Edith Philipps' (born Brandes) (1879–1968) unique album tells the stories of a world-renowned Dane’s enormous network within European intellectual life throughout half a century. Georg Brandes (1842–1927) was an undaunted cultural critic who for more than 50 years represented Danish open-mindedness and tolerance. He was incredibly productive and is today especially known for being the father of “The Modern Breakthrough”, a period in Scandinavian literature, which was initiated with a series of lectures at Copenhagen University in 1871. Here Brandes called for a debate of current issues – literature was now supposed to show life as it truly was. His literary objective was shared by many authors, and Brandes was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature several times.

Among the many contributions – some of which have handwritten notes by Edith Brandes attached that highlight the connection to Georg Brandes – are: Albert Einstein, Rainer Maria Rilke, Anatole France, Henrik Ibsen, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Henry James, Thomas Mann, Auguste Rodin, August Strindberg, Leo Tolstoy, H.G. Wells, Emile Zola, Selma Lagerlöf, Marie Curie, Albert Dreyfus, Ellen Key, Mylius-Erichsen, Fridtjof Nansen, John Stuart Mill, Michael and Anna Ancher, P.S. Krøyer, Stefan Zweig, and many more.

The Brandes family's album not only shows that Georg Brandes had close acquaintances in broad circles of intellectual Europe, but also to what extent many of the European intelligentsia at the time admired him. Edith Brande's diligent work with gathering this amazing material is a very important documentation of a decisive era in modern Danish literature and intellectual history.

Provenance: Edith Brandes, the daughter of the Danish cultural critic Georg Brandes.