Did you know?

Did you know that the story of Marie Pachler (1794–1855), a pianist from Graz with Slovenian roots, is not merely the story of a former child prodigy who simply vanished from the musical world in later life? In historical accounts, she has too often been portrayed primarily as an acquaintance of Beethoven and Schubert, yet her recently discovered letters reveal a rather different image of her.

Her correspondence with female relatives in Lower Styria and Carniola sheds light on a long-overlooked aspect: the seemingly less significant private life of a woman exposed to the constraints of social norms, which she nonetheless sought to overcome.

You can read more about how the epistolary culture of the early 19th century illuminates previously neglected dimensions of the lives of Marie Pachler and her relatives in an article by Dr Ingeborg Harer (https://doi.org/10.3986/dmd21.1.01).