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Emma Orczy

Emma ("Emmuska") Magdolna Rozália Mária Jozefa Borbála Orczy de Orczi (anglicized to Baroness Emma Magdalena Rosalia Maria Josephina Barbara Orczy, in French …d'Orczy) (September 23 1865 – November 12 1947) was a British novelist, playwright and artist of Hungarian origin. She was most notable for her series of novels featuring the Scarlet Pimpernel. Some of her paintings were exhibited at the Royal Academy in London.

Early life

Emmuska Orczy (enPR2|ŏrt'zē) was born in Tarnaörs, Hungary, and was the daughter of composer Baron Felix Orczy and Countess Emma Wass. Her parents left Hungary in 1868, fearful of the threat of a peasant revolution. They lived in Budapest, Brussels, and Paris (where Emma studied music without success). Finally, in 1880, the family moved to London where they lodged with their countryman Francis Pichler at 162 Great Portland Street. Orczy attended West London School of Art and then Heatherley's School of Fine Art.

Although not destined to be a painter,art school did change her life forever, for it was there she met a young illustrator named Montague MacLean Barstow, the son of an English clergyman, whom she eventually married in 1894. It was the start of a joyful and happy marriage "for close on half a century one of perfect happiness and understanding of perfect friendship and communion of thought."

Writing career

They had very little money, and Orczy started to work with her husband as a translator and an illustrator to supplement his low earnings. John Montague Orczy-Barstow, their only child, was born February 25 1899. She started writing soon after his birth but her first novel, "The Emperor's Candlesticks" (1899), was a failure. She did, however, find a small following with a series of detective stories in the "Royal Magazine". Her next novel, "In Mary's Reign" (1901) did better.

In 1903, she and her husband wrote a play based on one of her short stories about an English aristocrat, Sir Percy Blakeney, Bart., who rescued French aristocrats from the French revolution: "The Scarlet Pimpernel". She submitted her novelization of the story under the same title to 12 publishers. While waiting the decision of these publishers, Fred Terry and Julia Neilson accepted the play for production in the West End. Initially, it drew small audiences, but the play ran four years in London, broke many stage records, was translated and produced in other countries, and underwent several revivals. This theatrical success generated huge sales for the novel.

She went on to write over a dozen sequels featuring Sir Percy Blakeney, his family, and the other members of the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel, of which the first, "I Will Repay" (1906), was the most popular. The last Pimpernel book, "Mam'zelle Guillotine", was published in 1940. None of her three subsequent plays matched the success of "The Scarlet Pimpernel". She also wrote popular mystery fiction and many adventure romances. Her "Lady Molly of Scotland Yard" was an early example of a female detective as the main character.

Orczy's novels were racy, mannered melodramas and she favored historical fiction. In "The Nest of the Sparrowhawk" (1909), for example, a malicious guardian in Puritan Kent tricks his beautiful wealthy young ward into marrying him by disguising himself as an exiled French prince. He persuades his widowed sister-in-law to abet him in this plot, in which she unwittingly disgraces one of her long lost sons and finds the other murdered by the villain. Even though this novel had no link to The Scarlet Pimpernel other than its shared authorship, the publisher advertised it as part of 'The Scarlet Pimpernel Series'.

Her work was so successful that she was able to buy an estate in Monte Carlo.

She died in Henley-on-Thames on November 12 1947.

Descendants

Her son, John Montague Orczy-Barstow, was a writer under the name John Blakeney, the surname taken from that of his mother's most famous fictional character.

Her grandson, Michael Felix Orczy-Barstow, was a British aviator and an early computer systems analyst. He died in Corpus Christi, Texas.

Name pronunciation

Asked how to say her name, Orczy told "The Literary Digest" "Pronounced "or'-tsey". It is a pure Hungarian name, the double consonant "cz" being equivalent to an English "ts". "Emmuska" – a diminutive meaning "very little Emma" – (accent on the first syllable—the "s" equivalent to our "sh"), thus, " 'em-moosh-ka"." (Charles Earle Funk, "What's the Name, Please?", Funk & Wagnalls, 1936.)

Works

(incomplete)
TRANSLATIONS
*Old Hungarian Fairy Tales (1895) translator with Montague Barstow
*The Enchanted Cat (1895) translator with Montague Barstow
*Fairyland’s Beauty (1895) translator with Montague Barstow
*Uletka and the White Lizard (1895) translator with Montague Barstow

PLAYS
*The Scarlet Pimpernel (1903)
*The Sin of William Jackson (1906)
*Beau Brocade (1908)
*The Duke's Wager (1911)
*The Legion of Honour (1918), adapted from A Sheaf of Bluebells

SHORT STORIES
*The Case of Miss Elliot (collection of detective stories, 1905)
*The Old Man In the Corner (collection of detective stories, 1909)
*Lady Molly of Scotland Yard (collection of detective stories, 1910)
*The Man in Grey (short stories, 1918)
*The League of the Scarlet Pimpernel, 1919)
*"Castles in the Air" (collection, 1921)
*Unravelled Knots (collection of detective stories, 1926)
*Skin o' My Tooth (collection of detective stories, 1928)
*Adventures of the Scarlet Pimpernel (1929)

NOVELS
*The Emperor's Candlesticks (1899)
*In Mary's Reign (1901) later The Tangled Skein (1907)
*The Scarlet Pimpernel (1905)
*By the Gods Beloved (1905) later released in the US as The Gates of Kamt (1907)
*I will Repay (1906)
*A Son of the People (1906)
*Beau Brocade (1907)
*The Elusive Pimpernel (1908)
*The Nest of the Sparrowhawk (1909)
*Petticoat Government (1910)
*A True Woman (1911)
*The Traitor (1912)
*The Good Patriots (1912)
*Fire in Stubble (1912)
*Meadowsweet (1912)
*Eldorado (1913)
*Unto Cæsar (1914)
*The Laughing Cavalier (1914)
*A Bride of the Plains (1915)
*The Bronze Eagle (1915)
*Leatherface (1916)
*Lord Tony's Wife (1917)
*A Sheaf of Bluebells (1917)
*Flower o' the Lily (1918)
*His Majesty's Well-beloved (1919)
*The First Sir Percy (1921)
*"The Triumph of the Scarlet Pimpernel" (1922)
*Nicolette: A Tale of Old Provence (1922)
*The Honourable Jim (1924)
*Pimpernel and Rosemary (1924)
*Les Beaux et les Dandys de Grand Siècles en Angleterre (1924)
*The Miser of Maida Vale (1925)
*A Question of Temptation (1925)
*The Celestial City (1926)
*Sir Percy Hits Back (1927)
*Blue Eyes and Grey (1929)
*Marivosa (1930)
*In the Rue Monge (1931)
*A Joyous Adventure (1932)
*A Child of the Revolution (1932)
*The Scarlet Pimpernel Looks at the World (1933)
*The Way of the Scarlet Pimpernel (1933)
*A Spy of Napoleon (1934)
*The Uncrowned King (1935)
*The Turbulent Duchess (1935)
*Sir Percy Leads the Band (1936)
*The Divine Folly (1937)
*No Greater Love (1938)
*Mam'zelle Guillotine (1940)
*Pride of Race (1942)
*The Will-O'-The-Wisp (1947)

OMNIBUS EDITIONS
*The Scarlet Pimpernel etc (1930) collection of four novels
*The Gallant Pimpernel (1939) collection of four novels
*The Scarlet Pimpernel Omnibus (1957) collection of four novels

NON FICTION
*"Links in the Chain of Life" (autobiography, 1947)

External links

* [http://www.blackmask.com/cgi-bin/newlinks/search.cgi?query=orczy Works by Baroness Orczy] at [http://www.blackmask.com/ Blackmask]
* [http://www.blakeneymanor.com/series.html Works by Baroness Orczy] at [http://www.blakeneymanor.com/ Blakeney Manor]
*
* [http://www.apwatt.co.uk/index.asp?left=authors_left.asp?author_id=274&right=author_full.asp?author_id=274 Literary agent]

ee also

* Alexandre Dumas, père
* H. Rider Haggard
* Karl May
* Rafael Sabatini
* Emilio Salgari
* Samuel Shellabarger
* Lawrence Schoonover
* Jules Verne
* Frank Yerby

References

*'Obituary—Baroness ORCZY: "The Scarlet Pimpernel"', "The Times", November 13 1947

Источник: Emma Orczy