Description
Description
'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.
About the Author
About the Author
STEPHAN ZWEIG (1881-1942) spent his youth studying philosophy and the history of literature in Vienna and belonged to a pan-European cultural circle that included Hugo von Hofmannsthal and Richard Strauss. 1n 1934, under National Socialism, Zweig fled Austria for England, where he authored several novels, short stories, and biographies. In 1941 Zweig and his second wife traveled to Brazil, where they both committed suicide. New York Review Books recently republished his novel, Chess Story, in Fall 2005. JOAN ACOCELLA is a staff writer for The New Yorker and contributes regularly to the New York Review of Books. Her latest books is Willa Cather and the Politics of Criticism.
Critical Reviews
Critical Reviews
"Beware of Pity, his first venture in longer fiction, is original and powerful work...Zweig has chronicled a hopeless and tragic relationship in a manner that so holds the reader as never to dispirit him, telling a story full of psychological pitfalls that only an experienced writer, and an experienced human being could dare to attempt...Zweig remains, after Beware of Pity, what he seemed to be--in his novelettes and biographies--before he wrote it: a brilliant writer." --The New York Times "Admired by readers as diverse as Freud, Einstein, Toscanini, Thomas Mann and Herman Goering." --The New York Times "Herr Zweig presents this story with considerable skill, with compelling force...It is a good story." --The New York Times "What is so impressive about Beware of Pity is Zweig's ability to make us feel the violently shifting emotions of all his characters as if they were our own. Only a writer of great sensitivity could do this. His theme, or moral, which he does not obtrude on us in any clumsy way, is that impulsive pity for others is a dangerous emotion with embroils us in false situations, often with disastrous results." --Sunday Telegraph "Beware of Pity is an utterly unsparing dissection of the corruptions of false pity...In stripping away the lies with which we disguise our true desires from ourselves, Zweig lays bare the larger lies of the age: it was, in fact, the perfect novel for that 'low, dishonest decade, ' as Auden termed it." --The New York Sun
Publishing Information
Publishing Information
Publisher:
New York Review of Books
Pub date:
2006-06-20
Length:
392 pages
The Allstora Membership
Membership Perks:
- Save 30% on all online store purchases
- Exclusive access to author's content
- You pay less, but authors still earn double
Membership Terms:
First Month:
$0.00
Monthly price:
$5.00
- To access membership discount simply log in and add to cart, discount applied automatically.
- One month free trial, cancel anytime. Membership renews on the 15th of each month.