Editing Empress Elisabeth of Austria (section)

===Marriage===

[[File:Elisabeth and Franz Joseph I of Austria young couple.jpg|thumb|Empress Elisabeth and Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria as a young couple c. 1855]]

Franz Joseph was passionately in love with his wife, but they had a very complex relationship. He was a stolid and sober man, a political conservative who was still guided by his mother and her adherence to the strict [[Habsburg Spain|Spanish Court]] ceremony regarding both his public and domestic life, whereas Elisabeth inhabited a different world altogether. Restless to the point of [[hyperactivity]], naturally [[introverted]], and emotionally distant from her husband as she got older, she fled him as well as her duties at the Vienna court, avoiding them both as much as possible; as a means of escape from her life and her misery, Elisabeth embarked on a life of endless travel and saw little of her children. Franz Joseph indulged her wanderings, but constantly and unsuccessfully tried to tempt her into a more domestic life with him.<ref name="ReferenceB" /> Their correspondence increased during their last years, however, and their relationship became a warm friendship.
The Empress slept very little and spent hours reading and writing at night, and even took up smoking, a shocking habit for women, which made her the further subject of already-avid gossip. She had a special interest in history, philosophy, and literature, and developed a profound reverence for the German lyric poet and radical political thinker [[Heinrich Heine]], whose letters she collected.<ref name="ReferenceC">Norton, Frederick, ''A Nervous Splendor'', Penguin, 1980</ref>

[[File:The Austrian Imperial family in Göddollo.jpg|thumb|Engraving depicting the Hungarian royal family at [[Royal Palace of Gödöllő|Gödöllő Palace]] ({{Circa|1870}})|left]]

She tried to make a name for herself by writing Heine-inspired poetry. Referring to herself as [[Titania (A Midsummer Night's Dream)|Titania]], [[William Shakespeare]]'s Fairy Queen, Elisabeth expressed her intimate thoughts and desires in a large number of romantic poems, which served as a type of secret diary.<ref name="ReferenceA" /> Most of her poetry relates to her journeys, [[Classical Greece|classical Greek]] and romantic themes, and ironic commentary on the [[House of Habsburg|Habsburg dynasty]]. Her wanderlust is defined by her own work:

{{poem quote|
O'er thee, like thine own sea birds 
  I'll circle without rest
For me earth holds no corner 
  To build a lasting nest.}}

Elisabeth was an emotionally complex woman, and perhaps due to the melancholy and eccentricity that was considered a given characteristic of her [[House of Wittelsbach|Wittelsbach]] lineage (the best-known member of the family being her favorite cousin, the eccentric [[Ludwig II of Bavaria]]),<ref>Landi, Karoline Franziska M. Zanardi, ''The Secret of an Empress'', Houghton Mifflin Co., 1914, p. 29</ref> she was interested in the treatment of the mentally ill. In 1871, when the Emperor asked her what she would like as a gift for her [[Name day|Saint's Day]], she listed a young tiger and a medallion, but: "...a fully equipped [[lunatic asylum]] would please me most".<ref name="ReferenceA" />