Karen Blixen’s Kenya

The Karen Blixen Museum was once the centrepiece of a farm at the foot of the Ngong Hills, 10 km from Nairobi’s city centre. Danish author Karen Blixen and her Swedish husband, Baron Bror von Blixen Fincke, owned the farm.

The National Museums of Kenya took over the house in 1985, and it was officially opened as a museum in 1985. The Karen Blixen Museum reflects a period in the history of Kenya when European settlers and a British colonial government ruled the African peoples. 

Mbogani House was the main house on the farm. In 1917, the Karen Coffee Company bought the house, which was originally constructed by a Swedish settler in 1912. Blixen sold it at an auction in 1931. The Danish state bought it in 1963, and then donated it to the Nat Museums of Kenya.

The farmhouse gained international fame with the release of the movie “Out of Africa,” starring Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. The movie is based on Karen Blixen's autobiographical novel of the same name from 1937. It won 7 Academy Awards, including Best Picture (1985).

At the time of the publication of arguably her most famous work, Out of Africa (1937), Karen Blixen was not well known and, because she published under the name Isak Dinesen, many people thought she was a man.

Danish and British publishers overlooked her early in her career, and an American published her first novel, Seven Gothic Tales (1934). Blixen soon rose to fame, however, and she was considered several times for the Nobel Prize in Literature. 

In April 1934, Isak Dinesen’s Seven Gothic Tales entranced American readers. The short stories told of fate and fantasy, aristocrats and peasants. The American writer Dorothy Canfield Fisher was a friend of Blixen’s aunt, and she convinced her publisher to print the stories.

Karen Blixen wrote her nonfiction memoir Out of Africa after she moved back to Denmark. In this work, she reflected on her life as a settler in Kenyan from 1914 to 1931. She wrote with nostalgia about the land and the people of Kenya and about her personal triumphs and hardships.

This photo shows Blixen with some of the native Kenyans who lived and worked on her farm. She considered herself friends with the Kenyans whom she met and employed.

Today, some credit her writings as among the first to describe Africans as individuals while others categorize it as racist. 

Most Karen Blixen’s later works were Romantic tales in the style of her Seven Gothic Tales. She could write in both English and Danish, and several of her works were published in both languages simultaneously. 

Karen Blixen’s marriage to her second cousin, Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke, was complicated from the start. His twin brother, Hans von Blixen-Finecke, a renowned horseman, was the love of Karen’s youth. But it was Bror with whom she moved to Kenya.

While married and in Kenya, Blixen met and fell deeply in love with Denys Finch Hatton, an English aristocrat and army officer. Bror Blixen had affairs of his own and asked for a divorce. Karen never married again and did not have children.

Bror, a great hunter, wrote in his autobiography, African Hunter, about hardships during his time with Karen in Kenya: “Difficulty upon difficulty arose. The plantation had to be sold. My home was broken up...

...I stood there in the forest empty-handed, but still had my sporting rifle.”

Denys Finch Hatton was a trader and safari leader in East Africa. He was killed when his private plane crashed in 1931. By that time, however, Karen and he were no longer together.

Both von Blixen-Finecke and Hatton were sought-after big game hunters. They were guides for the Prince of Wales’ royal safaris. The author Ernest Hemmingway was thought to have based the hunter in his novel The Short and Happy Life of Francis Macomber on Blixen. 

Once in Kenya, Bror von Blixen decided to grow coffee. The timing of this decision was disastrous. World War I began shortly after the Blixen’s moved onto their first farm, Mbagathi.

The war left little in the way of supplies and staff, and the British government banned the import of coffee. Cattle-plague, drought, and Bror’s reckless spending also affected the farm.

There were setbacks at the gibber farm Mbogani, and the Karen Coffee Company never turned a profit.

This is a coffee-drying machine. The Karen Coffee Company was backed financially by both Karen’s and Bror’s families. After Karen’s divorce, her uncle fired Bror as manager and hired Karen. Ultimately also unsuccessful, Karen was forced to sell the farm at auction in 1931.

Divorced and financially ruined after the farm failed, Karen Blixen moved back into her mother’s home, “Rungstedlund,”in Denmark. She was 46 years old. Forced to find a new career focus, she returned to her earlier passion of writing. 

In Kenya, Karen Blixen showed a talent for hospitality. She entertained aristocrats and artists. Back home in Denmark, she enjoyed the perks of her fame, which allowed her to meet other celebrities.

She also liked the adoration of her fans, especially when she traveled to the United States, where she was very well received. Photographs show her in highly stylized headwear and clothing.

Radio readings reveal her smooth, deep voice as she recited her own stories, which she had learned by heart.

Karen Blixen befriended celebrities. She had a memorable meeting with the movie icon Marilyn Monroe at a party in America at which she was rumoured to have danced on a table. She also befriended fellow authors, such as H.G. Wells and Aldous Huxley.

Fascinated with art since she studied it in her youth, Karen Blixen enjoyed exploring colour and composition in flower arranging. She would arrange flowers from her own cutting gardens and have them placed throughout her home.

The cooking and eating of an elaborate meal is showcased in another Oscar-winning movie, based on Karen Blixen’s work Babette’s Feast. The movie’s setting, director, and actors were all Danish. 

After a long battle with a chronic illness, Karen Blixen died from emaciation in 1962. She left behind a great love of the people and land of Kenya, which she lyrically portrayed in her writings.

The success of the movie version of her book Out of Africa highlighted the time and place in which she lived—even though it was not without controversy. Surrounded by suburbs, today, the Karen Blixen Museum is also a testament—much like her writing—to a different Kenya. 

The fact that Karen Blixen participated in the colonization of Africa complicates the story of this great writer. She herself was not naïve in this matter, and she spoke and wrote openly about issues between Europeans and Africans.

Karen Blixen’s home in Denmark is also a museum. In her last years, Karen Blixen asked for donations from the public to protect the house and land as a bird reserve. Her flower gardens continue to grow on the 40-acre property.