Felix Salten

 

TLS Bambi Author Felix Salten to Scribner’s Magazine

On Lecture Tour Proposal

Date: May 1, 1933

Location: Vienna, Austria

Medium: Typed letter signed (TLS)

Collection: Yavneh Klos Collection, Antisemitism Archive 

Although few of us familiar with Disney’s Bambi know it was based on a novel by an Austrian Jewish writer, Felix Salten intended his “animal book” as a parable about European antisemitism. Just weeks after Hitler seized power in Germany, Salten wrote to Scribner’s Magazine proposing a U.S. lecture tour. Anxious to secure an invitation to speak, Salten avoids overt political commentary, instead dancing around the unfolding crisis by referencing animals and history. Disney released the animated film of Bambi in 1942, avoiding crediting Salten in almost all publicity, and omitting the darker themes of antisemitism and Jewish persecution.

Book Banning is Not New: Felix Salten’s Contribution to Jewish Literary Spheres, Its Effects on American Viewers, Censorship, and the American Superficialization of Anti-Semitic Depictions in Bambi

Victoria Marino
Dr. Yavneh
LNCS-H396-003

19 March 2024

Document entitled Salten, Felix, a typed letter signed on Felix Salten 8 x 11 stationery dated May 1, 1933, to a Mr. Dashiell, Scribner’s Magazine. In the letter, he requests Scribner’s Magazine to publish his new "Animal Book" and sponsor a U.S. speaking tour. Salten’s context as a Jewish Viennese literary scholar navigating anti-Semitism in Vienna informs what he discusses in his letter to Mr. Dashiell. Although Salten is notably outspoken about the ways in which anti-Semitism functions—as depicted in his novel Bambi, also referred to in the letter as the “Animal Book”—he remains consciously neutral and agreeable in both letters. Much like the subtle themes in Bambi, he needed to avoid politicized language in order to actually succeed in going to America to lecture. More specifically, his interest in discussing history and the fall of the Habsburg Empire would likely be an avenue to discussing the current realities of his context.

The tone of both letters is intentionally dancing around the tragedies affecting his day-to-day life, but this was necessary in order to be accepted by American audiences. This superficialization of anti-Semitic realities underscores the fact that Americans, too, were complicit in discrimination and violence against Jewish people. Further proof of this is Disney’s profit off of said “animal book” without crediting Salten, and without including many of the dark themes centered around Jewish discrimination in the film. Even American audiences rejected the movie, leading it to be a box office flop, as it didn’t align with American values and views at the time of its release.

Salten’s experience as a writer, educator, and creative goes to show how censorship and banning of books like Bambi can lead to exploitation toward Jewish writers. If much of his work hadn’t been banned by the German government, it is unlikely that his letter to Mr. Dashiell would be as subtle in the way he articulates his own perspective. This form of silencing is not new; Americans have always avoided the ‘political’ in order to be family-friendly, monetized, and ultimately a false depiction of realities. This is harmful, and Salten is a mere example of the ways that this collective American mindset impacts education.

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Works Cited

“Archivesspace Public Interface.” Dashiell, Alfred S. (Alfred Sheppard), 1901–1970 | ArchivesSpace Public Interface, wheatoncollege.as.atlas-sys.com/agents/people/935. Accessed 19 Mar. 2025.

“Felix Salten and Bambi.” The German Way & More, www.german-way.com/notable-people/featured-bios/felix-salten-and-bambi/. Accessed 19 Mar. 2025.

Hope, Hillary. “Jewish Vienna Between the World Wars.” Vienna Is Different: Jewish Writers in Austria from the Fin-de-Siècle to the Present, 1st ed., Berghahn Books, 2011, pp. 93–173. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt9qd48m.6. Accessed 19 Mar. 2025.

Zipes, Jack. “Not Meant for Children: Felix Salten and the Story of Bambi.” Jewish Book Council, 22 Feb. 2022, www.jewishbookcouncil.org/pb-daily/not-meant-for-children-felix-salten-and-the-story-of-bambi#:~:text=Bambi%3A%20A%20Life%20in%20the,who%20deserved%20to%20be%20annihilated. Accessed 19 Mar. 2025.