Karen Blixen

“I had a farm in Africa at the foot of the Ngong Hills.”
Isak Dinesen from Out of Africa

The Karen Blixen Museum is housed in the farmhouse where Karen Blixen, a Danish aristocrat who once owned a coffee plantation in Kenya, lived between 1914 and 1931. Her famous memoir, Out of Africa, chronicles that prominent period in her life. The museum is located in Karen, a suburb of Nairobi that takes it’s name from Karen Blixen. The farmhouse along with the nearby agricultural college was presented to the Kenyan government at Independence, around 1963, by the Danish government.

The Karen Blixen Museum as it looks today

The farmhouse at the Karen Coffee Company Plantation from 1914 to 1931

Up in this high air you breathed easily, drawing
in vital assurance and lightness of heart.
In the highlands you woke up in the morning
and thought: Here I am, where I ought to be.

Isak Dinesen from Out of Africa

Although Karen Blixen came from a family of wealth and luxury her personal life was full of tragedy. She was born, Karen Dinesen, in 1885 fifteen miles north of Copenhagen in Rungstedlund, Denmark on her family’s spacious estate. Her father, Wilhelm Dinesen, fought in the Prusso-Danish war in 1864 and had an adventuresome spirit and talent for story-telling. At one point in his life he even lived for two years in the United States among Native American tribes. However, in 1895, when Karen was just ten years old, her father hung himself and left his wife to raise the five children alone. Although she didn’t know her father well, Karen claimed that she identified with his sense of exploration.

Karen Blixen posing after killing two lions on safari

In December of 1913, Karen’s life changed dramatically when she left the shelter of her childhood home and set out on her journey to British East Africa, now the Republic of Kenya. She married her Swedish cousin Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke at a ceremony in Mombasa and in 1916 bought a plantation and began the Karen Coffee Company, just outside Nairobi, in the Ngong Hills.

Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke

"Here at long last one was in a position not to give a damn for all conventions, here was a new kind of freedom which until then one had only found in dreams."

Karen Blixen, of her years in Africa

Karen was only 28 years old, her husband 27, and both had great expectations of their lives as settlers in Africa, but soon it proved to be more difficult than they imagined. August of their first year, World War I broke out and spread to East Africa. Battles between the British and the Germans led to a shortage of workers and supplies for the plantation. To make matters worse, East Africa was experiencing a three-year drought and in 1917 the British banned the import of coffee.

Karen Blixen and Denys Finch-Hatton

Meanwhile, Karen and her husband had many personal struggles in their dream of starting a family in Africa. Only a few months after their marriage, Karen became ill and was diagnosed with syphilis. She had to travel back to Denmark for treatment by a specialist, but was plagued with having attacks of intense pain for the rest of her life. The cause of the disease was never determined, but it was known that her husband had a reputation for being a popular and well-liked by many women. The struggles continued and after their marriage broke down in 1918, she began a secret love affair with the British Denys Finch-Hatton, who was an officer in the army, a pilot, a safari guide, and a big game hunter in Africa.

Denys Finch-Hatton with his private plane

"What is man, when you come to think upon him, but a minutely set, ingenious machine for turning, with infinite artfulness, the red wine of Shiraz into urine?"

Isak Dinesen from Seven Gothic Tales

Karen and her husband divorced in 1921. She ran the plantation by herself until 1931, which was very uncommon at that time for a woman to do, but due to a struggling crop, mismanagement, drought, and the falling price of coffee, the farm ran into debt and was sold at auction. Karen left Africa and returned to her family’s home in Denmark. But only a few months before her departure, Denys was killed in a plane crash on one of his routine flights to Tsavo National Park. He was buried at the foot of the Ngong Hills.

Karen Blixen's painting of a young girl from the Kikuyu tribe

While on the farm, Karen expressed her interest in the arts. She painted a number of portraits and started to write the first of her many books, Seven Gothic Tales, but when she returned home, she began work on her famous memoir of her years in Africa. Out of Africa was first published in Denmark in 1937, under her pen name, Isak Dinesen. Her memoir is considered by many to be a masterpiece. It is considered to be one of the most perfect records of early European ventures in Africa. In 1954 she was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature, but was passed over in favor of Ernest Hemingway. The book was adapted into an Oscar-winning film, starring Meryl Streep and Robert Redford in 1985.

Karen Blixen and her staff at the Karen Coffee Company

"White people, who for a long time live alone with Natives, get into the habit of saying what they mean, because they have no reason or opportunity for dissimulation, and when they meet again their conversation keeps the Native tone."

Isak Dinesen from Out of Africa

Karen has been criticized for some of her views of the African natives. Early settlers saw her as a friend to the natives while others saw her depiction of them as her “obligation” to be aristocratic and condescending. This attitude produced a conflicting opinion of her work and personal character in Out of Africa.

Karen Blixen's home in Rungstedlund, Denmark

Karen Blixen's final resting place at her home in Denmark

She continued to write and publish books from her home in Denmark and even made several radio broadcasts. In the 1950s her health began to worsen quickly and 1955 she had a third of her stomach removed due to an ulcer. Unable to eat, Karen Blixen died of malnutrition at her home in 1962, at the age of 77. Her last request was to be buried under a large beech tree at the foot of Ewald’s Hill at her family’s home in Rungstedlund.