Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
- This article is a Biography
Leopold Ritter von Sacher-Masoch (January 27, 1836 † March 9, 1895), writer and journalist, was born in Lemberg, Austrian Empire (now Lviv, Ukraine). Today, he is best known for his name being the basis for the term masochism.
He was the son of an Austrian police director in Lemberg and Charlotte von Masoch, a Ukrainian lady of noble birth. He started learning German at age 12.
During his life, Sacher-Masoch was well-known as a man of letters, who was seen by some as a potential successor to Goethe. He was a utopian thinker who espoused socialist and humanist ideals in his fiction and non-fiction. He associated with the artistic elite of Mitteleuropa, but was frequently in debt.
He planned to write a series of six novels under the collective title The Heritage of Cain: only the first two were ever completed, of which Venus in Furs (1870) is the most famous today. (Venus im Pelz is the original title in German). It is also the only Sacher-Masoch book commonly available in English.
Influence
The term masochism was coined by the 19th century psychiatrist Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing with Sacher-Masoch and his writings in mind. Sacher-Masoch was not pleased with this development.
"Venus in Furs" has been adapted for film three times: in 1967, in 1969 and in 1994. The 1994 film was directed by Seyferth and Nieuwenhuijs, and received an award at the 1994 international film festival of Saint Petersburg, Russia.
See also Leopold von Sacher-Masoch p2
- More information is available at [ Wikipedia:Leopold_von_Sacher-Masoch ]
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