Karen Blixen - Isak Dinesen home

The literature concerning Karen Blixen / Isak Dinesen contains mistakes that reappear perennially. These mistakes are often the result of a writer's or editor's use of information from an inaccurate (secondary) source.

Below are mistakes, or misconceptions, (in red) and corrections. We hope you will send us other mistakes not listed.
 

1.) The following quotations were not written by Karen Blixen/Isak Dinesen:
 
(a.) "When God wants to punish you, he answers your prayers."

(b.) "The earth was made round so that one cannot see too far down the road."

These quotations come from the film Out of Africa, screenplay by Kurt Luedtke.

2.) Karen Blixen has been referred to by some authors as "anorexic."
 
Karen Blixen did not suffer from anorexia nervosa--an eating disorder found in women between the ages of adolescence and forty years of age.

Karen Blixen's weight was normal throughout her life until she underwent surgery at the age of 70. At that time a stomach ulcer was surgically excised, taking with it one-third of her stomach. Afterwards she was unable to eat normal quantities of food. Her health deteriorated rapidly toward a state of emaciation, from which she eventually died at the age of 77.

3.) A respected literary journal published the following:
 
"Isak Dinesen was born Karen Dinesen in 1885 in Rungstedlund, Denmark."

Karen Dinesen was born at Rungstedlund, the Dinesen family estate, near the town of Rungsted, Denmark.

"and spent her early years in the fashionable world of Copenhagen's upper class."

She spent her early years in the bourgeois environment of her family's rural estate. Her widowed mother had few social contacts and was "not very sociable" according to Karen Blixen's brother Thomas. Her mother's extended family was middle class, and she saw her father's aristocratic relatives only occasionally.

After their marriage in 1914 Bror and Karen Blixen "moved onto a large plantation near Nairobi."

By colonial standards their 700 acres was small. In 1917 the family corporation expanded the farm to 6000 acres--still modest compared to the 100,000-acre ranches owned by wealthier settlers.

Karen and Bror "were separated after only a few years and divorced in 1921."

They were separated after seven years and divorced in 1925.

"When the coffee market collapsed in 1931, she was forced to leave Africa."

She was forced to leave Africa because of seventeen years without a profit from the farm --the result of unpredictable climate.

"Out of Africa, a novel about her years in Kenya, was published in 1937."

Out of Africa is a memoir (an idealized true story), not a novel.

"Her ill health in those years has been attributed to a venereal disease which was never properly treated."

Her symptoms were treated with the best methods known--first by intravenous arsenic, later by fever (high temperature bath) treatments, and finally by surgical intervention--even though medical tests found no recurrence of syphilis after the first episode.

4.) At least two Danish friends of Karen Blixen have published books referring to Denys Finch Hatton as a "World War I army pilot."
 
Denys Finch Hatton did not learn to fly an airplane until 1929, eleven years after World War I ended. (He had intended to go through flight training during the war, but he injured his foot shortly before the armistice and was unable to take flying lessons.)


5.) Biographies have published the following mistakes, and imitators have repeated the mistakes:
 
"When the Crimean War started" Wilhelm Dinesen went to Turkey, "hoping to fight against the Russians."

Wilhelm Dinesen was ten years old at the time of the Crimean War (1853-1856). He went to Turkey during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878.

In 1926 Karen Blixen believed she was pregnant and sent Denys Finch Hatton a cable referring to her baby by the codeword "Daniel." Denys is said to have cabled back from London: "'Strongly urge you cancel Daniel's visit.'" (The reference listed for this comment is: "Telegram from Denys Finch Hatton to Karen Blixen, May 21, 1926.")

The above telegram is not found in Karen Blixen's papers--or in any primary sources. The original quote may have resulted from author speculation--later misinterpreted as fact by a copy editor.

The actual text of Denys Finch Hatton's cable to Karen Blixen on May 21, 1926, is: "Reference your cable and my reply please do as you like about Daniel as I should welcome him if I could offer partnership but this is impossible STOP You will I know consider your mother's views Denys."

"Karen Blixen sold her farm to Remy Martin...."

The correct spelling is Remi Martin--a Nairobi businessman. There is no connection to the famous liquor.

Karen Blixen is said to have had syphilis throughout her life. She returned from Africa to Denmark with dysentery, which has been attributed to syphilis. It is said that she was beyond hope of recovery by any medical intervention.

Although syphilis, "The Great Imitator," can produce symptoms that resemble other diseases, the opposite is also true. Karen Blixen's doctors diagnosed her diarrhea as amebic dysentery, a disease common in Africa, and there is no reason to disagree with their medical tests. Despite a persisting legend to the contrary, examinations of Karen Blixen's blood and tissues over many years showed no recurrence of syphilis after the first episode.
 

6.) The opera Vanessa, by Samuel Barber, libretto by Gian Carlo Menotti, is not based on a story from Isak Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales, despite the claims of several media sources. Paris's Le Monde attributes inspiration for the story to "un peu Tchekhov et un peu Ibsen" [a little of Chekhov and a little of Ibsen]. The story is not found in any of Isak Dinesen's works.

7.) An article about Copenhagen circulated online makes a silly mistake. Karen Blixen used the pen name Isak Dinesen,  not the reverse as claimed by the author of the article.

8.) The following quote was not written by Isak Dinesen, as some sources claim, but by Saba Douglas-Hamilton:
"At night, the dew settles the dust, so that tracking in the morning is like reading a newspaper of footprints. The drama of the night unfolds before your eyes, if you can read the signs in the sand."

9.) Contrary to the claims of one online encyclopedia, one large American newspaper, several online travel agencies, and a host of blogs, Karen Blixen was Danish, not "Dutch."
 
Copyright © 2005 by Linda Donelson. All rights reserved.

Comments or questions: Write to  GraceJames at karenblixen.com.

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