The World of Yesterday: An Autobiography by Stefan Zweig Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The World of Yesterday: An Autobiography
Book Review: I never saw, a better auto-biography
Summary: 5 Stars
I read this excellent book, here in Brazil.The author, then living in Brazil, wrote his last great book.In fact he and his wife commited suicide,some hours after finishing this worderfull auto-biography.
Are you looking to see how a great man was feeling and living, during Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini times?
No other begin is better than this book.
This book is 100% sincere, unbiased and correct.
Book Review: Insecurity
Summary: 5 Stars
The world of security lurched to insecurity in Zweig's lifetime. In the secure form there were insurance schemes for every eventuality. People believed they were barricaded against fate.
The author's father, a Moravian, had been a careful capitalist, the owner of a weaving establishment. He clung to a private anonymous mode of existence. Zweig's mother was a Brettauer, a member of an international banking family. The desire to be of a good family was one of the secret desires of Jewish life. There was a tendancy there to elevate the intellectual to the highest class. The drive toward cultural ideals was particularly passionate in Vienna. Love of art was a communal duty in Vienna.
Schooling to the author was wearisome and boring. The Viennese coffee houses provided intellectual stimulation where traditional education in the gymnasium did not. The Viennese had intellectual mobility and international orientation. All the new painters, the poets, and the musicians were young.
In middle class families where early marriage was not permitted, there was inner disharmony. Theodor Herzl was the feuilleton editor of the Neue Freie Presse. When the author moved from Vienna to Berlin, Berlin was just becoming a world-class city. There was a Prussian sense of orderliness.
In subsequent sections of the book Zweig covers his experiences in Brussels and Paris. Paris stood for a freedom of existence. The inheritance of the revolution was still present. Although a German poet, Paris calls to mind Rilke. Shy and retiring, he seemed most receptive in Paris. Rilke and Zweig went together to see the grave of Andre Chenier.
At age twenty-six Zweig was not bold enough to start a novel, and people he had met inspired in him inpired high standards, hindering his productivity. Two different early plays were not put on for reason of the death of actors. Zweig became hesitant.
Walter Rathenau suggested to Zweig that he go to India. The author was shocked to see all the emaciated bodies there. He saw India as an admonition that disaster loomed. Next the author traveled to America where he experienced extreme solitude since he knew so few people. He hit upon the rather good idea of pretending to be a job applicant and was struck by all of the opportunities available.
Friendships with Freud, Verhaeren, and Romain Rolland were terribly important to Zweig. Even at the time of World War I Zweig was able to take an international view of things. By 1939 it was known that war was not romantic, it was barbaric.
After World War I Austria was a mere shadow of the imperial monarchy. There was famine. Hard money, currency, disappeared, as it was hoarded. Austria, pillaged and desperate, escaped disintegration. The years 1919, 1920, 1921 were the hardest. Gewrman inflation ended in 1924. The years 1924 to 1933 were comparatively peaceful.
The author spent a fortnight in Soviet Russia. Tolstoy's grave was magnificent. When Salzberg became the summer artistic capital, Zweig found himself in the heart of Europe. He shared the fate of the Mann brothers, Werfel, Freud, and Einstein of having his work banned after the Nazis seized power. Zweig spent 1934 to 1940 in England. He led there an anonymous life. Stefan Zweig and Elizabeth Zweig died in Brazil in 1942.
Book Review: Is today any better?
Summary: 5 Stars
Reading this book, one would inevitably ask himself if we, at the end of the 20th century, have come out any wiser than the world of yesterday. Gone are the days of world-wide intellectual brotherhood. Gone are the days of belief in the victory of reason and humanity. Instead have come the days of electronic messaging from one unfulfilled soul to another. How much we owe to the world of yesterday, and how little we have achieved in answer to their call!Book Review: One of the 20 best books ever writen in Brazil.
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm a (unemplyed) agronomist and I live in Brazil.I read this book translated to portuguese, some years ago.This book was writen(at least the end part) by a european jew refugee, here in Brazil.In fact, the author died by suicide, after ending this great book.
There's many things about this book.At first this is a self-biography, a history book, etc.
Reading this great book, you can be transported to Europe about 100 years ago until 1930's Europe.It's very rare, a self-biography to be also a sincere and complete book.
And this a self-biography very sincere.This book doesn't tells only about Stefan Zweig itself.
You can see happiness, carity, sincerity, wisdom and also madness, hipocrisy, bigotry all maden by man living in times and places, when the author of this great book was writen and living.
Book Review: One of the most moving books I ever read
Summary: 5 Stars
World of Yesterday is an unforgettable classic and it should be mandatory reading in high school. In this autobiography, Stefan Zweig not only tells his life story and how he became a successful writer in Vienna, but he also paints the most vivid picture of Europe in the beginning of the century, with heart-breaking detail of the consequences of World War 1 and Hitler's rise to power on his life and the life of all Europeans. What touched me the most is his suggestion of a free-thinking continent with symbolic borders and no passports, and his definition of peace. Reading this book reminded me of the meaninglessness of war. How one's friend and neighbor living across the river can become his "enemy" once war is declared. Its message is still 100% valid today. Just watch the world news...