GERMAN LITERATURE IN TRANSLATION
By Michaela Anchan
I ’ m reading my way through the Deutsche Welle list of the top 100 German books in translation as a way to learn more about Germany ( and all the European history I didn ’ t learn at school in Wellington , New Zealand ).
Reading Beware of Pity ( 1939 ), by Stefan Zweig sent me off in a few unexpected , serendipitous directions . I thoroughly enjoyed the novel itself , which I read in a mix of paperback and audiobook . It ’ s an entertaining if somewhat melodramatic story of a young Austrian soldier , Anton Hofmiller , who befriends a wealthy local family in the years leading up to World War II . The story is a framed narrative : the soldier tells us the story from 1938 to an unnamed character in a Viennese café . The soldier has a terrible habit of misreading signals , overcommitting himself when feeling sorry for people , and generally putting his foot in his mouth , often . One particular instance leads him down a path of no return — hence the title of the novel . Within the story there is even another long story , of how the wealthy landowner came into his money . Behind all the digressions , side stories , the dramatic quivering of lips and the trembling of bosoms , Zweig has created a fascinating , psychological study of his characters and the social hierarchies of the time .
After enjoying this novel ( Zweig ’ s only full-length fiction work ), I also read his novella Chess ( 1941 ), which is another excellent example of his grasp of psychological realism — a chess challenge on a ship journey leads us into the side story of one passenger who narrates how he memorized chess games while imprisoned by the Nazis .
I then went on to read Zweig ’ s memoir The World of
Yesterday , published in 1943 after Zweig and his wife committed suicide in Brazil . I also read this as a mix of paperback and audiobook — the narrator on Audible is excellent . The memoir was , by chance , an excellent accompaniment to my first-ever trip to Vienna on a long weekend in January ; the first chapter , titled “ The World of Security ,” is a beautiful depiction of the city in the late 1800s — the music , the people , the buildings — and also how many of the Jewish population found their place within the thriving arts scene .
It certainly gave me a different level of appreciation during our weekend of eating sachertorte and schnitzel and visiting the opera house and Belvedere Castle ! It was fascinating to learn of his travels in Paris , Berlin , and London , his relationships with Goethe , Strauss , Freud , and Joyce , among others , and very chilling to read an account of the growth of Nazism in the 1930s from an Austrian Jew .
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