The True Origins of ‘Bambi’
The intriguing story behind the book that led to Disney’s beloved movie about a baby deer plays out in some of Vienna’s most iconic and historic settings and natural landscapes untouched to this day.
One might argue that the movie’s key story element, the scene in which Bambi learns his mother’s fate, is the moment in which Bambi’s world loses its childlike innocence and the young stag is initiated into the real world. Despite the trauma of these moments, the Disney movie is an enchanting coming of age story beloved by three generations of fans.
Hardly anyone knows that Bambi’s character was based on the story of an Austrian stag from the Danube woods near the town of Stockerau, 12.4 miles / 20 km north of Vienna. Its life was immortalized in the novel „Lebensgeschichte aus dem Walde“ by the Viennese author Felix Salten, who was himself a hunter with hunting grounds in those very same woods.
Since its publication in 1923, there has been a lot of speculation about the deeper meaning behind Salten’s novel. Some saw it as a parable for the slaughter during the first World War, some even saw a coded erotic story, still, others interpreted it as a condemnation of technology apostles disturbing the balance of nature by destroying natural woodlands.
The latter would have made Salten a prescient sage, an intellectual forerunner of Greta Thunberg, 100 years before global warming was a widely recognized problem.
Felix Salten found inspiration for his novel during his long walks through the Stockerauer Au near Zögersdorf where he used to hunt, and in the vicinity of his house in the bourgeois Vienna Cottage District (Wiener Cottageviertel) with its - back then still limitless - views of the Vienna Woods.
In many ways, Felix Salten just made notes of everything he observed during his walks and hunting excursions, and then reflected on it with the unflinching realism of a trained journalist. A little like a wartime correspondent witnessing the ceaseless struggle for the survival of the species.
I wanted to free my readers from the faulty perception that nature is a sunny paradise.
As is the case with several Disney movies, the actual screenplay reflected little of these sentiments. When it came to hunting, Felix Salten was far from apologetic. He was also quoted as stating bluntly that “Bambi would have never come to life if I hadn't trained my weapon on the head of many a deer or an elk,” crediting the experience with triggering the observations and reflections that formed the core of his novel.
Where Bambi's Offspring Roam
The Cottageviertel in Vienna
100 years after the publication of his book, the Vienna Cottage District - wrongly pronounced with a drawn-out “ä” in a French fashion by the Viennese - is still a sleepy neighbourhood wedged between two posh suburban districts. Its villas are among the most expensive in Vienna and home to artists and ambassadors.
Ambling from Salten’s villa at Cottagegasse 37 towards the Türkenschanzpark some 100 years later, you get the impression that no time has passed at all. As you enjoy a cup of coffee and admire the beautiful views over the Vienna Woods from the „Salettl“ (Viennese for Pavillon), which was built by Otto Wagner, it is easy to imagine Bambi hopping into view from between the shrubs of the Türkenschanzpark.
Stockerauer Au
Bambi’s offspring are still roaming the woods in the Stockerauer Au, where Salten used to hunt. The untouched river landscape has hardly changed over the last 100 years. Fauna and flora could develop without restrictions and the Danube’s sidearms remained unregulated.
Here, the event Salten seems to warn about has not come to pass and nature has remained intact. An unspoiled piece of nature's paradise that lies only a 20-minute drive away from Vienna.
Nature lovers most often are completely ignorant of nature and the daily violence of the wilderness.
Cottageviertel and Stockerauer Au - Discover Magical Places
Cottageviertel
Stockerauer Au
If the shower scene in “Psycho” was the shocker of the sixties, and to me it was, then the equivalent in the forties was the scene in which Bambi’s mother dies. And the sentence: “The man has entered the woods.”