Mini Modern Classics Chess (Penguin Mini Modern Classics) - Softcover

Zweig, Stefan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0141196300 ISBN 13: 9780141196305

Publisher: Penguin Classic, 2011

Synopsis

'... a human being, an intellectual human being who constantly bends the entire force of his mind on the ridiculous task of forcing a wooden king into the corner of a wooden board, and does it without going mad!' A group of passengers on a cruise ship challenge the world chess champion to a match. At first, they crumble, until they are helped by whispered advice from a stranger in the crowd - a man who will risk everything to win. Stefan Zweig's acclaimed novella Chess is a disturbing, intensely dramatic depiction of obsession and the price of genius.

About this title

About the Author

Stefan Zweig was born in 1881 in Vienna to a wealthy Austrian-Jewish family. Recognition as a writer came early for Zweig; by the age of forty, he had already won literary fame. In 1934, with Nazism entrenched, Zweig left Austria for England, and became a British citizen in 1940. In 1941 he and his second wife went to Brazil, where they committed suicide. Zweig's best-known works of fiction are Beware of Pity (1939) and The Royal Game (1944), but his most outstanding accomplishments were his many biographies, which were based on psychological interpretation.

Review

A brilliant writer * New York Times * One of the joys of recent years is the translation into English of Stefan Zweig's stories -- Edmund de Waal Stefan Zweig was a late and magnificent bloom from the hothouse of fin de siecle Vienna * The Wall Street Journal * Zweig is one of the masters of the short story and novella, and by 'one of the masters' I mean that he's up there with Maupassant, Chekhov, James, Poe, or indeed anyone you care to name -- Nick Lezard * Guardian * A new favourite writer of mine -- Wes Anderson Perhaps the best chess story ever written, perhaps the best about any game -- Economist His great achievement in short form * The Times *

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Classic
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0141196300
• ISBN 13: 9780141196305
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 112