Handel-Mazzetti, Enrica von (1871–1955)

Austrian novelist who wrote many novels reflecting the religious struggles that convulsed Central Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries. Name variations: Baroness Enrika von Handel-Mazzetti; (pseudonym) Marien Kind. Born Enrica Ludovica Maria Freiin von Handel-Mazzetti in Vienna, Austria, on January 10, 1871; died in Linz, Austria, on April 8, 1955; daughter of Heinrich von Handel-Mazzetti and Irene Cshergö de Nemes-Tacskánd von Handel-Mazzetti; never married.

In 1871, Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti was born into an aristocratic Viennese family that exemplified the multinational nature of the Habsburg imperial state of Austria-Hungary. Her maternal grandmother was a Dutch Protestant, whereas her maternal grandfather was a Hungarian state official and adherent of the liberal ideals of Emperor Joseph II. On her paternal side, her grandmother was the offspring of Italian civil servants, while her grandfather had a distinguished military career that culminated in his becoming a member of the Austrian army's general staff. Enrica's father, a captain in the Austrian army, died when she was an infant. Enrica attended the finishing school of the English Sisters in St. Pölten, Lower Austria, an institution which had a profound impact on her. This convent school kept alive a religious neobaroque tradition of celebrating festive events with theatrical performances. The power of this tradition can be seen in the fact that other alumnae of the English Sisters school, including Paula von Preradovic, Paula Grogger , and Maria Veronika Rubatscher , all became distinguished literary figures. The convention, first experienced by Handel-Mazzetti in St. Pölten, would be a major influence on her intellectual and literary development. After graduation, she returned to Vienna to live with her mother, moving to Steyr after her mother's death, and then finally to Linz, where she would spend the rest of her life.

By 1890, Enrica was publishing short stories in, among other journals, Vienna's semi-official newspaper, the Wiener Zeitung. During this early phase of her career, she also wrote plays. In 1897, she made her debut as an author of novels by allowing Meinrad Helmpergers denwürdiges Jahr (Meinrad Helmperger's Memorable Year) to appear in installments in a periodical (it was published in book format in 1900). Set in the 17th century and based on fact, this novel tells the story of a Protestant boy, the son of English refugee parents, who must first witness the torture and execution of his father (who had been accused of the crime of atheism) before he is received into the Roman Catholic faith at Kremsmünster abbey. Encouraged by the positive response of critics and readers alike, Handel-Mazzetti was emboldened to write more large-scale works. She was encouraged by Professor Robert Zimmermann of the University of Vienna, who gave her valuable ideas on how to achieve verisimilitude in a literary work through the study of contemporary archival documents.

Jesse und Maria (1906), which many critics consider to be Handel-Mazzetti's best novel, was based on her research into the parish church of Krummnussbaum, a small hamlet in the Pöchlarn region of Austria. Set in the years 1658–59, the plot centers around the historical confrontation between the Protestant noble Jesse von Velderndorff and Maria Schinnagel, the Catholic wife of the forester to the local bishop. The story ends tragically, but not before the author has explored the complex psychological and historical processes of the Catholic Counter-Reformation of the 16th century as it affected individual lives. Carl Muth, editor of the respected Catholic periodical Hochland, praised Jesse und Maria as a harbinger of more sophisticated Catholic literature that could compete on equal terms with the great tradition of German letters. Muth announced to his Hochland readers that the young Austrian novelist's psychological insights matched those of another rising literary star, Thomas Mann. Mann himself praised her work, as did two past masters

of Austrian letters, Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach and Peter Rosegger.

Encouraged by positive reviews and strong sales of her first books, Handel-Mazzetti would write a large number of novels over the next half-century. All are based on the lives of saints, including the virgin martyrs of the early centuries of the Catholic Church. The substructure of all of her major books were the Stations of the Cross, and it is more than likely that her inspiration for this technique was the immensely popular 1854 British work by Cardinal Wiseman, Fabiola , or the Church of the Catacombs. The basic action is then set into neobaroque Austrian settings in which invariably a self-sacrificing heroine is able to convert an errant man to the path of goodness by means of her virtuous steadfastness. As part of her literary formula, Handel-Mazzetti customarily included detailed scenes of the execution of her heroes. The inspiration for these gory episodes, she freely admitted, came not only from the Passion of Christ but also from personal memories of her religious instructors' vivid stories of stigmatization and the countless paintings and prints of the sufferings of Christian martyrs over the centuries.

In two novels published between 1909 and 1914, Die arme Margaret (Poor Margaret) and Stephana Schwertner, Handel-Mazzetti depicted the tragic nature of religious conflicts in 17th-century Austria, when human frailty and the desire to impose religious orthodoxy inevitably clashed. In both novels, young men attempt to rape women of the opposing religious faith, and pay for their transgressions with their lives. The strength of the author's prose rises above the melodramatic aspects of the stories, creating an epic canvas in which both human flaws and strengths are depicted in meticulous detail. Despite her own deep Catholic faith, Handel-Mazzetti was careful to avoid the trap of creating stereotypes on either side of the religious divide of the 17th century. While celebrating the revival of the Catholic spirit in Austria, she did not succumb to a mindless triumphalism.

Like virtually all Austrian intellectuals, Enrica Handel-Mazzetti rallied to the national cause when World War I began in the summer of 1914. Already famous, she became even more popular while serving as vice-president of the Austrian Red Cross. Wealthy from the sales of her books, she was generous in dispensing gifts to various charities. During part of the war, she worked as a nurse's aide in hospitals, experiences that inspired her to write the 1917 short story, "Ilko Smutniak, der Ulan" ("Ilko Smutniak, the Lancer"). The military defeat and political collapse of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy was a severe blow to conservatives like Enrica Handel-Mazzetti. Not only a political and social regime, but a complex multinational, indeed supranational, Habsburg way of life was swept away, leaving behind little more than chaos and confusion. The loss is mirrored in Handel-Mazzetti's post-1918 writings, many of which are distinctly weaker than her earlier works. Her 1920 novel Der deutsche Held (The German Hero), set in the period of the Napoleonic Wars, is an unsuccessful attempt to create a modern version of Heinrich von Kleist's classic work The Prince of Homburg. Critical judgment of her final trilogy—Das Rosenwunder (The Miracle of the Roses, 1924–26), Frau Maria (1929–31), and Graf Reichard (Count Reichard, 1939–49)—is also essentially negative, the consensus being that these works are wordy, superficial and unconvincing.

Although Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti's literary skills appeared to have entered a period of decline after 1918, there is one exception. In her 1934 novel Die Waxenbergerin (The Woman of Waxenberg), the author appears to once again have found her true voice, strong, eloquent and vibrant in its celebration of religious faith and human strength. Set in the year 1683, when Austria and indeed all of Central Europe was threatened by the military might of the Ottoman Empire, the story centers around the exploits of the indomitable Aloysia Silbereissin, an apothecary's daughter. Aloysia saves lives by nursing wounded soldiers, organizing the rationing of scarce food supplies, and generally helping to keep her community from disintegration. At the same time, she makes preparations to begin the next phase of her life as an Ursuline nun. The novel received critical praise because of its clear focus on everyday details of life in the 17th century, as well as on its accurate and sympathetic use of the dialect spoken by ordinary folk in the district of Waxenberg and the Mühlviertel.

As a conservative Roman Catholic author and representative intellectual figure of the old Habsburg order, Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti was persona non grata in Nazi-occupied Austria. None of her works could appear in print after 1941, and when World War II ended in 1945 and Austria was liberated from seven years of dictatorial rule, she appeared to many of the younger generation to be a ghost from a vanished past. A new generation of readers now found her works to be old-fashioned and irrelevant. When she died in Linz on April 8, 1955, Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti was largely forgotten. In the 1980s, however, her novels began to be rediscovered by scholars and readers alike, and her strengths as an author were being savored once more by a growing number for whom a good story well told was sufficient reason to open a book. Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti was honored by Austria on January 11, 1971, when a commemorative postage stamp was issued on the occasion of the centenary of her birth.

sources:

Bourgeois, Joseph Earl. "Ecclesiastical Characters in the Novels of Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti." Ph. D. dissertation, University of Cincinnati, 1956.

Doppler, Bernhard. Katholische Literatur und Literaturpolitik: Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti, eine Fallstudie. Königstein im Taunus: Verlag Hain, 1980.

"Enrica Freiin von Handel-Mazzetti," in Der Österreicher. Vol. 6, no. 1. January 24, 1931, p. 5.

Freylinger, Maria J. Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti: Biographie und Werke.

Grenzmann, Wilhelm. "Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti," in Frederick Ungar, ed., Handbook of Austrian Literature. NY: Frederick Ungar, 1973, pp. 108–110.

Handel-Mazzetti, Enrica von. Jesse and Maria. Translated by George N. Shuster. NY: Henry Holt, 1931.

Hemmen, Alcuin Ambrose. "The Concept of Religious Tolerance in the Novels of Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti." Ph. D. dissertation, University of Michigan, 1945.

Kern, Elga, ed. Führende Frauen Europas: Neue Folge, in fünfundzwanzig Selbstschilderungen. Munich: Ernst Reinhardt Verlag, 1930.

Schmidt, Josef. "Enrica von Handel-Mazzetti (1871–1955)," in Donald G. Daviau, ed., Major Figures of Austrian Literature: The Interwar Years 1918–1938. Riverside, CA: Ariadne Press, 1995, pp. 107–128.

John Haag , Associate Professor, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia