Stefan Zweig and the Holocaust

[Isaac]

Was Stefan Zweig aware of the Holocaust before he passed away? If yes, did he ever refer to it in writing?

[Feliks]

I do not know for sure if he ever knew the full scope (exact figures were only available after the war) but I feel he must have certainly been aware of the construction of and purpose for the camps; widespread deportments were surely occurring well before 1942. What it meant to be deported, was plainly known in Europe and Zweig would have been aware of all that via letters.

[Dave]

Isaac and Feliks, there are many answers to be found in George Prochnik's recent biography, Impossible Exile.
Prochnik details Zweig's expatriate experience upon leaving Austria in 1936, time spent in England and the US to his death in Brazil. A worthwhile read for anyone interested in the life of Zweig.

[Dave]

Here is another thought for you both from an earlier post:If you are reading this book or have read The World of Yesterday, get yourself a copy of The Little Book by Seldon Edwards. About 25% in there is a sequence where Edwards hero finds himself in 1890's Vienna (don't ask how just yet). The descriptions of the city are wonderful and what our hero has planned for one would be dictator would humor Zweig, me thinks. If only...

Hope you find Impossible Exile as engrossing as I.

[Alfredo]

Dave wrote: "Isaac and Feliks, there are many answers to be found in George Prochnik's recent biography, Impossible Exile.
Prochnik details Zweig's expatriate experience upon leaving Austria in 1936, time spent..."

Thanks David for your recommendation.

I have just started Prochnik book. I'm enjoying his work because it is interesting, entertaining and also departs from the normal style of biographies. In its way, Pochnick intends to follow Zweig's approach as biographer.

Certainly for those that admired Zweig as a writer, Prochnik provides us with a biographical framework that helps to understand better the motives and the reasons behind this outstanding and prolific author

[Feliks]

Zweig's double suicide with his wife is certainly one of the most bizarre anecdotes from that timeperiod.

[Alfredo]

Feliks wrote: "Zweig's double suicide with his wife is certainly one of the most bizarre anecdotes from that timeperiod."

To understand the human mind is a quite complex task. Moreover, if we tried to find the reasons to explain the Zweig's' suicide.

To be an exiled must be a hard and difficult experience because all personal roots and attachments are broken. But I believe that this situation is even worse, as happened with Zweig, when the exiled is certain that those roots and the world where he lived, have been destroyed for ever. In that respect, it is interesting to notice that the first chapter of Zweig's memories is about the world of security that from his perspective prevailed prior the first World War.

I assume that Zweig's life as an exiled was a process of mounting losses.

[Feliks]

There's something in what you say.

What struck me was what he left in his note, something about how he was despairing over the state of humanity or some such abstraction. Very strange motive for suicide.

[Dave]

Feliks imagine the world as you know it comes to an end. You and a few "survivors" find yourselves adrift in an alien culture with no knowledge of what has become of the world you knew. On top of that, you are celebrated for your "art" but the culture that formed you no longer exists or so you think. Your final act is to recreate that world for posterity knowing it can no longer nurture or sustain your "voice". If one can no longer feed the mind the body dies.

[Dave]

Alfredo, glad you find the Zweig Bio worthwhile. Your comment about it being different from others is apt in that there is a family connection that gives Prochnik a unique perspective. The third act may also offer answers for Feliks about the suicide.

[Elena]

Both Prochnik and Matuschek pay sympathetic attention to Zweig's first and second wives. Both women were proud to be his companion, and the each lost him in a different way. His note to Friderike is lovely, saying she has much to live for in her daughters, the girls he himself did not get on with. No sense of what his loss would mean to her. The emigre community also lost him. Thomas Mann thought he was a coward not to stay the course. I have read similar responses in the emigre papers in the Hoover Institution Archives. He left his fans and supporters deeply disappointed. In my opinion he wrote his most lasting works in exile. World of Yesterday and Chess Game are more substantial than his light bestselling biographies and melodramatic short stories. He may have felt he had accomplished what he could in the world that let him down.