Felix Salten – Hungarian author, 1869-1945
Using the pseudonym Felix Salten, journalist Siegmund Salzmann wrote several anthropomorphic animal tales, including the novel Bambi: Eine Lebensgeschichte aus dem Walde, published in English as Bambi: A Life in the Woods in 1926. The author was born in Budapest, Hungary, but grew up in Vienna. He worked as a journalist and drama critic for many years before publishing his first book, Der Hund von Florenz (The hound of Florence) in 1923. The novel was later adapted for the 1959 Disney film The Shaggy Dog.
Disney’s animated version of Bambi (1942) is so well known, and inspired so many poor-quality print adaptations, that the original novel is sometimes overlooked by readers. But this story of life in the forest is written with integrity emotion, and great skill. As the seasons pass, Bambi evolves from a carefree fawn to a mature, solitary deer. The creatures of the forest converse in dialogue but always remain true to animal nature. In one of the most touching chapters, the author ascribes dialogue to a pair of dying autumn leaves. The novel contains beautifully descriptive scenes of nature but also realistically presents the bloodshed caused by hunters and wild animals. Salzmann wrote a sequel, published in English as Bambi’s Children (1939), and several other animal stories, including Fifteen Rabbits (1930) and Perri: The Youth of a Squirrel (1938), which was afe© adapted as a Disney film, Perri, in 1957,
After spending his life in Vienna, the author fled to Switzerland during World War II and died so exile, Bambi remains his best-known work, and it is a classic in the genre of animal stories.
P.D.S.
Source: Chidlren’s Books and their Creators, Anita Silvey.
Felix Salten’s Selected Works
- 1899 – Der Gemeine
- 1906 – Josephine Mutzenbacher, authorship assumed – in German: Josefine Mutzenbacher oder Die Geschichte einer Wienerischen Dirne von ihr selbst erzählt (Vienna: Privatdruck [Fritz Freund], 1906)
- 1907 – Herr Wenzel auf Rehberg und sein Knecht Kaspar Dinckel
- 1910 – Olga Frohgemuth
- 1911 – Der Wurstelprater
- 1922 – Das Burgtheater
- 1923 – Der Hund von Florenz; English translation by Huntley Paterson, illustrated by Kurt Wiese, The Hound of Florence (Simon & Schuster, 1930)
- 1923 – Bambi: Eine Lebensgeschichte aus dem Walde; English transl. Whittaker Chambers, illus. Kurt Wiese, foreword John Galsworthy, as Bambi, a Life in the Woods (US: Simon & Schuster, 1928; UK: Jonathan Cape, June/July 1928)
- 1925 – Neue Menschen auf alter Erde: Eine Palästinafahrt
- 1927 – Martin Overbeck: Der Roman eines reichen jungen Mannes
- 1929 – Fünfzehn Hasen: Schicksale in Wald und Feld; English transl. Whittaker Chambers, as Fifteen Rabbits (US: Simon & Schuster, 1930); revised and enlarged (New York : Grosset & Dunlap, 1942, illus. Kurt Wiese)
- 1931 – Freunde aus aller Welt: Roman eines zoologischen Gartens; English transl. Whittaker Chambers, illus. Kurt Wiese, as The City Jungle (US: Simon & Schuster, 1932)
- 1931 – Fünf Minuten Amerika
- 1933 – Florian: Das Pferd des Kaisers; transl. Erich Posselt and Michel Kraike, Florian, the Emperor’s Stallion (Bobbs-Merrill, 1934)
- 1938 – Perri; German, Die Jugend des Eichhörnchens Perri
- 1939 – Bambi’s Children, English translation (Bobbs-Merrill); German original, Bambis Kinder: Eine Familie im Walde (1940)
- 1940 – Renni the Rescuer
- 1942 – A Forest World
- 1945 – Djibi, the Kitten, illus. Walter Linsenmaier; U.S. transl., Jibby the Cat (Messner, 1948)
