Holger Henrik Herholdt Drachmann (1846-1908) was a Danish poet and painter. He is considered to be one of the pioneers of the breakthrough in modernism. He was born in Copenhagen as a cousin to the politician Viggo Hørup. He was educated a painter, but poetry won him over. He had his breakthrough with the poem collection Digte (1872), which showed revolutionary interest. He was noted for the many women, who inspired his poetry, but very often were the cause of scandals. After his first divorce he started a passionate relationship to a married woman, Polly. He had a child with her, but she ran away from him. In Hamburg he met a young girl, Emmy, who he confided in. Emmy fell deeply in love with him, without knowing that it was her own sister Polly, he talked about. Drachmann told her in a letter and she fled to England. They ended up getting married anyway, he adopted her daughter and they had four children together. The marriage was difficult because of bad finances, but they were closely related. In 1887 Emmy became sick during her pregnancy and in the same year, one of their children died of illness. Maybe as an escape Drachmann fell in love with the cabaret singer Amanda Nielsen, who he called Edith. She became the most important muse among all the other muses. Five years after Drachmann’s death Emmy wrote the story down.
