Search results for ""author stefan zweig""

It's the 1930s. Christine, A young Austrian woman whose family has been impoverished by the war, toils away in a provincial post office. Out of the blue, a telegram arrives from an American aunt she's never known, inviting her to spend two weeks in a Grand Hotel in a fashionable Swiss resort. She accepts and is swept up into a world of almost inconceivable wealth and unleashed desire, where she allows herself to be utterly transformed. Then, just as abruptly, her aunt cuts her loose and she has to return to the post office, where - yes - nothing will ever be the same.

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One of the masters of the short story' Guardian I have to tell you you see, this is just about the strangest experience I have been through...'These six stories of obsession, secrets, delusions and desires from one of the greatest European writers show individuals caught up in forces beyond their control whether an art dealer agreeing to a heartbreaking deception, a soldier destroyed by war, a servant infatuated with her employer or a young boy witnessing illicit adult passions. Portraying innocence lost and lives crushed by history, each tale is a psychologically acute, startling human drama.Translated by Jonathan Katz

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''The most exciting book I have ever read ... a feverish, fascinating novel'' Antony Beevor, Sunday Telegraph''I can''t take any more of your revolting merciful kindness!''Who would have thought that the great military hero Captain Hofmiller - that living monument to his own courage - would have anything burdening his soul? But when he reveals his story, it is not one of bravery but tragedy: a simple blunder at a dance from which disaster grows, ruining lives with his weak, foolish pity...Beware of Pity is Stefan Zweig''s greatest novel, fiercely capturing human emotions in all their subtleties and extremes - while Hofmiller, his unforgettable, naïve creation, misunderstands everything, resulting in his downfall.Translated by Jonathan Katz. Previously published as Impatience of the Heart.

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