Berta Zuckerkandl was born in Vienna, the daughter of Dr. Moritz Szeps, an influential liberal writer and an outstanding European journalists who had studied medicine in his youth. Zuckerkanl’s elder sister, Sophie, married Paul Clemenceau, the brother of the French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau, and moved to France.
As a young woman Berta was secretary to her father, and shared his grief when Crown Prince Rudolph, her father’s close friend, committed suicide in 1889. Berta married Dr. Emil Zuckerkandl, an eminent surgeon, who was appointed to the chair of anatomy at Vienna University.
Berta Zuckerkandl set up a parlor in her home in Doebling, in suburban Vienna, where she entertained famous personalities of the Viennese artistic and cultural circles, including Johann Strauss the younger, August Rodin, Gustav Klimt, Arthur Schnitzler, Gustav Mahler, whom she introduced to his future wife Alma Schindler, and many others in the science and academic world. Later she moved her salon to Palais Lieben-Auspitz at 6 Oppolzergasse in central Vienna. Her home, like many other Jewish salons before her, provided an ideal meeting place for many talented people. She handled her parlor with charm, and intelligence.
During the World War I, Berta Zuckerkandl tried, without success, along with her sister, to reconcile between Austria and the Western Allies, and to reach a separate peace. When the war ended, she restarted her social activities, and among her friends were Max Reinhardt, Dr. Kunwald the Chancellor’s adviser, and Egon Friedell. Berta Zuckerkandl was one of the earliest supporters of the Salzburg Festival.
Although Liberal in thinking from her youth, Berta Zuckerkandl’s political leanings became more Conservative. This, in particular, came about after Chancellor Dolfuss opposed the workers movement in 1934 and she felt betrayed. Following the Anschluss, Berta immigrated to France in 1938, and later on she settled in Algiers, and returned to Paris after the Liberation, and died there in 1945.
Her works include Die Pflege der Kunst in Österreich 1848-1898. Dekorative Kunst und Kunstgewerbe, Vienna, 1900; Zeitkunst Wien 1901-1907, Heller, Vienna, 1908; Ich erlebte 50 Jahre Weltgeschichte, Bermann-Fischer Verlag, Stockholm, 1939; Clemenceau tel que je l’ai connu, Algier 1944, and Österreich intim. Erinnerungen 1892-1942, Propyläen, Frankfurt 1970.