Elisabeth Burnod

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Elisabeth Louise Cécile Burnod (born August 11, 1916 in Morges ; † May 6, 1979 in Lausanne ) was a writer from French-speaking Switzerland .

Life

Youth and Parisian Years

Élisabeth Burnod was born in Morges on Lake Geneva in 1916 as the daughter of the primary school teacher Félix Francois Burnod (1891-1945) and Fanny Elisa Jeanneret († around 1920/25), who were considered to be very well educated . In the same year the family moved to Berolle at the foot of the Swiss Jura , where they attended primary school where their father taught. This was followed by a visit to the Collège in Morges , then to the grammar school in Lausanne. Burnod spoke German very little, but English very well. She was Catholic and also had her children baptized Catholics.

After attending school, she worked briefly at Radio Suisse Romande and lived in Villeneuve . In July 1936 she married Edmond Kaiser , a 22-year-old Frenchman who lived in Lausanne and who later founded the children's charity " terre des hommes ". Just two months later, she moved with her husband to Paris , where she appeared as an author in 1937/1938 with articles in the magazine La Phalange . In 1943 she wrote her novel Florentine in Paris , which she dedicated to Claudine Cantacuzène . The birth of their daughter Myriam in 1937 was followed in 1939 by that of their son Jean-Daniel, called "Jani", who died in an accident in March 1941.

Unwilling collaboration? (1943–1944)

V2 -Bunker La Coupole

In September 1943, when her daughter Myriam was living in Switzerland, she met the German secret agent Erwin Streif in the apartment of her husband Edmond Kaiser, who was active in the Paris Resistance . Kaiser asked Streif, who pretended to be a member of the British secret service under the code name Marcel Stael, to take Élisabeth Burnod with him to Lille because she had to leave Paris.

At the beginning of 1944 Burnod was introduced by Streif to the V-Mann -führer Feldwebel Friedrich Topp from the Abwehrstelle Arras , who presented himself to Burnod as an employee of the British secret service with the name Alfred Lambert, born in Oran / Ireland. Streif claimed that Burnod was being followed by the German police. Burnod agreed to work as "wife" Topps under the code name Diana Lambert in Resistance networks for the alleged British secret service. Her "husband" Alfred Lambert, who - according to Topps later - also became her lover, took her several times by car from Lille via Hazebrouck to St. Omer , where she found herself - mainly in the Wizernes ( La Coupole ) area - for transport routes for inquired about the V1 and V2 weapons and reported regularly to Topp. According to Topps, Burnod knew his true identity by April 1944 at the latest, without their reports having changed afterwards. In May or June 1944 Topp rented an apartment for her in Tourcoing on Rue Carnot, where she was still visited by her husband Edmond Kaiser in June or July.

Family life in Lausanne and on Lake Constance (1945–1947)

Former Villa Kaiser in Lausanne

After the liberation of France by the Allies, Burnod first returned to Lausanne , where she lived with her daughter Myriam in the "Villa Kaiser", Chemin de Langueroc 10. In June 1945 she published poems in the humanist - anti-fascist magazine Suisse contemporaine and in 1946 her first novel " Le Miracle des violettes " , in which she prosaically described her life in the Parisian art scene and processed her relationship with the German secret agent alias Lambert autobiographically.

At the request of her husband, she and her daughter moved in early 1946 to his villa on Lake Constance near Konstanz , where Edmond Kaiser was an officer of the French occupation. There she was arrested with her husband in early 1947 because of her collaboration with a German; the proceedings against them were discontinued a little later.

Emancipation and Feminism

In July 1949 she returned to her homeland, the Swiss canton of Vaud , and initially lived in Lausanne. At the end of 1950 she moved to the neighboring Pully . As early as 1948 she had separated from Edmond Kaiser, who dedicated his lyric work Le Mémorial d'une poupée , begun in 1941, to her in 1951 , in which he tried to deal with the death of her son. Three months after her divorce, she regained Swiss citizenship in Villeneuve , but stayed in Pully, where in January 1953 she moved into an apartment in Chemin du Villardier 27, which she lived in until her death. After the publication of her first two novels, she worked from 1949 to 1978, first as a secretary, then as Attachée de Presse des Comptoir Suisse , the national consumer fair, in Lausanne. In 1976 she lived in Pully with a boy she had adopted and was born around 1960.

Despite her falling out with her husband, contact with Edmond Kaiser did not break off after her divorce, who named her in 1973 in the obituary notice for his mother Louise Chrostmann, was present at her death bed in the hospital and arranged for her funeral.

Meaning of her novel

In the 1960s and 1970s, Élisabeth Burnod was one of the most famous female writers in French-speaking Switzerland. Burnod received the Prix ​​d'Alliance culturelle romande in 1964 for her novel Ornements pour la solitude . Thanks to financial support from the Swiss cultural foundation Pro Helvetia , she was able to interrupt her professional activity for five months in 1970 and devote herself to work on her novel Le Vent d'Août . In 1975 she received the Prix ​​des écrivains vaudois for her literary life's work .

In 1979, the writer Mireille Kuttel Burnod was one of the "great women" of French-speaking literature in Switzerland and praised her flawless stylistic elegance, the clarity and charisma of her work. In 1998, Cathérine Dubuis' assessment in the Histoire de la litérature en Suisse romande was critical : In 1963 Burnod described the vain rebellion of a girl against the constraints of her bourgeois environment in an impressive style in her novel Les Arrangeurs . In the following novels, however, she regrettably conformed to bourgeois conventions and only portrayed women as heroines who submit to social norms and thus give up their own lives. Although Burnod does not result in young women’s longing for a free, self-determined life in a revolt directed against masculine supremacy, but in the loneliness of a civil marriage, it was recognized by the feminist movement in Switzerland at the end of the 1970s Viewed as role model.

Works

  • Le Pont du Nord . Novellas. Éditions de Kogge, Brussels 1943.
  • Le Miracle des violettes . Novel. Jehub, Geneva / Paris 1946.
  • Florentine . Novel. Jehub, Geneva / Paris 1949. (Written in Paris 1943).
  • Agnès et le cercle intime . Novel. Jehub, Geneva / Paris 1955.
  • Les arrangers . Novel. Spes, Lausanne 1963.
  • Ornements pour la solitude . Novel. Spes, Lausanne 1964.
  • Chefs-d'oeuvre of the suisse collection. De Monet à Picasso . Palais de Beaulieu, Lausanne, from May 1st to October 25th 1964. Guide officiel de l'Exposition. Lausanne 1964.
  • La femme disparue . Novel. Spes, Lausanne 1966. (novel).
  • Lausanne. Ch. Veillon, Lausanne 1967. (With René Creux; English by Eduard H. Steenken).
  • Livre d'Or. 50 ans Comptoir sisse. Marguerat, Lausanne 1969. (With Hanspeter Schmidt, German by Eduard H. Steenken: Goldenes Buch. 50 years Comptoir Suisse. ).
  • Le Vent d'Août . Novel. Édition du Panorama, Paul Thierrin, Bienne 1970.
  • Le Dimanche papouadan . Novel. Édition du Panorama, Bienne 1976.

Contributions for Radio Suisse Romande :

  • Une constant collaboration.
  • Iris ou la message des dieux.
  • Au banc d'essai.
  • Visa pour mon pays.

literature

  • Michelle Kuttel: Une grande Romancière n'est plus. In: Information culturelle SPS , November 26, 1979. (Uncritical laudation on Burnod's work.)
  • Contemporary writers: Switzerland. (Ed .: Grégoire Boulanger). Aarau 1988, ISBN 3-7941-2933-4 , p. 277.
  • Henri-Charles Dahlem: Elisabeth Burnod. In: Dictionnaire des écrivains suisses d'expression française. (Ed .: Alain Nicollier, Henri-Charles Dahlem.) Geneva 1994, ISBN 2-88115-012-8 , Vol. 1, pp. 150-151. (Excerpt from Kuttel's laudatory speech).
  • Cathérine Dubuis: You roman bougeois au roman engagé. In: Histoire de la literature en Suisse romande. (Ed .: Roger Francillon.) Vol. 3: De la Seconde Guerre aux années 1970. Lausanne 1998, here p. 319. (Brief critical evaluation of Burnod's novels).
  • Franz Josef Burghardt : Spies of Retribution. The German defense in northern France and the secret service securing of the launching areas for V weapons in World War II. A socio-biographical study . Schönau 2018. ISBN 978-3-947009-02-2 .

Web links

  • Elisabeth Burnod in Bibliomedia Switzerland .
  • Jaqueline Thévos: Elisabeth Burnod. In: Femmes suisses et le Mouvement féministe , Organe officiel des informations de l'Alliance de Sociétés Féminines Suisses, 64, No. 2 (February 1976). doi : 10.5169 / seals-274442 (interview, with picture)
  • Les lettre4s vaudoises en deuil, Élisabeth Burnod n'est plus. in: Nouvelle Revue de Lausanne of May 8, 1979 (with picture).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Her body was cremated in the Center funéraire de Montoie in Lausanne ; Archives commununales de la Ville de Lausanne.
  2. ↑ Rue de Lac 17. This street is today's Rue Louis-de-Savoie; Archives commununales de Morges.
  3. ↑ The father was transferred to Nyon in 1924 and married Louise Dubrit for the second time. Apparently there were no further children from the first marriage, and two more daughters (Rose-Marie and Josette) from the second marriage; ATS Burnod-Dubrit, Fèlix, and ATS BURNOD, Élisabeth, in: Archives cantonales vaudoises, Chavannes-près-Renens.
  4. ^ Message from a close family member.
  5. ↑ Whether Burnod the Matura ( Abitur ) reached, is not known. According to her own, probably autobiographical, information in her novel Le Miracle des violettes , she left school at the age of 15.
  6. ↑ In the advertisement for her engagement in June 1936, Villeneuve is given as her place of residence; 24heures newspaper of June 16, 1936, Archives communales de la Ville de Lausanne
  7. ↑ The dedication was made “with deep affection” ( en profonde affection ). Claudine Cantacuzène came from a Romanian line of the late medieval Byzantine ruling dynasty Kantakuzenos , her grandfather Gogu C. (1845–1898) was Romanian finance minister; Jean Michel Cantacuzène: Mille ans dans les Balkans. Chronique des Cantacuzènes dans la tourmente des siècles. Paris 1998, ISBN 2-86496-054-0 . Pp. 375-376. The family tree there (p. 439) also in: Arbre généalogique de la famille Cantacuzino - Cantacuzène .
  8. ↑ Christophe Gallaz: Entretiens avec Edmond Kaiser, Fondateur de terre des Hommes, Confondateur de Sentinelles. Éditions Favre, Lausanne 1998, ISBN 2-8289-0549-7 , pp. 143-144. The little son "Jani" fell into a running washing machine; ibid. pp. 23-24.
  9. ↑ Erwin Streif's testimony during his interrogation by the Americans; TNA, Kew, KV 2/2850 ( Memento from December 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  10. ↑ To Topp in detail: Burghardt, Spione der Vergeltung , pp. 158–166. On the collaboration between Topp and Burnod also ibid. Pp. 23–24. Burnod dealt with her relationship with Topp alias Alfred Lambert in part in her novel Le Miracle des violettes , published in early 1946 . Topp was a prisoner in the British internment camp Recklinghausen-Hillerheide from 1945–1947 .
  11. ↑ Suisse contemporaine
  12. ↑ Burnod describes this phase of life on Lake Constance in detail in her novel Agnes et le cercle intime , published in 1955 .
  13. ↑ Burnod himself did not later deny that he had worked with a German secret agent on the assumption that he worked for the English secret service. But she stopped doing this as soon as she realized his true identity. Her husband Kaiser was always firmly convinced of the correctness of this statement; Message from a close family member.
  14. ↑ She was referred to as an office worker and lived at Chemin des Allières 10 with a Kalteneich family; Registration of residents , Archives communales de la Ville de Lausanne. According to her own statements, she stayed in France for 13 years, i.e. from 1936 to 1949; Interview with J. Thévos.
  15. ↑ Chemin du Liaudoz 32; Residential registration, Archives communales de la Ville de Pully.
  16. ↑ Gallaz. P. 144. The official divorce did not follow until January 8, 1952; Resident Registration Office, Archives communales de la Ville de Lausanne.
  17. ↑ How much Burnod still suffered from the loss of her son at the end of the 1960s, the editor of the Édition du Panorama expressed in her diary: Burnod gave her a copy of Kaiser’s book along with the manuscript of her novel Le vent d'Août sent. The editor was surprised that Burnod would accept such a dedication after their divorce. Burnod, who was supported by the Pro Helvetia cultural foundation with half of the printing costs, clung to her work “so as not to strive for hunger and not to hear the voice that kills her”; Berthe Bochet-Ramuz: Bilan d'une vie. Lausanne 1989, pp. 163-164.
  18. ^ Citizenship and reintegration in the canton of Vaud according to the decision of the Conseil d'État of March 24, 1952; Residential registration, Archives communales de la Ville de Pully.
  19. ↑ As attachée de presse , she had to maintain contacts with important personalities and possible exhibitors as well as with associated press work for the annual trade fair events of the Comptoir suisse.
  20. ↑ Interview with J. Thévos.
  21. ↑ Whether the statement made by Anni, who has strong autobiographical traits, in Burnod's novel Le Miracle des violettes (1946) about her husband ( he wasn't brutal, he was an idiot! ) Actually concerned Edmond Kaiser remains to be seen.
  22. ^ Message from a close family member.
  23. ^ Ernst Bollinger: Alliance culturelle romande. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . May 4, 2001 , Retrieved July 7, 2019 .
  24. ↑ A dossier “Literary Commissions 1968” with documents relating to this grant from the Pro Helvetia Foundation is in the Swiss Federal Archives under E9510.6 # 1991/51 # 654
  25. ↑ List of the winners of the Prix ​​des écrivains vaudois ( Memento of December 20, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  26. ↑ Tripe: Une grande romancière sneezes plus.
  27. ↑ Interview with Burnod in the journal of the Alliance de Sociétés Féminines Suisses 1976. doi : 10.5169 / seals-274442
  28. ↑ In the framework of the story, the novel describes the bleak life of the 35-year-old Agnès in a villa on Lake Constance near Konstanz , which she shared with her husband Bernard (officer of the French occupation) and their daughter in 1945/46. Bernard, who values ​​German music and literature very much and is of the opinion that the Germans are no longer National Socialists, unabashedly maintains a relationship with the young singer Reine, while his conversations with Agnès are only formal and often cynical. When her former lover, the Englishman Laurie, appears in November 1946, accompanied by two officers from the British occupation zone, Agnès spends a day with him against Bernard's protest. The protagonist's life path is presented in detail: her childhood and youth, her first love affair and her early marriage with Bernard, with whom she immediately moved to Paris, where she lived in poor conditions and gave birth to a daughter. After a short time, the couple became completely alienated, and when Bernard went into hiding when the German troops marched in, Agnès first tried to earn a living as a secretary, then joined the Resistance and returned to Switzerland. From there, Bernard calls her to Constance .
  29. ↑ Burnod claims to have started this novel as early as 1947, which - according to a newspaper comment from December 1, 1964 - is not an autobiography , but shows "certain analogies with the author's life". The action takes place in "Marolle near Paris" (probably Marolles-en-Brie near Villecresnes ), "where the son Élisabeth Burnods rests"; Newspaper clipping of unknown origin Élisabeth Burnod lauréate du Prix de l'Äalliance culturelle romande , in: ATS BURNOD, Élisabeth, Archives cantonales vaudoises, Chavannes-près-Renens.
  30. ↑ Tripe: Une grande romancière n'est plus. Thévos: Elisabeth Burnod . doi : 10.5169 / seals-274442
personal data
SURNAME Burnod, Elisabeth
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Burnod, Élisabeth Louise Cécile (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss writer
DATE OF BIRTH August 11, 1916
PLACE OF BIRTH Morges
DATE OF DEATH May 6, 1979
Place of death Lausanne