His name was Felix Salten.įelix Salten was an Austrian writer, born in Hungary in 1869. The writer was evidently a keen naturalist, with an eye for details of flora and fauna throughout the seasons, and also skilled at his craft. How come I have never read this little treasure before now?īambi: A life in the Woods is a true classic of children’s literature, with passages of great joy and also of deep regret and sorrow exhilarating, but also occasionally savage, and heavy with exquisite prose descriptions of the woods and countryside. Salten is considered to be the author of the erotic novel Josephine Mutzenbacher, the fictional autobiography of a Vienna prostitute, which was published in 1906.

His stories 'Perri' and 'The Hound of Florence' inspired the Disney films Perri and The Shaggy Dog. He wrote another book based on the character Bambi, titled Bambi's Children: The Story of a Forest Family, 1939. He was married to the actress Ottilie Metzl, and had two children: Paul and Anna-Katherina. Two years later (1938), after Austria had become part of Germany, Salten moved to Zurich, Switzerland, where he lived until his death. Adolf Hitler had Salten's books banned in 1936.

Life in Austria became perilous for a prominent Jew in the 1930s. Disney released its movie based on Bambi in 1942. In 1933, he sold the film rights to Sidney Franklin for $1,000, who later transferred the rights to the Walt Disney studios. It was translated into English in 1928 and became a Book-of-the-Month Club hit. His most famous work is Bambi, which he wrote in 1923. In 1927 he became president of the Austrian P.E.N. He wrote film scripts and librettos for operettas. He also wrote for nearly all the major newspapers of Vienna. He was soon publishing, on an average, one book a year, of plays, short stories, novels, travel books, and essay collections. In 1900 he published his first collection of short stories. In 1901 he founded Vienna's first, short-lived literary cabaret. He became part of the Young Vienna movement (Jung Wien) and soon received work as a full-time art and theater critic in the Vienna press. He also began submitting poems and book reviews to journals.

When his father went bankrupt, Felix had to quit school and begin working in an insurance agency. Many Jews were immigrating into the city in the late 19th century because Vienna had finally granted full citizenship to Jews in 1867. When he was three weeks old, his family moved to Vienna, Austria. He was born Siegmund Salzmann in Budapest, Hungary. There is more than one author with this Name.įelix Salten was an Austrian writer.

Bambi a life in the woods book