Rahel Sanzara (also Sansara; pseudonym for Johanna Bleschke) (9 February 1894 – 8 February 1936) was a German

dancer Dance is a performing art form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoi ...

actress An actor or actress is a person who portrays a Character (arts), character in a performance. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. The analogous Greek ...

and

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire to ...

Biography

Johanna Bleschke was the oldest of a town musician's four children. After graduating from a school for 'higher daughters', she went into an apprenticeship as a

bookbinder Bookbinding is the process of physically assembling a book of codex format from an ordered stack of ''signatures'', sheets of paper folded together into sections that are bound, along one edge, with a thick needle and strong thread. Cheaper, b ...

Blankenburg Blankenburg may refer to: Places * Blankenburg am Harz, a German town in the district of Harz, Saxony-Anhalt * Blankenburg Castle (Harz), the castle in Blankenburg am Harz (see above) * Bad Blankenburg, a German town in the Saalfeld-Rudolstadt dis ...

. In 1913 she moved to Berlin, where she met physician and author

Ernst Weiss Dr Ernst Weiss (German language, German: Weiß, August 28, 1882 – June 15, 1940) was a German-speaking Austrian physician and author of Jewish descent. He is the author of '':de:Ich, der Augenzeuge, Ich'':de:Ich, der Augenzeuge, , d''er ...

. Their relationship lasted for more than twenty years, and she acted in productions of Weiss' dramas. After a short stint as a wartime nurse in 1914/15 she received an education as a dancer and launched a successful career. Since 1916 she also worked successfully as a film actress and received actress training from

Otto Falckenberg Otto Falckenberg (5 October 1873 in Koblenz25 December 1947 in Munich) was a German theatre director, manager and writer. In April 1901, he co-founded ''Die Elf Scharfrichter'', the first political ''kabarett'' (a form of cabaret which developed ...

in Munich, and found employment first in

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

, and from 1921 to 1924 at the

Landestheater Darmstadt The Staatstheater Darmstadt (Darmstadt State Theatre) is a theatre company and building in Darmstadt, Hesse, Germany, presenting opera, ballet, plays and concerts. It is funded by the state of Hesse and the city of Darmstadt. Its history began i ...

. Her first novel ''Das verlorene Kind (The Lost Child)'' was published in 1926 and caused great controversy for its subject matter, the

lust murder Lust murder, also called sexual homicide, is a homicide which occurs in tandem with either an overt sexual assault or sexually-symbolic behavior. ''Lust murder'' is associated with the paraphilic term erotophonophilia, which is sexual arousal or ...

of a four-year-old girl by an older boy. The book, based on a real 19th century crime case and drawing from both the genres of the

detective novel Detective fiction is a subgenre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator or a detective—whether professional, amateur or retired—investigates a crime, often murder. The detective genre began around the same time as s ...

and the

psychological drama Psychological drama or psychodrama is a sub-genre of drama that places emphasis on psychological elements. It often overlaps with other genres such as crime, fantasy, black comedy, and science fiction, and it is closely related with the psychologi ...

received rave reviews. It quickly saw several editions and was translated into eleven languages. It is still in print and continues to sell well today. Rahel Sanzara was to be awarded the respected

Kleist-Preis The Kleist Prize is an annual German literature prize. The prize was first awarded in 1912, on the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of the death of Heinrich von Kleist. The Kleist Prize was the most important literary award of the Weimar Repu ...

in 1926, but she turned it down. Her subsequent novels couldn't repeat her debut's success. In 1927, Rahel Sanzara married the Jewish stock broker Walter Davidsohn, who emigrated to France to escape persecution from the

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

, while she remained in Berlin, already weakened by

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

. She died in 1936 after a long illness.

Literary works

* ''Das verlorene Kind (The lost child)'' (Novel 1926) , LCCN 29022338. * ''Die glückliche Hand'' (in: ''

Vossische Zeitung The (''Voss's Newspaper'') was a nationally-known Berlin newspaper that represented the interests of the liberal middle class. It was also generally regarded as Germany's national newspaper of record. In the Berlin press it held a special role d ...

'' March 1933; Novel, Zürich 1936) * ''Hochzeit der Armen'' (Novel, unpublished and lost)

Filmography

* ''Der Fall Routt...!'' (1917)

Secondary literature

* Orendi-Hinze, Diana. ''Rahel Sanzara. Eine Biographie'' (= ''Fischer'' 2258). Fischer Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1981, . * Weidermann, Volker. ''Das Buch der verbrannten Bücher.'' Verlag Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Köln 2008, (Sanzara covered on pages 96–98). * Hutton, Marcelline J. ''Russian and West European Women, 1860-1939: Dreams, Struggles, and Nightmares.'' Oxford: Rowman and Littlefield, 2001. 169-170.

External links

Guide to the Rahel Sanzara Collection
at the

Leo Baeck Institute The Leo Baeck Institute, established in 1955, is an international research institute with centres in New York City, London, and Jerusalem that are devoted to the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry. Baeck was its first intern ...

, New York. {{DEFAULTSORT:Sanzara, Rahel 1894 births 1936 deaths Actors from Jena People from Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach 20th-century German novelists German women novelists Writers from Jena 20th-century German actresses German female dancers German film actresses 20th-century German women writers