Born: June 9, 1843, Prague, Bohemia, Austrian Empire [now in Czech Republic]
Died: June 21, 1914, Vienna
Baroness Bertha Sophie Felicita Von Suttner was an Austrian writer and peace activist who in 1905 became the first woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Her novel Die Waffen nieder (1889; Lay Down Your Arms, 1892) depicted the horrors of war and became an influential work for the cause of peace. As a leader of the international peace movement, Suttner encouraged Swedish chemist and philanthropist Alfred Nobel to set aside part of his estate to establish the peace prize that she later won.
Suttner was born Bertha Sophie Felicita Kinsky in Prague (then in Austria-Hungary). Her father, an Austrian field marshal, died shortly before her birth. As a child, she travelled widely with her mother, mastered several European languages, and became acquainted with prominent members of European society. Her mother’s extravagant lifestyle diminished the family fortune, and in the 1870s Bertha went to work as a governess for the Suttner family in Vienna, Austria. There she met and fell in love with Baron Arthur Gundaccar von Suttner, one of the family’s sons. His family disapproved of the relationship, so in 1876 the couple eloped and moved to the Caucasus region of Russia, where they became the tutors of European languages and music.
During the nine years they spent in Russia, the Suttners read widely about European culture and political affairs. They became ardent pacifists as they witnessed the horrors of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877 and 1878. During the war, Arthur wrote influential war dispatches for periodicals in Vienna. Inspired by her husband’s success, Bertha von Suttner tried her hand at writing and discovered her own talent. In the years that followed, she wrote several novels, some together with her husband, and numerous essays. In 1883, she wrote her first full-length nonfiction work, Inventarium einer Seele (Inventory of the Soul), promoting world peace and internationalism.
In 1889, Suttner published her most influential work, Die Waffen nieder. The novel, which vividly describes the horrors its young heroine experiences during wartime, turned Suttner almost overnight into a leading figure of the peace movement. In 1891 she founded the Austrian Peace Society, and the following year she helped establish the International Peace Bureau in Bern, Switzerland, which served as a coordinating organization for the many peace groups in western Europe. In addition to her work with formal peace organizations, Suttner wrote and lectured widely on peace as well as on the rights of women. Her correspondence with Alfred Nobel in the 1890s increased his knowledge of the peace movement.
After winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1905, Suttner continued to write and lecture on peace and women’s rights. She promoted a united Europe and strongly opposed the military use of airplanes. As World War I (1914-1918) approached, she became the honourary leader of the International Peace Bureau and continued to endorse pacifism despite opposition from many Austrians. She had died just weeks before the war began.
