Maria Friederike Cornelia "Frida" Strindberg (née Uhl; 4 April 1872 – 28 June 1943) was an Austrian

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, p ...

and translator, who was closely associated with many important figures in 20th-century literature.

Biography

Uhl was the daughter of Friedrich Uhl, editor of the ''

Wiener Zeitung ''Wiener Zeitung'' is an Austrian newspaper. It is one of the oldest, still published newspapers in the world. It is the official publication used by the Government of the Republic of Austria for legally-required announcements, such as company r ...

'', and Maria Uhl (née Rieschl), a Catholic. She met

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in early 1893, when she was only 20; they soon married and she at once tried to organize a production of his work in England, and took his financial affairs in hand. They had a daughter, Kerstin. Strindberg did not approve of the active role Frida was taking in his business affairs, and the marriage ended in divorce in 1895. Frank Wedekind was the father of Frida's second child Friedrich. She sent her children to be cared for by her parents. With a later lover, the poet

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, she started the first German cabaret in 1900. She was closely involved with several writers of the

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movement, such as the poet

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for whom she organized a subscription, and the journalist Karl Kraus, whom she convinced to sponsor a reading of Wedekind's ''

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.'' Her affair with the writer Werner von Oesteren was particularly stormy. She threatened him on two separate occasions with a revolver. Details of this relationship were made public in 1905 when she sued him for harassing a detective she had hired to follow him. In 1908 she fired a gun in a Viennese hotel on New Year's Day. It is unclear whether this was a suicide attempt; she had recently written a number of suicide notes. The event caused a great scandal as Prince Fugger-Babenhausen was a guest at the party.Martinus, p. 186. She fled to London. On 26 June 1912, she opened The Cave of the Golden Calf, a nightclub decorated by

Wyndham Lewis Percy Wyndham Lewis (18 November 1882 – 7 March 1957) was a British writer, painter and critic. He was a co-founder of the Vorticist movement in art and edited ''BLAST,'' the literary magazine of the Vorticists. His novels include ''Tarr'' ( ...

Charles Ginner Charles Isaac Ginner (4 March 1878 – 6 January 1952) was a British painter of landscape and urban subjects. Born in the south of France at Cannes, of British parents, in 1910 he settled in London, where he was an associate of Spencer Gore a ...

, and Spencer Gore. Ezra Pound complimented her on her acumen. Other frequent guests of the establishment included

Katherine Mansfield Kathleen Mansfield Murry (née Beauchamp; 14 October 1888 – 9 January 1923) was a New Zealand writer, essayist and journalist, widely considered one of the most influential and important authors of the modernist movement. Her works are celebra ...

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, and

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. In 1914, she left for the United States, where she quickly secured a job with Fox Film. In 1937, she published the memoir '' Marriage with Genius''. She spent her last years in her family's summer residence at Mondsee and died there at the age of 71 in 1943.

References

* Monica Strauss, ''Cruel Banquet: The Life and Loves of Frida Strindberg,'' Harcourt, New York, 2000 * Eivor Martinus, ''Strindberg and Love'' Amber Lane Press, 2001.

Footnotes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Uhl, Frida 1872 births 1943 deaths Austrian women writers Young Vienna Strindberg family