Baroness Orczy

Photograph of fairy tale author Baroness Orczy by unknown photographer from the National Portrait Gallery, 1920.

Emma Magdolna Rozália Mária Jozefa Borbála “Emmuska” Orczy de Orci  Tarnaörs, also known as the author Baroness Orczy, was born in Heves County, Hungary in 1865. She was the daughter of composer and conductor Baron Felix Orczy, and Countess Emma Wass de Szentegyed et Cege. The fairy tale author’s childhood was spent in Brussels, Paris and London, where she studied art and eventually met her husband Montague MacLean Barstow. After the birth of her son, Orczy began working as a literature translator to help make ends meet, and eventually begin writing original novels. She is best known as the author of The Scarlet Pimpernel novels, but she is known for her translated fairy tale collection, Old Hungarian Fairy Tales.