Karen Blixen - Isak Dinesen home

Question 87: Source of "I am a storyteller?"

Q.  Where did Karen Blixen say "Moi, je suis une conteuse, rien qu'une conteuse"?

A.   The original quote was later translated into French.

As Donald Hannah points out in "Isak  Dinesen" and  Karen Blixen (p.60),  Karen Blixen spoke publicly about her literary persona in a Danish recording made by Lousiana Grammofonplader (LGLP 3002. MONO. 1977):

"I belong to an ancient, idle, wild and useless tribe, perhaps I am even one of the last members of it, who, for many thousands of years, in all countries and parts of the world, has, now and again, stayed for a time among the hard-working honest people in real life, and sometimes has thus been fortunate enough  to create another sort of reality for them, which in some way or another, has satisfied them. I am a storyteller."

Lynn R. Wilkinson gives another source in an essay, "Hannah Arendt on Karen Blixen."  The quote appeared in a telephone interview published in The New York Times Book Review on November 3, 1957. Karen Blixen said: "I am not a novelist, really not even a writer; I am a storyteller."

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