Short Stories, Irish literature, Classics, Modern Fiction, Contemporary Literary Fiction, The Japanese Novel, Post Colonial Asian Fiction, The Legacy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and quality Historical Novels are Among my Interests








Saturday, November 12, 2016

Confusion by Stefan Zweig (1927, a novella, translated by Anthea Bell)



"One of the most callous criticisms of Stefan Zweig’s suicide along with his wife Lotte came from Thomas Mann. “He can’t have killed himself out of grief, let alone desperation. His suicide note is quite inadequate. What on earth does he mean with the reconstruction of life that he found so difficult? The fair sex must have something to do with it, a scandal in the offing?”  From Yiyun Li, 



Includes these works
Burning Secret
Chess Game
Fear 
Confusion
Journey to the Past






My Readings For German Literature VI November 2016

1.  The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hesse

2.  Royal Highness by Thomas Mann

3. A Small Circus by Hans Fallada

4.  Rosshalde by Hermann Hesse

5.  "Did He Do It" by. Stefan Zweig

6.  Journey Into the Past by Stefan Zweig (second reading, no post, posted on in Nov 2015)

7.  The Emigrants by W. G. Sebald

8.  "The Ballarina and the Body" by Alfred Doblin

9.   Confession by Stefan Zweig

Confession is one of the five works included in The Collected Novellas of Stefan Zweig, translated by Anthea Bell. Socially unacceptable romantic entanglements and out of the publicly
approved forms of sexuality are frequent themes in Zweig's work.  In the novella I just retread, Journey into the Past,a young man and the wife of his mentor and benefactor fall in love.  

For the time being some of my posts will be brief.  The election of Trump has made me too sad,to feel why bother. 

The best thing about this novella are the descriptions the narrator, he is looking back from any years ago,on his younger days patrolling Berlin looking for easy women and prostitutes.  The professor has adRk secret also.he is a closeted homosexual.  The narrator's description of gay cruising in Berlin, rent boys, back alley sex and all was very well done.

For those wanting wanting to get into Zeiwg, this collection would be a good start. ,

I love as given a review copy of this book.

 



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