Lou Andreas-Salomé was born in 1861 in St Petersburg. She studied theology at the University of Zurich. As a young woman, she travelled to Italy, where she met Nietzsche, who proposed marriage to her. She rejected him, although she remained close to him and his circle. In 1887 she married the Orientalist Friedrich Carl Andreas. She fist met Rilke in 1897, and in 1899 travelled to Russia with him. From 1911 she was closely involved with Freud and his Viennese circle. In addition to novels, she published studies of Nietzsche, Freud and Rilke. Her correspondence with Rilke was published in 1952.She died in 1937 in Göttingen.