author
Hans von Kahlenberg
1870–1957
Known for the bestselling novel Ahasvera, this German writer published under a male pen name and built a wide readership in the early 20th century. Her work often mixed popular storytelling with themes that drew attention in its day, including the controversial Nixchen books.
3 Audiobooks
Nixchen. Ein Beitrag zur Psychologie der höheren Tochter
by Hans von Kahlenberg
Der Fremde: Ein Gleichniss
by Hans von Kahlenberg
Tenhotar
by Hans von Kahlenberg
About the author
Hans von Kahlenberg was the best-known pen name of Helene Keßler, née von Monbart, a German writer born on February 23, 1870, in Heiligenstadt, Thuringia, and died on August 8, 1957, in Baden-Baden. She published fiction under this masculine pseudonym and became widely known in the German-speaking world.
She is remembered above all for Ahasvera (1910), which became her bestseller. Another part of her reputation came from the Nixchen novels, whose erotic subject matter attracted notice at the time. Some of her work later reached the screen, including adaptations of Nixchen.
Today, she is of interest both as a popular novelist and as an example of a woman writer who chose a male literary identity in order to navigate the publishing world of her era.