MEMORY OF THE WORLD REGISTER
The Karen Blixen archives
(Denmark)
Ref N° 2010-59
PART A – ESSENTIAL INFORMATION
1
SUMMARY
This nomination is the result of a co-operation between The Royal Library, Copenhagen and
the Rungstedlund Foundation, including the Karen Blixen Museum at Rungstedlund.
The voluminous Karen Blixen archives were acquired by The Royal Library in 1976. The
collection of documents encompasses private letters, diaries, manuscripts, drawings and
sketches. The archives provide a unique insight into the life and work of one of the most
outstanding and original European writers of fiction in the 20th century. And the archives
have been and will in the future be of indispensable importance for books and articles on the
style and themes of her books and their biographical background. The archives are of
fundamental importance to a new critical edition of her literary oeuvre currently in
production by the Danish Society of Language and Literature.
The works of Karen Blixen are not only of European, but of worldwide importance. Her book
Out of Africa gives a unique insight into the thought-provoking encounter between African
and European culture. The screen version of the book renewed the international interest in
her works. Her works, including her published letters, have been translated into close to 35
languages. In the 1950s she was nominated several times for the Nobel Prize in literature,
and in 1959 by the majority of the Nobel Prize Committee. Today we know from the Nobel
Archives that she was rejected only because 3 other Nordic novelists had received the prize in
the previous 15 years, and the Nobel Committee found this to be a disproportionate
representation of the Nordic countries.
2
DETAILS OF THE NOMINATOR
2.1
Name (person or organisation)
Erland Kolding Nielsen, the Royal Library, Copenhagen
2.2
Relationship to the documentary heritage nominated
The nominator is Director General of the Royal Library and National Librarian
2.3
Contact person (s)
Bruno Svindborg, research librarian, mag.art., Manuscript Department, The Royal Library.
Marianne W. Asmussen, mag. art., literary executor of the Rungstedlund Foundation, former
director of the Karen Blixen Museum at Rungstedlund, Northern Zealand.
2.4
Contact details (include address, phone, fax, email)
Bruno Svindborg
Manuscript Department, The Royal Library
P.O. 2149
DK-1016 Copenhagen K
bs@kb.dk
Tel: +45 3347 4415
3
IDENTITY AND DESCRIPTION OF THE DOCUMENTARY HERITAGE
3.1
Name and identification details of the items being nominated
‘The Karen Blixen archives’ refers to the papers left by Karen Blixen at her death in 1962 and
acquired by The Royal Library in 1976.
3.2
Description
See attachment A.
4
JUSTIFICATION FOR INCLUSION/ ASSESSMENT AGAINST CRITERIA
4.1
Is authenticity established? (see 4.2.3)
The authenticity of the archival material is established by the fact that Karen Blixen herself
produced, received and collected the documents during her lifetime.
Rungstedlund was Karen Blixen’s (1885-1962) home all of her life. Even in the years 19141931, when she also had a home in what is now Kenya, she spent roughly a third of the period
in Denmark. Karen Blixen herself collected all the archival material at Rungstedlund, from
where it was sold to the Royal Library in 1976.
4.2
Is world significance, uniqueness and irreplaceability established? (see 4.2.4)
The world significance is found in the fact that the documents reflect the life and work of one
of the most famous writers of fiction in the 20th century. The original letters, manuscripts and
drawings cannot be replaced.
Karen Blixen published her first book, Seven Gothic Tales, in 1934 (Syv fantastiske
Fortællinger, 1935). She wrote both the English and the Danish versions herself. The English
edition, her debut, was, prior to publication, chosen as the Book-of-the-Month, a remarkable
debut. Her second book, Out of Africa, 1937 (Den afrikanske Farm, 1937) received the same
reception in America. When the latter book formed the basis in 1985 for Universal Film’s
production Out of Africa, which received seven Oscar nominations, Karen Blixen’s works
became known throughout the world. She has been translated into close to 35 languages and
was in the 1950s (last in 1959) nominated several times for the Nobel Prize in literature.
The Karen Blixen archive is unique in that it represents all genres:
1. manuscripts, typed or handwritten, in both Danish and English
2. sketch books from her youth which contain rough drafts for stories accompanied by
drawings, for example of characters from the French Revolution
3. radio talks
4. letters both to and from Karen Blixen, especially a copious correspondence with her
family during the years in Africa. Her correspondence after her return to Denmark
with her family, authors, publishers and friends bears witness to a large and
interesting set of contacts
5. guest books, diary entries, for example from a four month stay in Paris in her youth in
1910
6. accounts from running the coffee plantation in Africa
7. passports and other personal papers
8. drawings from the period spent in the preparatory class at the Art Academy in
Copenhagen
The archive provides unique insight both into her life and works, as well as the creative
process behind the individual works. Karen Blixen is one of very few authors who wrote with
the same literary quality in two languages. The archive contains, for example, her own
bilingual manuscript for Out of Africa.
4.3
Is one or more of the criteria of (a) time (b) place (c) people (d) subject and theme (e)
form and style (f) social, spiritual and community significance satisfied? (see 4.2.5)
(b) The documents describe, among other things, Karen Blixen’s stay in Kenya as a coffee
farmer.
(c) The correspondence in the archives with Karen Blixen’s family, friends, and colleagues
gives a vivid representation of the personal and cultural background of Karen Blixen’s life
and her career as a writer.
(d) Karen Blixen was born at Rungstedlund, north of Copenhagen in 1885. She grew up in a
family of five, where she was the middle of three sisters and had two younger brothers.
Wilhelm Dinesen, her father, was from a landowning and military family, and her mother,
Ingeborg Dinesen, born Westenholz, came from a merchant family. Shortly before her tenth
birthday, her father committed suicide, and this loss left lasting marks on the young girl.
Karen was perhaps the child closest to her father and she later discovered in herself his
longing for wide open spaces, need for independence, literary propensities and depressive
tendencies. Throughout her life she struggled to find her own place between the bourgeois
moderation of her mother’s family and her father’s love of adventure.
She was educated at home, as were girls in good families at that time. Her mother and her
maiden aunt, Mary Bess Westenholz, were two strong women, who put their stamp on the
children. Education was the acquisition of cultural background in literature, music and
history. The intention was to make the three daughters suitable marriage partners, while the
two boys were allowed to go to school. Karen Blixen did have drawing lessons outside her
home and was in 1903 admitted to the preparatory class for women at the Art Academy in
Copenhagen. The years of her youth were characterized by restlessness and idleness, trips to
Paris in 1910 and to Italy in 1912, and social life at the manor houses of family and friends.
Her engagement to her second cousin Bror von Blixen-Finecke in 1913 and marriage to him
on arrival in Mombasa in January, 1914, was the decisive turning point in her life. For 17
years in Africa she strove, though in vain, to create a life as a coffee farmer. First, together
with her spouse, and then, after their divorce, (proceedings were started in 1920 and finalized
in 1925), she attempted to run the plantation on her own. The coffee plantation remained a
failure, but her encounter with the native people and their land created an author of unique
power and originality.
Loss, first represented by the loss of her father, became a common motif in her life. Later her
marriage failed and her close friend Denys Finch Hatton died in a plane crash a few months
before she was forced to accept that she had lost both the plantation and her identity as a
farmer.
At the age of 47, Karen Blixen had no other choice but to move back to her childhood home.
Without any education, no professional identity and no financial resources for an independent
life, she moved in with her mother at Rungstedlund. The literary attempts of her youth, a few
of which had been published, and the tales she had started on in her last years in Africa
determined her fate: to become an author. She chose to dramatize her new identity by making
a pact with the devil that from that time on, she would transform everything that happened to
her into stories. But her works are in no sense autobiographical.
Seven Gothic Tales (Syv fantastiske Fortællinger) was published first in English in 1934 in
the United States and England and in Denmark the next year. Prior to publication in New
York, the book was selected as the Book-of-the-Month, a remarkable international debut.
In 1938 The New York Times Book Review referred to Blixen as ”The Danish master of
English prose”. Later she wrote all her books both in Danish and English. The tales all take
place in the 1800s, and Blixen created her very own interpretation of the short story genre.
The gothic tales, in their literary form, are, all at once old-fashioned, completely
contemporary and even ahead of their time. They were a far cry from the realism and culture
wars of that time, and in Denmark she was viewed as a poorly adjusted eccentric.
Out of Africa (Den afrikanske Farm): Only after her successful debut did Blixen dare to make
use of her impressions from the 17 years in Africa. The book, which was published
simultaneously in Danish and English in 1937, has more the character of a beautiful myth
about a lost paradise than a actual memoir. It has since been published in many languages,
and after the Oscar-winning film version in 1985 with Meryl Streep and Robert Redford in the
starring roles, it was re-printed in many languages in large editions.
Winter’s Tales (Vinter-Eventyr) is Blixen’s third book. It appeared under difficult conditions
during the Second World War in 1942 in both Danish and English. It is a collection of stories
which, in contrast to Seven Gothic Tales (Syv fantastiske Fortællinger), are placed in
Denmark. The eleven tales all revolve around the theme of fate, and the language is less
exotic and extravagant than in her debut book.
The Angelic Avengers (Gengældelsens Veje) appeared under the pseudonym Pierre Andrézel
in 1944. It was a thriller, which Blixen herself viewed as a lighter genre, and not until 1956
did she acknowledge the book as hers. Blixen wrote, as did her father, under various
pseudonyms, first as Isak Dinesen, which was her identity at her English debut. In her works
she also plays with the many identities of her characters.
Last Tales (Sidste Fortællinger) appeared in 1957. Illness had forced her to take a break, but
this was not her last book, since the very next year she published
Anecdotes of Destiny (Skæbne-Anekdoter) a collection of tales that Blixen had published in
the Ladies’ Home Journal and other magazines in the 1950s. One of these was Babette’s
Feast (Babettes Gæstebud) and the film version, which won an Oscar, again brought Blixen
new readers.
Shadows on the Grass (Skygger på Græsset), the last, and seventh, book that appeared in
Blixen’s lifetime, is a fine short book of four essays with themes from Africa. She remembers
reflectively and lovingly ”her” country and ”her” native friends – and her works come full
circle with this book.
Completed manuscripts for a few tales were found at Rungstedlund after her death, and these
were published posthumously, as was the large collection of letters from her years in Africa
and her time in Denmark. The editions of the letters provide a valuable picture of a great
artist. When the French edition of the letters from Denmark appeared, Le Figaro Littéraire
spoke of her as one of the twenty best European letter writers of the twentieth century.
No other Danish author’s literary works in the twentieth century have attracted so much
international attention, and they continue to do so. She is read in many different cultures, and
her work is still the object of new books and studies. Theatrical productions and films about
her life and of the tales continue to be made. In 2010 it came out that the Nobel Prize
committee had recommended her in 1959 for the Nobel Prize in literature, but the Swedish
Academy highly unusually chose to ignore the recommendation. The committee’s attention in
particular was concentrated on Out of Africa (Den afrikanske Farm). This book is still
viewed as one of the books that best depicts, in talented literary form, the meeting of two
cultures with dignity and equality. Despite its origins in the seventeen years in Africa, it is not
particularly biographical, and thus has universal validity as an existential document, which
appeals at all times to people in all cultures.
Karen Blixen may well be the only author whose two homes have both been set up as
museums. Her African plantation was opened as a museum in 1985 and has about 80,000
visitors a year, whereas Blixen’s Danish house, The Karen Blixen Museum, which opened in
1991, has a slightly lower number of annual visitors. It was in the tension between the
Danish and African homes that this unique body of works was created. Rare also is the case
that a whole body of literary works has been written in the same physical framework, which
was as well the childhood home of the author. The museums contribute in each their culture
to the broad dissemination of a universal body of works.
Towards the end of her life Karen Blixen set up a foundation, Rungstedlundfonden, to which
she left her house, its large park and the rights to her works. In the charter of the foundation,
she determined that the park should be preserved and maintained as a bird sanctuary and the
successful result is a rich and varied bird life. A desire to protect nature and ecology was also
characteristic of Karen Blixen’s way of thinking.
She was born at Rungstedlund on April 17, 1885 and died the same place September 17, 1962
at the age of 77. And it was here that she wrote her seven books. The archive, which contains
such rich and various materials that illuminate these works of international significance, was
also collected and kept together at this place, until transferred to the Royal Library in 1969.
4.4
Are there issues of rarity, integrity, threat and management that relate to this
nomination? (see 4.2.6)
Attach a separate statement if space insufficient.
Rarity: An archive containing many original documents that describe in detail the life and
work of one of the 20th century’s best known writers is unique.
Integrity: The papers represent what Karen Blixen left at her home at her death.
Threat: The archive material is handled, stored and divided up in accordance with physical
and safety related requirements.
Management plan: Due to an arrangement between The Royal Library, Copenhagen and the
Rungstedlund Foundation central parts of the collection will be digitized in the near future
and this work will take place at the Royal Library. The digitized documents will be published
on the web, and this measure will ensure that over time parts of the archives will become
more accessible to researchers and other interested parties.
5
LEGAL INFORMATION
5.1.
Owner of the documentary heritage (name and contact details)
The Karen Blixen Archives have been in the possession of the Royal Library since 1976 when
they were bought from the Rungstedlund Foundation
5.2
Custodian of the documentary heritage (name and contact details, if different to
owner)
Same as 5.1.
5.3
Legal status:
(a) Category of ownership
Full ownership by the Royal Library.
(b) Accessibility
With prior permission from the Rungstedlund Foundation (until the year 2032) the
Karen Blixen Archives are accessible to scholars and other interested persons in the
Manuscript Department’s high-security reading room upon written request. Parts of the
archives have been, and will, be accessible to the general public in several exhibitions.
(c) Copyright status
Copyright owned until the year 2032 by the Rungstedlund Foundation.
(d) Responsible administration
Department of Manuscripts, The Royal Library, Copenhagen.
(e) Other factors
6
MANAGEMENT PLAN
6.1
Is there a management plan in existence for this documentary heritage? YES/NO
Yes. See 4.4. The documents are in general in good physical condition. Some preservation
work on selected parts of the archives has been undertaken by the staff of the Preservation
Department of the Royal Library. A regular analysis of the archives will be made by
specialists from this department.
7
CONSULTATION
7.1
Provide details of consultation about this nomination with (a) the owner of the heritage
(b) the custodian (c) your national or regional Memory of the World committee
(a) The nominator and the owner are identical.
(b) The nominator has appointed the custodian.
(c) The nominator is currently president of the Danish Memory of the World Committee.
PART B – SUBSIDIARY INFORMATION
8
ASSESSMENT OF RISK
8.1
Detail the nature and scope of threats to this documentary heritage (see 5.5)
Although the material is stored in accordance with physical and safety related requirements,
there will always be a risk when handling the unique and sometimes fragile original
documents when used in the reading room. This is one of the main reasons for digitizing
central parts of the archives.
9
ASSESSMENT OF PRESERVATION
9.1
Detail the preservation context of the documentary heritage (see 3.3)
The Karen Blixen archives are kept in the security storage of the Royal Library, Copenhagen.
PART C - LODGEMENT
This nomination is lodged by:
(Please print name)… Erland Kolding Nielsen, Director General, the Royal Library,
Copenhagen.
(Signature)………………………………… (Date)………………………………………