Emma Barta-Mikl

Portrait of Emma Barta-Mikl, 1950

Emma Barta-Mikl , née Emma Eckschlager (born May 12, 1908 in Graz , † August 20, 1993 in Villa General Belgrano ) was an Austrian author.

Life

Emma Eckschlager grew up with adoptive parents, Johann and Antonia Hren, in Graz . She took their family name from 1917. Although the young girl was trained as a dental technician, she soon discovered her love for literature. In 1927 she married the physician Lawrence Mikl and from 1928 on she attended lectures in German and art history at the University of Graz . In 1930 she gave birth to a son. Two years later, her husband died as a result of suffering from war. During this time she began to write and wrote the novel The Chaos and a Young Person , which was published in 1937 by the European publishing house Vienna-Leipzig . Not least because of this publication stood the poetErnst Wiechert exchanged letters with her for a long time. In 1938 the young widow married the Jewish merchant Ladislaus Barta. As a result of political events, her husband was soon forced to leave Austria. The Bartas fled to Buenos Aires with their son Oskar in 1939 . In 1943 the Austrian émigré made friends with the writer Paul Zech, who had fled Germany . Emma's apartment became a meeting place for European exiles and for members of the Friends of the magazine '' Deutsche Blätter '', which is published in Chile . After Zech's death, she played a key role in ensuring that his literary estate ended up in Berlin. During this time she corresponded extensively with the writer Kurt Erich Meurer and the lawyer and publicist Udo Rukser . In 1947 Emma Barta-Mikl moved to Córdoba , where she was accepted by Gerhard Elkeles , director of the provincial hygiene institute in Argentina. In addition to her work as a teacher at a private school, she translated works by Miguel de Unamuno into German. In 1948, after the death of her second husband, she traveled to the devastated post-war Germany and got involved with the US Displaced Persons Commission (DPC) . In 1950 she returned to Argentina , where she worked in the book trade from 1954. At the beginning of the 1960s she took a position in Lima and was then instrumental in founding branches of the "ABC bookstore chain" with an extensive range of German and European literature in four South American countries. With the beginning of her retirement in 1975, she lived secluded in the country in Argentina.

Works

• Emma Barta-Mikl: Chaos and a young person . European publisher, Vienna / Leipzig 1937.
• Speech on the foundation of the friendship group of the Deutsche Blätter . In: Paul Zech: Selected Works , Volume 4, Mixed Writings , pp. 273f.
• Alfred Hübner: Emma Barta-Mikl. About - Living with Books , in the magazine Zwischenwelt , published by the Theodor Kramer Society, Vienna 2016.

Web links

• Article by Alfred Hübner , Theodor Kramer Gesellschaft, accessed on November 1, 2017
• Paul Zech in Argentina. Cultural crisis and new creation , accessed on November 6, 2017