Elisabeth Reichart is an Austrian author. Reichart was born in Mühlviertel

Mühlviertel

The Mühlviertel is an Austrian region belonging to the state of Upper Austria: it is one of four "quarters" of Upper Austria, the others being Hausruckviertel, Traunviertel, and Innviertel. It is named for the two rivers and .-Region:...

, Austria, in 1953.

Biography

Reichart's grandmother survived the Nazi occupation of Austria

Anschluss

The Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....

 and strongly influenced the life of Reichart. Reichart wrote her dissertation about the Austrian resistance

Austrian resistance

The Austrian resistance to the Nazi rule that started with the Anschluss in 1938 had a prehistory of socialist and communist activism against the era of Austrofascism from 1934. These activists, limited primarily to adherents of the political far left, operated in isolation from the Austrian...

 movement and the silence of Austria during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. Soon after, she began writing her first novel, February Shadows

February Shadows

February Shadows is a 1984 historical novel by award-winning Austrian author Elisabeth Reichart. She wrote it as a response to her discovery of the Mühlviertler Hasenjagd , a massacre on February 2, 1945 at the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp in Upper Austria...

.

Reichart developed into a well-known Austrian writer after the release of February Shadows, a historical novel which dealt with the Mühlviertler Hasenjagd

Mühlviertler Hasenjagd

The Mühlviertler Hasenjagd was a Nazi war crime that took place near Linz in the Mühlviertel, a region in Upper Austria. In February 1945, around 500 Soviet prisoners escaped from Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp in the Mühlviertel. Local civilians, soldiers and local Nazi organizations hunted...

 ("The Rabbit Hunt of the Mill District"), and has since produced five novels, a book of short stories, several dramas, and a collection of radio plays. In 1993, she received the Austrian National Prize for the Promotion of Literature and in 1995, she was awarded the prestigious Elias Canetti Grant, named for Nobel Prize

Nobel Prize

The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...

 winner Elias Canetti

Elias Canetti

Elias Canetti was a Bulgarian-born modernist novelist, playwright, memoirist, and non-fiction writer. He wrote in German and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1981, "for writings marked by a broad outlook, a wealth of ideas and artistic power".-Life:...

. In 2000, she received the Anton Wildgans Prize

Anton Wildgans Prize

The Anton Wildgans Prize of Austrian Industry is a literary award that was endowed in 1962 by the Federation of Austrian Industry. The prize is worth 10,000 Euro and is granted by an independent jury to a young or middle-aged writer of Austrian citizenship....

.

Literary Works

• Februar Schatten 1984 (February Shadows)
• Komm über den See 1988 (Come Across the Lake)
• La Valse 1992
• Fotze 1993
• Nachtmär 1995 (Nighttale)
• Das vergessene Lächeln der Amaterasu 1990 (The Forgotten Smile of the Amaterasu)