Felix Braun - Life

Life

Braun was born in Vienna to a Jewish family. His mother died in 1888 during the birth of his sister, Käthe, who would also become a famous writer. In 1904, he enrolled in German studies, as well as art history, at the University of Vienna, and took his doctorate four years later. His literary publications began to appear in 1905 in the Neue Freie Presse, the Österreichische Rundschau, and in Die neue Rundschau. He was appointed arts editor of the Berliner National-Zeitung in 1910.

In 1912, Braun married Hedwig Freund, but the couple would divorce in 1915. While working as an editor at Verlag Georg Müller in Munich, he made the acquaintance of a number of important writers, among whom were Hans Carossa, Thomas Mann, and Rainer Maria Rilke. From 1928 to 1938, he was a Privatdozent in German literature at Palermo and Padua. He converted from Judaism to Catholicism in 1935. To escape persecution by the Nazis, who banned his work, he immigrated in 1939 to the United Kingdom and remained there until 1951, teaching literature and art history. After returning to Austria, Braun lectured at the Max Reinhardt Seminar and the University of Applied Arts Vienna. Braun died in 1973 and was honored with a burial in the Zentralfriedhof of Vienna. In 1977, a lane in Vienna was named after him.