Erika Ewald is a young, lonely and innocent young woman who falls increasingly under the charm of a very gifted violinist whom she accompanies on the piano, and finally things come to a brink during a Sunday outing to the outskirts of Vienna where the owner of an establishment where they stop for refreshments politely addresses her as the violinist’s bride, that they both realise she almost is.
An intense and very convincing exploration of the profound emotional, psychological and (...)
Home > Stefan Zweig > THE 26 STEFAN ZWEIG TEXTS ON THIS SITE
THE 26 STEFAN ZWEIG TEXTS ON THIS SITE
-
"The Love of Erika Ewald", an early masterpiece by Stefan Zweig (1904)
14 July 2022, by Stefan Zweig -
"The Debt Paid Late (1941)" – one of Stefan Zweig’s best stories now available on-line in English
17 June 2022, by Stefan ZweigA middle-aged woman writes to an old friend to recount how during a brief holiday in the Tyrolean mountains she’d encountered an actor that they both had utterly worshipped in their adolescence and who’d since fallen on hard times. She reveals to her old friend how the actor had played a key role in an absolutely crucial moment in her life, and how she finally paid back the debt she owed him.
One of Stefan Zweig’s best stories, this late work was completed in his penultimate year, 1941. (...) -
"Twenty-Four Hours in the Life of a Woman" by Stefan Zweig (1925)
26 May 2022, by Stefan ZweigIn this story within a story a woman recounts a decisive moment in her life when she had tried to help a young nobleman whose passion for the roulette table had lead him to the brink of self-destruction.
Soberly recounted with sensitivity and in-depth psychological penetration: one of the most powerful masterworks of the celebrated Viennese author of Letter From an Unknown Woman.
(23,400 words)
Translated specially for this site. An e-book is available for downloading below, with (...) -
"Fear (Angst)" by Stefan Zweig (1922)
29 April 2022, by Stefan ZweigA well-to-do married woman who has faulted with a seductive young pianist is aggressively blackmailed by a coarse young woman who threatens to denounce her to her husband. The blackmail is increasingly successful, the lady is overcome with fear and anguish and finally she sees only one fatal way out of her dilemma.
One of the major works of the celebrated author of Letter From an Unknown Woman.
(22,800 words)
Translated specially for this site. An e-book, with the original text in an (...) -
"The Fantastic Night (Phantastische Nacht)" by Stefan Zweig (1922)
22 November 2021, by Stefan ZweigA well-off and rather idle reserve officer in Vienna in June 1913 quite by hazard finds himself at the races in the Prater, the great Viennese public park, and watches the excited behaviour of the crowd during the races with a detached eye. His day and his whole existence are thrown head over heels when he starts paying attention to an alluring person next to him and he rapidly goes through a major life-changing experience.
A memorable account of the glories of a summer pre-WW1 Viennese (...) -
"Amok" by Stefan Zweig (1922)
29 October 2021, by Stefan ZweigAn expatriate doctor on the verge of a nervous breakdown in a remote outpost in the Dutch East Indies receives the visit of an elegant lady from the European community in the area’s capital who offers him a large sum of money to perform an illegal operation. Although he does need the money, her arrogant and humiliating attitude provokes him into making her a dishonourable counter-proposition that she tauntingly refuses. Losing all sense of reason and his mental equilibrium, he runs amok – (...)
-
"Chess Story (Schachnovelle)" by Stefan Zweig (1942)
25 October 2021, by Stefan ZweigHaving learned that the world chess champion is on board the ship that’s taking him from New York to Buenos Aires, the narrator organises a match at high stakes – the hard-nosed champion only plays for money – against the combined forces of the chess enthusiasts on the boat. The champion scornfully humiliates them but in the revenge match a bystander intervenes to prevent the group from playing the obvious move, and then plays the rest of the game to a draw. Recognizing the force of the (...)
-
"Mendel the Book-dealer (Buchmendel)" by Stefan Zweig (1929)
5 October 2021, by Stefan ZweigThe narrator recounts how he had taken shelter unexpectedly in a suburban café where he suddenly remembered having met twenty years before Mendel, a book-handler who possessed a phenomenal memory for the slightest details of any book he had ever seen or read about.
Famous in his day, he had now been quite forgotten by everyone in the café where he had officiated all day every day, except by the washerwoman who recounts the sad fate of the famous expert whose life, like so many others, (...) -
"The Invisible Collection" (1925) and other stories by Stefan Zweig
24 October 2020, by Stefan ZweigTABLE OF CONTENTS
1. TWO LONELY SOULS (1901) A disabled lad limps home at the end of the day’s work in his factory, left behind by the other workers because of his handicap. He stops when he hears sobbing by the roadside and tries to console another social outcast, a female worker at the factory who has been brutalised because of her ugliness. (1,400 words)
2. THE STAR OVER THE FOREST (1904) The waiter François is suddenly stricken with a slavish worship for the elegant countess (...) -
"Burning Secret" by Stefan Zweig (1911)
7 September 2020, by Stefan ZweigIn in the celebrated Austrian mountain resort of Semmering an experienced ladies’ man sets his sights on an attractive woman who has come there with her sickly twelve-year-old son for a cure, and cleverly first strikes up a friendship with the boy as a way to his mother’s heart. This stratagem is brilliantly successful, but the baron makes the mistake of ignoring the boy from then on.
This 23,000-word novella is one of Stefan Zweig’s best-known works – with Letter From an Unknown Woman (...)