Austrian popular novelist, whose MENSCHEN IM HOTEL (People in a Hotel, 1929) started her career as one of the most widely-read authors of her time. Baum's novel was made into an Oscar winning film in Hollywood in 1932 under the title Grand Hotel, starring Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Wallace Beery, and Lionel Barrymore.

"Sonderbar ist es mit den Gästen im grossen Hotel. Keiner verlässt die Drehtür so, wie er hereinkam." (from Menschen im Hotel)

Vicki Baum was born in Vienna into a Jewish family, the daughter of Hermann Baum and Mathilde Donath. She spent her childhood in bourgeois surroundings, as "the single child of a good family", but in her memoirs she has revealed that due family problems her childhood was not particularly happy. At the age of eight Baum started to study the harp. Her first stories appeared in print when she was fourteen. Baum studied music six years at the conservatory and was educated as a harp player. Although Baum's first marriage to a journalist in 1914 was short lived, it introduced her to the world of letters and the Viennese culture scene. After the divorce Baum went to Germany, where she played the harp for three years in an orchestra and worked as teacher in the musical high school in Darmstadt.

During World War I Baum worked for a short time as a nurse. In 1916 she married the conductor Richard Lert, who had been her best friend since childhood. Baum gave up music as a profession and accompanied her husband from one town to another. In 1926 she went to Berlin, where she worked as an editor for the publishing company Ullstein-Velag.

"I want to be alone... I think I have never been so tired in my life." (Greta Garbo as Grusinskaya in Grand Hotel, 1932)

Baum's literary breakthrough novel, People in a Hotel, was published in 1929. The story about a fading prima ballerina, shady nobleman, and other types who in one weekend pass through an elegant hotel, was told with an acute perception of minor detail. Baum had taken a job as a parlourmaid in a hotel for six weeks to gather material for the novel. She dramatized the text for the Berlin stage in the same year. The play turned into a sensation and its English language adaptation gained a huge success in New York in the early 1930s. Irving Thalberg, the famous MGM producer, got its synopsis in 1930. The role of Grusinskaya, an aging prima ballerina, seemed perfect for Greta Garbo. Joan Crawford was chosen for the role of the slut-stenographer, Flaemmchen. The last line of the picture was reserved for Dr. Otternschlag (Lewis Stone): "Grand Hotel. Always the same. People come, people go. Nothing ever happens." The gala opening of the film was held at Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Grand Hotel won a Best Picture Oscar and later Crawford told the film was her first big chance. "They told me I wouldn't be able to hold my own with the big boys, against Garbo and the Barrymores. But I proved otherwise." In London moviegoers camped out on the pavement overnight outside the Palace Theatre so they could be the first to see the film.

"Adaptation of Vicki Baum's novel Menschen im Hotel is erratically acted by the male stars, but Garbo and especially Crawford, who was never more appealing, glow – as Hollywood stars once did." (from Guide for the Film Fanatic by Danny Peary, 1986)

HELL IN FAUEMSEE (1930) Baum used the successful formula of Grand Hotel. This time she collected a group of colourful people in a bathing establishment in Thüringen at the Alps. The protagonist, Urban Hell, is a poor but talented chemist, who works as swimming instructor, and becomes acquainted with an eccentric baroness, famous actress, and industrialist who has two beautiful daughters, May and Karla. After visiting Bali in 1935, Baum wrote A TALE FROM BALI (1937), about a family caught in the middle of the Puputan Badung War and massacre of 1906.

In the 1930s Baum emigrated with her family to the United States and became a screenwriter in Hollywood. Her popular books were banned in Hitler's Germany. Baum often depicted powerful, self-reliant women caught up the social and economic turbulence of the 20th-century Europe or the US. Starting in 1941 with THE SHIP AND THE SHORE she wrote all her books in English, and produced a novel every two or three years. Baum died of leukemia in Hollywood on August 29, 1960. Her later works include HOTEL BERLIN '43, set in the Nazi Germany, and THEME FOR BALLET, which concerned the American career of a beautiful Viennese danseuse. Baum's memoir, IT WAS ALL QUITE DIFFERENT, appeared posthumously in 1964.

For forther reading: World Authors 1900-1950, Volume 1, ed. by Martin Seymour-Smith and Andrew C. Kimmens (1996); Best-Sellers by Design: Vicki Baum and the House of Ullstein by L. King (1988) - Other films based on Vicki Baum's works: Lac-aux-dames, dir. by Marc Allégret (1934); The Great Flamarion, dir. by Anthony Mann (1945), starring Erich Von Stroheim and Dan Duryea; Le château de verre, dir. by René Clément (1950); Futures vedettes, dir. by Marc Allégret (1954)

Selected works:

• FRÜHE SCATTEN, 1919
• SCHLOSSTHEATER, 1920 (novelettes)
• DER EINGANG ZUR BÜHNE, 1920 - Once in Vienna (tr. 1943) - FILM 1955, Futures vedettes, dir. Marc Allégret, starring Jean Marais, Brigitte Bardot, Isabelle Pia
• DIE TÄNZE DER INA RAFFAY, 1921
• WELT OHNE SÜNDE, 1922
• DIE ANDERN TAGE, 1922 (novelettes)
• BUBENREISE, 1923
• ULLE, DER ZWERG, 1924
• DAS CHRISTSTERNLEIN, 1924
• DER WEG, 1924 (novelette)
• TANZPAUSE, 1926 (novelette)
• FERNE, 1926 - Secret Sentence (tr. Eric Sutton, 1932) -film 1927, dir. Richard Oswald, starring Eduard Rothauser, Mathilde Sussin, Hans Stüwe, Grete Mosheim, prod. Richard-Oswald-Produktion
• MINIATUREN, 1926
• HELL IN FRAUENSEE, 1927 - Martin's Summer (tr. Basil Creighton, 1931) - Uimaopettaja Urban Hell (suom. Unto Koskela, 1931) - films: 1928, Die Drei Frauen von Urban Hell, dir. Jaap Speyer, screenplay by Vicki Baum, starring Hilde Maroff, Mona Maris, Alfred Döderlein, Mia Pankau, Angelo Ferrari; 1934, Lac Aux Dames, starring Simone Simon, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Rosine Derean, Michel Simon, Odette Joyeux; 1981, TV film, dir. Wolfgang Panzer
• MENSCHEN IM HOTEL, 1929 - Grand Hotel (tr. 1931) - Loistohotelli (suom. Clara Borenius, 1931) - films: 1932, dir. by Edmund Golding, starring Wallace Beery, Joan Crawford, John Barrymore and Greta Garbo (the story depicts a luxurious Berlin hotel, in which a Russian ballerina, played by Garbo, falls in love with baron – Barrymore – who means to rob her. Joan Crawford is a stenographer and Wallace Beery an industrialist. "Our observations must also record the extremely pathetic Miss Garbo, before whose photograph countless American college boys have been offering up prayers these last ten years. For all her beautiful head and appealingly awkward lankiness, Miss Garbo steadily loses her spell through the sound machines. Speaking our language badly, she must be cast always as a foreigner, mumbling but a few words at a time. As usual she has the air of an aspirin addict; she still wears the perpetual headache which once seemed so intriguing in the deaf-and-dumb pictures." Matthew Josephson in the New Republic, April 27, 1932); 1945, Weekend at the Waldorf, adapted by Guy Bolton, screenplay by Sam and Bella Spewack, starring Ginger Rogers, Van Johnson, Walter Pidgeon, Lana Turner; 1959, Menschen im Hotel, dir. by Gottfried Reinhardt, starring Michèle Morgan, O.W. Fischer, Heinz Rühmann, Gert Fröbe, Sonja Ziemann
• STUD. CHEM. HELENE WILLFÜER, 1929 - Helene (tr. by Ida Zeitlin, 1932) - Naisylioppilas (suom. Joel Lehtonen, 1930) - films: 1930, dir. Fred Sauer, starring Olga Tschechowa, Ernst Stahl-Nachbaur, Elza Temary, Igo Sym, prod. Ideal-Film GmbH; 1936, Hélène, dir. Jean Benoît-Lévy, starring Madeleine Renaud, Jean-Louis Barrault, Constant Rémy, prod. Les Films Marquise; 1956, dir. Rudolf Jugert, starring Ruth Niehaus, Hans Söhnker, Elma Karlowa, Erik Schumann
• GRAND HOTEL, 1930 (play, with John Golden)
• ZWISHENFALL IN LOHWINKEL, 1930 - And Life Goes On (tr. Margaret Goldsmith, 1931) / Results of an Accident (U.K. title)
• PARIZER PLATZ 13, 1931 (play) - TV film 1963, Haus der Schönheit, dir. Eugen York, cast: Maria Sebaldt, Alexander Kerst, Fita Benkhoff, Gisela Fackeldey, prod. Südwestfunk (SWF)
• LEBEN OHNE GEHEIMNIS, 1932 - Falling Star (tr. 1934)
• DIVINE DRUDGE, 1933 (play, based on Zwiscehnfall in Lohnwinckel)
• JAPE IM WARENHAUS, 1935
• DAS GROSSE EINMALEINS, 1935 (RENDEZVOUS IN PARIS) - Men Never Know (tr. Basil Creighton, 1935) - film 1982, dir. Gabi Kubach, starring Claude Jade, Harald Kuhlmann, Barry Stokes, Vérénice Rudolph, Gunther Malzacher
• 'The Big Shot' (in Collier's, Sept. 19), 1936 - film 1945, dir. Anthony Mann, screenplay by Heinz Herald, starring Erich von Stroheim, Mary Beth Hughes, Dan Duryea
• DIE KARRIERE DER DORIS HART, 1936 - Sing, Sister, Sing (tr. by Basil Creighton, 1939) / Career (U.K. title) - film 1950, La Belle que voilà, dir. Jean-Paul Le Chanois, starring Michèle Morgan, Henri Vidal, Henri Arius, Jean Debucourt
• DER GROSSE AUSVERKAUF, 1937 - Central Stores (tr. 1940) - Suuri loppuunmyynti (suomentanut Kersti Bergroth, 1939)
• LIEBE UND TOD AUF BALI, 1937 - Tale of Bali (tr. by Basil Creighton) / A Tale from Bali (U.K. title)
• HOTEL SHANGHAI, 1939 - Shanghai '37 (tr. Basil Creighton, 1939) / Nanking Road (U.K. title) - TV film 1996, dir. Peter Patzak, cast: Agnieszka Wagner, Nicholas Clay, James McCaffrey, prod. Durniok Produktion
• DANCE, GIRL, DANCE, 1940 (story); film dir. Dorothy Arzner, starring Maureen O'Hara, Louis Hayward, Lucille Ball
• DIE GROSSE PAUSE, 1941 - Grand Opera (tr. 1942) - Väliverho nousee (suom. Sole Ueæküll, 1949)
• MARION LEBT, 1941 - Marion Alive (tr. 1942) - Marion elää (suom. Aira Aalto, 1948)
• THE SHIP AND THE SHORE, 1941
• HOTEL BERLIN '43, 1944 (U.K. title: BERLIN HOTEL) - Odota minua (suom. Olavi Salas, 1947) - film 1945, dir. Peter Godfrey, starring Faye Emerson, Helmut Dantine, Helmut Dantine, Peter Lorre, Andrea King
• KAUTSCHUK, 1944 (CAHUCHU) - The Weeping Wood (tr. 1943)
• HIER STAND EIN HOTEL, 1944
• MORTGAGE ON LIFE, 1946 - Padot murtuvat (suom. Olavi Salas, 1948) - film A Woman's Secret (1949), dir. by Nicholas Ray, screenplay by Herman J. Mankiewicz, starring Maureen O'Hara, Gloria Grahame, Melvyn Douglas
• SCHIKSALSFLUG, 1947 - Flight of Fate (tr. 1965) - Kohtalonlento (suom. Olli Nuorto, 1950)
• HEADLESS ANGEL, 1948 - Päätön enkeli (suom. Olli Nuorto, 1951)
• CLARINDA, 1949
• DANGER FROM DEER, 1951 - Varokaa kaurista (suom. Olli Nuorto, 1952)
• VOR REHEN WIRD GEWARNT, 1952 - film 1956, Liebe, dir. Horst Hächler, screenplay Jochen Huth, starring Maria Schell, Raf Vallone, Eva Kotthaus, Camilla Spira
• KRISTALL IM LEHM, 1953
• THE MUSTARD SEED, 1953
• WRITTEN ON WATER, 1956 (U.K. title: BLOOD ON THE SEA)
• TIBURON, 1956 - Tiburon (suom. Mario Talaskivi, 1958)
• EINZAMER WEG, 1958
• DIE GOLDENE SCHULE, 1958
• THEME FOR BALLET, 1958 (U.K. title: BALLERINA) - Ballerina (suom. Martta Eskelinen, 1960)
• ES WAR ALLES GANZ ANDERS, 1962 - It Was All Quite Different (tr. 1964) / I Know What I'm Worth (U.K. title)
• VERPFÄNDETES LEBEN, 1963