Leonie Adele Spitzer (17 May 1891 – 5 June 1940) was an Austrian writer, poet, and educator.
Leonie Adele Spitzer | |
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Born | (1891-05-17)17 May 1891 Vienna, Austria-Hungary |
Died | 5 June 1940(1940-06-05) (aged 49) Oxford, United Kingdom |
Language | German |
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Leonie Adele Spitzer was born into a distinguished assimilated Jewish family in Vienna. Her father was Obermedizinalrat Dr. Franz Spitzer, who worked as a physician for the Concordia [de] writers' and journalists' association, while her paternal grandfather was mathematician Simon Spitzer.[1] Her mother Charlotte, née Pokorny, was the daughter of Dr. Wilhelm Pokorny, homeopath and physician to the Austrian aristocracy. She was educated at the Hanausek Lyceum [de], and passed the teaching qualification examination for French and English in 1912.[1]
Spitzer graduated with a doctorate from the University of Vienna on 21 July 1920, with a dissertation entitled "Über Rilkes Verskunst".[2] She was editor of the Rikola publishing house until 1922, whereupon she pursued teaching as a profession. She passed the teacher's examination for gymnasia in 1923, and then worked at various secondary schools in Vienna, including the Floridsdorf Gymnasium.[3]
She fled to Italy after the annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938 (her twin brother Dr. Fritz Spitzer, meanwhile, committed suicide).[1] She emigrated to Oxford the following year with the help of Dr. Erna Hollitscher [Wikidata], secretary of the Emergency Sub-Committee for Refugees.[4] She received positions at Cheltenham Ladies' College and then Crofton Grange School, but soon succumbed to a serious illness and died in June 1940.[3]
Because she was Jewish, Spitzer's doctorate was posthumously revoked on 22 July 1943, only to be symbolically re-granted on 15 May 1955.[2]
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