Life
Elsa Bernstein was born in Vienna, a daughter of Heinrich Porges (himself the friend of Richard Wagner), and married Max Bernstein. She was educated at Munich; and, for a short time, on the stage. An affliction of the eyes forced her to retire, and she thenceforth devoted herself to dramatic literature. Shortly after her marriage in 1892 to Max Bernstein, she wrote her first play, "Wir Drei," which created considerable discussion. It was really a dramatized version of the matrimonial and sexual views of Taine and Zola. Her next plays fell rather flat: "Dämmerung" (1893); "Die Mutter Maria," 1894; "Tedeum" (1896); "Themistokles" (1897); and Daguy Peters. But unbounded admiration was elicited by Die Königskinder (1895) — a dramatic fairy-tale. Though its plot was simple, the beauty of the theme and its poetry were such as to class it with Ludwig Fulda's Der Talisman." She died, aged 82, in Hamburg-Eimsbüttel.
Read more about this topic: Elsa Bernstein
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“Newspapermen are either drunkards or idealists, Miss Rutledge. I’m afraid I’m both. But however soiled his hands, the journalist goes staggering through life with a beacon raised.”
—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)
“On the grey rock of Cashel I suddenly saw
A Sphinx with woman breast and lion paw,
A Buddha, hand at rest,
Hand lifted up that blest;
And right between these two a girl at play
That, it may be, had danced her life away....”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“Our life is not so much threatened as our perception. Ghostlike we glide through nature, and should not know our place again.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)