Queer Places:
Neulinggasse, Vienna

The Story of Sidonie C: Freud's famous Margarete Csonka von Trautenegg (April 26, 1900 – August, 1999) belonged to the great Austrian burgeoisie of Jewish origin that had converted to Catholicism. Sigmund Freud treated Margarete Csonka. Carefree and worldly, loving the luxury and freedom that her fortune and her elegance afforded her, she had always been attracted by women, though without desiring sexual relations with them. Thus she had rejected the advances of her friend Christl Kmunke, whose lesbianism was completely overt. In 1917, Margarethe experienced a delirious passion for the flamboyant baroness Leonie von Puttkamer, a demimondaine from the Prussian nobility, supported by men and going out openly with women. Lennie found it amusing to see Margarete following her everywhere, idolizing her, serving her, and indulging in the pose of a troubadour straight out of chivalric literature. One day, surprised by her father on the arm of the baroness, Margarete fled to escape his gaze. Leonie dismissed her. Margarete then attempted suicide, and her father, Arpad Csonka, obliged her to consult Freud to bring an end to the scandal of this homosexuality deemed intolerable.

Margarete Csonka was born in Lviv, Lviv Oblast, Ukraine, to Arpad Csonka and Irma Csonka. Margarethe's mother was very flirtatious and was not indifferent to the attentions of men and it was rumoured that Paul Csonka, one of Margarethe's brothers, was the illegitimate son of Emperor Franz Joseph. Paul Csonka became a renowned composer and conductor, a friend of Karajan, Toscanini and Klemperer. Margarete Csonka married Eduard Rzemenowsky von Trautenegg, and she had relationship with Bertha Hermine Leonie von Puttkamer and Wjera Fechheimer.

Sidonie Csillag, nicknamed Gretl, whose real name is Margarethe Csonka-Trautenegg, underwent under analysis with Sigmund Freud in Vienna in 1919, for four and a half months. In 1920, she inspired him to write the case entitled On the Psychogenesis of a Case of Female Homosexuality, which was his only case on the subject of female homosexuality and ended in failure.

In February 1919, Sigmund Freud received a man from the Viennese bourgeoisie to discuss the fact that his daughter was flirting with a woman. A cure ensues, which he concludes by claiming that it was a failure. In 1920, this case was published in the German language under the title On the psychogenesis of a case of female homosexuality included in the French collection Neurosis, Psychosis and Perversion. In 2000, two German journalists and activists, Ines Rieder and Diana Voigt published her biography, Sidonie Csillag, homosexual at Freud, lesbian in the century, with documents on the woman she was in love with, Anita Berber, and supplemented by numerous interviews with the patient more than fifty years after the experience of the cure. Jean Allouch published a book on the subject in 2004, Shadow of your dog, psychoanalytic discourse, lesbian discourse.

rieder ines voigt diana - AbeBooks


Sidonie Csillag, Wjera Fechheimer, Helene Rothballer in Wienerwald, 1936


Margarethe Trautenegg in der Sommerfrische


Margarethe Trautenegg in Havanna, 1940s


Margarethe Trautenegg


Vera Fechheimer by Margarethe Trautenegg

After being involved in a poison murder charge, whose defectors lead into right-wing political circles and into the Purple Berlin of Anita Berber, Sidi feels for the first time great affection for a man, but this relationship is doomed to failure by the early death of the lover. This is followed by a marriage forced by society. The marriage was not divorced, but annulled, because a new law stipulated that "mixed marriages" would be annulled if one spouse had concealed the affiliation to the "Jewish race" before the wedding of the other. Since her Jewish origin was never an issue for Gretl, she had not talked about it with her husband. And so she was suddenly unmarried again from one day to the next, as if the not always conflict-free years of marriage had never existed.

Under the Nazi regime Margarethe Trautenegg emigrated to Cuba where she resumed her former hobby, portraiture, before returning to Vienna via Paris in 1949. She spent most of her twilight years travelling, until she died in Vienna in 1999, almost one hundred years old. In 2004, following the publication of their book on Margarethe Trautenegg, Heimliches Begehren. Die Geschichte der Sidonie C., the two authors, Ines Rieder and Diana Voigt, donated Margarethe Trautenegg’s estate to the Sigmund Freud Private Foundation, together with tape recordings and transcripts of interviews.

Chronology:

1891 Birth of Léonie von Puttkamer. December 3, 1895, in Vienna. Birth of Anna Freud. 1897 Marriage of Antal Csillag and Ema. 1899 Heinrich Csillag is born in Lemberg.

April 26, 1900 Sidonie Csillag is born in Lemberg. Csillag children are entitled to a registered baptism. 1902 Antal Csillag founds the company for the transport and storage of Boryslaw crude oil. The Csillags move to Vienna. 1905 Birth of Robert Csillag. 1909 A splendid apartment on the Neulinggasse. At thirteen or fourteen, Sidonie displays an excessively strong towards a three year old boy found in a square.

June 1914 The Austro-Hungarian monarchy declares war on Serbia. November 1916 Death of the old emperor. 1917 First revolutionary wave in Russia. June 1917 Birth of Ernst, third brother of Sidonie Csillag. 1917 Heinrich leaves for war. On vacation, Sidonie tries to bond with a film artist, which she dislikes her father. Sidonie finishes her high school. She will remain friends with Ellen Schoeller, later to be surnamed Ferstel, as well as Grete Weinberger and Christl Schallenberg; Christl Kmunke, a homosexual friend her age whose Sidonie rejects hints, she too will remain her friend and her messenger. On summer vacation at the Semmering at the Panhans hotel, Sidonie sees for the first time to Leonie von Puttkamer in the company of Klara Waldmann. She returned to Vienna. Sidonie spies on the Baroness at the Grand Hotel, then the she goes on and takes the same tram. She has broken the ice, a gesture of giving way in the style of a knight errant during that first encounter. From now on, Sidonie will accompany her lover every day. Faced with such passion, her father is alert and severe, her mother tolerant and indifferent. Early 1918 On a walk, Sidonie and Léonie's partner come across him Sidonie's father. Various versions. Sidonie throws herself onto the platform of the urban railway. "Six months after that accident" the consultation takes place according to the Freud's account. But it seems that it was more like almost a year later, already that parents consult Freud in February 1919. Spring 1918 Sidonie finds her lover in a better disposition towards she. Summer 1918 In Semmering with her mother, who "seduces and flirts such to the point that her daughter dies of shame and disgust ”. A humiliating episode in which her mother denies Sidonie as a potential competitor. November 11, 1918 Signing of the cease-fire between the German Empire and the allies. Sidonie visits the baroness in the apartment provided by the earl Apponyi (until July 1920). Read with her Joséphine Mutzenbacher. 1918 Freud, "The taboo of virginity." October 1, 1918 Beginning of Anna Freud's analysis with her father, six sessions per week, until spring 1922, then there is a two-year hiatus and resumed in 1924. February 1919 Sidonie's parents consult Freud about her. Sidonie goes to 19 Bergasse five times a week at the hour of siesta, 3:30 p.m. Despite her promise to her parents, Sidonie sees her again. Léonie after her sessions with Freud, at the Herrenhof café. Even she'll wait for Léonie at the talkative hairdresser who Emma also goes to. Mid-June 1919 Sidonie counts the days (two weeks) until summer vacation (rush to break up with Freud), Anna has been in analysis with her father for six months (according to the authors, nine months in my opinion; instead, perhaps “six months” is the time that there would be Freud's dealings with Sidonie lasted). Anna goes on vacation with the Rie family. Summer 1919 Sidonie spends a season in Brioni. September 1919 Freud tells Sidonie to end their analysis at the time of the first session after the summer holidays. For her part, Sidonie wishes Freud to tell her father that Léonie " he pushed her out of the straight path towards her bed. " Freud says, by leaving Sidonie: "You have a very cunning look ... I would not like to find you for life as her enemy." August 1919 “They beat a child. Contribution to the knowledge of the genesis of sexual perversions ”, inspired by the case of Anna.

January 1920 Death of Sophie Halberstadt, Freud's daughter. 1920 Freud publishes “On the psychogenesis of a case of homosexuality feminine ”. KLAUS / FRITZ 1921 Freud invites Lou Andreas-Salomé to Vienna. It's about Lou and Anna arguing. Importance of an interlocutor woman for Anna. January 1921 Albert Gessmann divorces his wife Paula Gessmann from him. March 1921 Léonie and Gessmann move to Sebastianplatz. Summer 1921 Léonie tries to meet the nudist dancer Anita Berber. February 4, 1922 Léonie and Gessmann are married. August 1922 Léonie and Gessmann divorce. 1922 "Flagellation Fantasies and Daydreams", Anna's lecture for her candidacy at the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society. Summer 1922 Sidonie on the shores of Lake Wörthersee, with Heinrich. She meets Klaus Bäckström who is courting her and Fritz Dietz von Weidenberg, first man that interests you. They make an arrangement between themselves (that she unknown). Fritz knows that she is an esthete. September 1922 Sidonie realizes Léonie's passion for Anita Berber. She is afraid that will happen to her one day. December 1922 A brawl in the Tabarin involving Anita Berber. December 1922 Léonie leaves to settle in Berlin. Sidonie tries to end her days. She steals a poison vial from a friend, she takes one night. Which causes several hours of discomfort and many vomiting, but she does not die. 1923 Léonie returns from Berlin, accompanied by Carola Horn, to spend six weeks in Vienna, then she returns to Berlin. Autumn 1923 Leónie goes to Munich. Tumultuous relationships at the same Letters from Albert Gessmann arrive. Different companions: Susi Wanowski, Bebi Becker, Gisela Spira, Lotte Oeltjen, Carola Horn, etc. February 1923 First kiss from a man, Klaus. Sidonie is grossed out. Spring 1923 she announces to her parents that Klaus is asking for her hand. February 1923 Freud has cancer of the jaw, undergoes an operation on April 20 and another on November 12. In the course of sixteen years he following he will be operated on sixteen more times. Anna will no longer leave her father. June 19, 1923 Death of Freud's grandson, Heinerle Halberstadt, a five years of age. March 1924 Léonie returns to Vienna; Léonie's new marriage to Gessmann. March 26, 1924 Albert Gessmann begins a trial against his wife for attempted poisoning. Process and scandal. March 29, 1924 Declaration of Sidonie. April 5, 1924 Absolution of suspicion of poisoning. Albert sends Léonie to the Löwy health home in Sulz-Stangau. June 1924 Gessmann is examined by Wagner-Jauregg. July 1924 Sidonie sends a telegram to Leónie from Brioni: she requests that I end all contact with my daughter. Antal Csillag ”. October 1924 she takes care of the wedding dress. Suicide attempt in Weinberger's home in Katzelsdorf. Sidonie shoots himself with a revolver. She missed her heart by an inch. The attending physician at the Wiener Neustadt hospital tells her: “you are a typical asexual”. She know cancels the marriage project. 1925 Another failed meeting with Fritz. 1925 Freud gives Anna a wolf dog, Wolf. She insisted to have a Male large enough to give him the feeling of being protected during his solitary summer walks in the Semmering. March 1926 Fritz, hospitalized for venereal disease, dies of septicemia, Sidonie dresses in strict mourning. Spring 1926, in Prague, at the home of Marianne Kraus Winterberger, first sexual approach with a female body, Sidonie only lives "With the fervor of the others." She dresses as the Knight of the Rose. Summer of 1926 in Brioni. Fall 1926 Business training, although Sidonie does not want to work. July 1927 Fire in the Vienna courthouse. Sidonie resumes her riding courses at the Prater. She meets Eduard von Weitenegg. 1928 she Accepts Ed's invitation. "Pays her tribute to normality", repulsive experience, though she doesn't say so. "When things start to fit in, it's over, that's how it worked, apparently ”. Heinrich Csillag lives in Paris; he will obtain French nationality. 1929 Economic debacle.

May 18, 1930 Sidonie and Eduard are married. Sidonie receives as a gift from wedding of her father the dishes of actress Katharina Schratt from Burgtheater acquired at the Dorotheum. April 17, 1931 Death of Antal Csillag. Robert Csillag leaves business and begins studies at the Conservatory. Spring 1933 Robert Csillag marries singer Herta Glaz who she works with Ernst Krenek until November 1935. They will soon begin cancel concerts in Austria. WJERA November 1934 Sidonie meets Wjera Fechheimer, daughter of Helene Rothballer, at Ellen Ferstel's house; she falls in love with her and looks for her in the hotel like before she did it with Léonie. Wjera, widow of Ernst Gutmann in 1925, is married since 1928 with Hans Martin, they live in Nuremberg. Sidonie multiplies the encounters with Ellen for six months to hear from her lover. April 28, 1935 Sidonie invites Wjera to her house and manages to hug her by surprise. 1935 Racial laws are enacted in Nuremberg. June 1935 The Fechheimers settle in Munich. Christmas 1935 Sidonie anonymously sends Wjera flowers and a poem. 1936 Franz, Ed's brother, pro-Nazi, dies after an operation for appendicitis. Summer 1936 in Saint-Gilgen. Robert is about to found a company opera with Herta Glaz and Ernst Krenek. 1936 Sidonie goes to listen to the Salzburg Opera Guild, which is performed at the Count Almeida's castle on the shores of Lake Mondsee. November 1936 Comrades from the Heimwehr offer Ed the leadership of the Austrian Institute for Visual Statistics. 1937 Robert's musical ensemble embarks on a tour of the States United. 1938 Annexation of Austria by Germany. Anschluss. March 15, 1938 Hitler arrives in Vienna. March 26 Hermann Göring declares that Vienna must be “purified of Jews” in four years. April 1 First transportation of detainees. March 1938 Sidonie sees certain humiliations imposed on the Jews, such as Sweep the streets. May 9, 1938 Ed learns that he can continue to serve as his. Ed proposes to Sidonie that they get divorced. September 13, 1938 A decree annuls their marriage. Robert and Ernst cannot stay in the United States, the quota of Austrian immigrants has been filled. Summer and Fall 1938 Sidonie helps her mother pack her bags with you look at her emigration to France with Heinrich. August 17, 1938 A decree dictates that as of January 1939 the Jews should bear the name of Israel and the Jewish women that of Sarah, along with their first names. December 1938 The moving service empties her mother's apartment, Sidonie lives sublet with a friend. January 1, 1939 The vexatious laws against the Jews are accentuated. February 16, 1939 Emma Csillag leaves Vienna. In the course of the journey in Accompanying her mother, Sidonie visits Wjera and her husband in Munich. She returns to Vienna, but at the end of February she thinks about leaving. February 21, 1939 Jews are ordered to hand over their objects of value at public outlets. For Sidonie, handing over her jewelry is the drop that makes the glass overflow. March 1939 Arrest of Willy Weinberger and Hugo Wazlawek by the Gestapo. The three young people who denounced them for homosexuality (article 129 b) will also be deported. April 1939 Hugo is released. July 11, 1939 Willy is released, named on the background record, and expunged in 1942. September 1, 1939 The German army invades Poland.

IN CUBA Early 1940 Sidonie tries to get a place on a ship and a visa for Cuba. April 1940 Failed attempt to leave for Hamburg. Return to Vienna; Sidonie is forced to enlist the help of an agency, the Gildemeester. June 1940 Paris is occupied and Marshal Pétain becomes the head of the French government. June 22 Armistice, German and Austrian emigrants are no longer protected. Heinrich, in the unoccupied area, cannot get his mother brought in. August 12, 1940 in Berlin, Sidonie sees Léonie again after sixteen years. Her love for the Baroness still lingers. September 19 Jews are forced to wear a yellow star. Four and a half months of travel. Berlin Königsberg Moscow. The 18 of August 1940 Sidonie boards the Trans-Siberian. 23 August, Irkutsk, 27 Harbin in Manchuria. Then Japan and a wait until October. On 24 October she embarks to cross the Pacific. On November 7, Honolulu, November 17 San Francisco. On the boat she meets the Peruvian Carlos, who makes a direct proposal that she rejects. On December 4, Balboa in Panama, December 24, last ship. December 27 Havana. Sidonie is in Cuba with her young people brothers Robert and Ernst. In Havana, Sidonie attends language school. Friendship with Jeannette, a French. May 1941 Heinrich returns to look for his mother to whom he gives a ultimatum to flee from Paris; but she has a flu on the scheduled day. At the end of May 1941 Heinrich is arrested in the course of raids anti-Jewish, he is interned in the Pithiviers camp. However, he will get false papers for his mother. June 1941 Germany attacks the USSR. Heinrich escapes with his friend Léo thanks to the help of a young woman from Mail. He will remain hidden for two years in the pantry of fruits of that woman's family. Summer of 1941 Cuba. The Csillag village is built in Miramar. Sidonie becomes attached to her dog Petzi. 1942 Interruption of the postal exchange with Europe. Late 1942 Wjera Fechheimer's in-laws are deported to Theresienstadt. Sidonie hangs out with Gisela and meets the Cuban historian Lydia Cabrera. 1943 Sidonie gets rid of Gisela by endorsing her to a conductor who makes court to her. Wonderful relief. 1943 Defeat of the Germans in Stalingrad, insurrection of the ghetto of Warsaw. In Germany the humiliations against the Jews are accentuated. In Munich, Hans Martin Fechheimer no longer leaves his apartment; he has lung disorders that he cannot treat. Instead hope of an upcoming departure for Heinrich. Early 1944 Relationship with Marie-Louise. Marie-Louise gets a husband to have a child; Sidonie is not jealous. 1944 Landing in Normandy. Heinrich can come out of hiding from him. I know will marry the younger of the two sisters of the family who saved the lifetime. February 1945 The war is lost for Germany, but the machinery Nazi continues. Hans is arrested sick by the Gestapo to be taken away to Dachau. April 1945 Hans attends the liberation of the camp by the US Army, but his illness worsened and he died two weeks later. 1945 Sidonie is forced to work. She lives (together with Petzi) on the plantation Mercedes de los Mattacena, taking care of Orestes until June 1947. The boy adores her. 1948 Sidonie meets Marie-Louise in the United States and finds a job in Brooklyn with an invalid lady; her husband teaches Sidonie about her Jewish customs. Petzi spends the week at Marie Louise's house in Connecticut and Sidonie returns there on the weekends. Intense erotic experience on a train. One of her hands rested on her thigh, she pretends to sleep. April 1949 Sidonie embarks for Europe with Petzi. Separation of Marie-Louise. PETZI June 1949 Sidonie arrives in Cherbourg. First week in Paris. She goes back to see her mother and her older brother, she hears Heinrich's account. Return from Sidonie to Vienna with Petzi. She is waiting for her friends Muni and Grete Weinberger, Sylvie Dietz, Christl Schallenberg (missing Ellen). She finds her childhood friend Ellen Ferstel seriously ill (a misdiagnosed skull fissure after a fall in 1920). She returns to see Ed who has managed to keep his position; she disgusted by her story, she leaves him definitively. Summer 1949 Vacation in the Austrian Alps with her mother. Meeting organized with Wjera in Golling. The planned weekend in Golling lasts ten days, the two women love and desire each other, honeymoon; she takes her out photos to Wjera. Exceptional moment. Sidonie knows that happy moment she can't sign up for the duration. I return to Vienna, a year at Ellen's house that suffers more and more. Sidonie she (who hates everything that affects her body) cannot bear to accompany Ruth, Ellen's daughter, in her delivery. Sidonie finds out that Ed has sex with his maid and also incestuous relations with her daughter, by his first marriage; indignant, she intervenes before Heinrich to make to finish the money transfers they had agreed to.

1950 New Years at the Ferstel's. February 1950 Travel to meet Wjera, along with Grete Weinberger and Sylvie Dietz for evening bridge and Petzi with Maria Taferl, Sidonie no he cares more than Petzi. Tense atmosphere. Spring 1950 Death of Helene Rothballer, Wjera's mother. Summer 1950 Sidonie and Wjera on the shores of Lake Walchsee, room double, a bit far from Emma's room. Rift. Sidonie uses Petzi as a pretext to avoid displays of tenderness and physical sexuality. Wjera offended urges her to choose. Sidonie leaves with Petzi. At times Sidonie wants to throw herself into the lake, at times she showers Wjera with gifts. Back in Vienna, Wjera continues to claim a continuing relationship, Sidonie is not determined. Wjera ends the relationship. During your next On the trip to Vienna, Wjera refuses to open the door for Sidonie. The only contact that will take place will be when she requests the return of her letters. Sidonie no longer lives at the Ferstel house, but she visits Ellen every other day. Christmas 1952 Ellen passes away. Gas suicide. Sidonie feels like doing the same as Ellen. 1953 Léonie dies in Berlin. Sidonie lives subletting or with friends; she has nothing of her own, she recovers some items kept by Ed, she resells the marriage gift of her father at the Dorotheum; she has to work to live. Representative, classes of languages, portraits, governess of the son of the ambassador of France. 1955 Death of Petzi. BOY / EMMA 1959 Revolution and rise of Fidel Castro in Cuba, Sidonie has recovered her Austrian nationality.

1960 Ruth, eldest daughter of Ellen Ferstel, remarried to a Dutch diplomat, proposes to go to Bangkok for three years; she know take care of her daughter Andrea. Heinrich regrets that Sidonie no longer dedicates her summers to Emma. In Bangkok, a number of animals are acquired, Sidonie becomes attached to the monkey Boy. Sidonie, who is supposed to take care of Andrea, bores the young woman. 1964 Sidonie stays in Thailand with Chico, she becomes a lady of company at the Costa's home. Heinrich and his wife have settled in Algeciras, in southern Spain, Emma is sick. November 1964 Sidonie separates from Chico to go care for her mother. In Algeciras, Emma continues to wait for admirers, insensitive to the presence of her daughter. She makes up suitors and takes rides she doesn't she wants her daughter to accompany her, still considering her as a competitor. That insanity reminds Sidonie of her old wound. February 1965 Chico dies. Sidonie curses God. March 1966 Death of Emma Csillag. June 1966 Sidonie lands in Florida where she meets her brother Ernst hers. Sidonie finds a job as a cook and escort in Scarsdale at Mrs. Herbert's house. 1969 Sidonie is now entitled to Social Security and leaves Mrs. Herbert. Summer 1969 Return to Algeciras. September Visit from Jeannette and then from Elisabeth, her friend from Rotterdam.

November 1970 Return to Vienna spending a few days in Paris. Dinner in Costa's house. Sidonie falls in love with Monique, Jacqueline's niece Coast. In Vienna, Sidonie works in the show reservation office. Spring 1971 Jacqueline Costa proposes to Sidonie to accompany her to Brazil for two years. Three weeks at Jacqueline's in Paris, where she sees Monique several times, she asks her friends to keep her together with them in her castle (near Monique) when she goes on mission has finished. From Rio, Sidonie writes to Monique, who does not reply, and compares the love she feels for her to the attraction of her that a certain Catherine exerts on her. 1973 Trips to the interior of Brazil. I return, passing through Miami to see her brothers, then Paris and the south by Monique. Jacqueline Costa tells him that Monique is not interested in her. Sidonie cannot stay in the castle, which is very badly heated. 1974 Return to Vienna, she lives in the house of Countess Inge Küenburg. 1976 she feels the desire to travel again, Bangkok, Cuba. Marie-Louise is dead, her house is dilapidated, her pictures destroyed. Return to Vienna.

GIRLFRIENDS 1980 Death of Sidonie's host. Lotte, the youngest of the daughters of Ellen, find a house where they house ladies, a house maintained by Caritas, a charitable institution of the Catholic Church.

1996 Dean of the pensioners of the home, Sidonie moves to play bridge, meeting with Dora; Serial misunderstandings (Dora who shows up with bare breasts or who prefers tulips over orchids). Henceforth, her friends are the daughters or granddaughters of her friends. her youth, Lotte and Ruth (daughters of Ellen Ferstel), Andrea, Ruth's daughter. Diana Voigt, the granddaughter of Sylvie Dietz (Fritz's great niece) becomes one of her interviewers. 1998 Sidonie still wants to live a great adventure, she tries to reconnect with Carlos, the Peruvian that she met on the ship in 1940. He sends a flattering photo, Sidonie loses interest. 1999 Sidonie dies in the hundredth year of her life.

2000 Vienna. Publication of the biography written by Ines Rieder and Diana Voigt.


My published books:

See my published books

BACK TO HOME PAGE