In 1913 a young second lieutenant discovers the terrible danger of pity. He had no idea the girl was lame when he asked her to dance-his compensatory afternoon calls relieve his guilt but give her a dangerous glimmer of hope. Stefan Zweig's only novel is a devastating depiction of the torment of the betrayal of both honour and love, realised against the background of the disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
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Beware of Pity is the most exciting book I have ever read...a feverish, fascinating novel. --ANTHONY BEEVOR, Sunday Telegraph
The novel I'll really remember reading this year is Stefan Zweig's frighteningly gripping Beware of Pity, first published in 1939 (...) and part of the ongoing, valiant reprinting by Pushkin Press of Zweig's collected oeuvre; an intoxicating, morally shaking read about human responsibilities and a real reminder of what fiction can do best. --ALI SMITH, TLS Book of the Year 2008
An unremittingly tense parable about emotional blackmail, this is a book which turns every reader into a fanatic. --JULIE KAVANAGH, Intelligent Life (The Economist)
Beware of Pity is the most exciting book I have ever read...a feverish, fascinating novel. --Anthony Beevor, Sunday Telegraph
An unremittingly tense parable about emotional blackmail, this is a book which turns every reader into a fanatic. --JULIE KAVANAGH, Intelligent Life (The Economist)
Beware of Pity is the most exciting book I have ever read...a feverish, fascinating novel. --Anthony Beevor, Sunday Telegraph
An unremittingly tense parable about emotional blackmail, this is a book which turns every reader into a fanatic. --JULIE KAVANAGH, Intelligent Life (The Economist)
The novel I'll really remember reading this year is Stefan Zweig's frighteningly gripping Beware of Pity, first published in 1939 (...) and part of the ongoing, valiant reprinting by Pushkin Press of Zweig's collected oeuvre; an intoxicating, morally shaking read about human responsibilities and a real reminder of what fiction can do best. --ALI SMITH, TLS Book of the Year 2008
An unremittingly tense parable about emotional blackmail, this is a book which turns every reader into a fanatic. --JULIE KAVANAGH, Intelligent Life (The Economist)
Beware of Pity is the most exciting book I have ever read...a feverish, fascinating novel. --Anthony Beevor, Sunday Telegraph
An unremittingly tense parable about emotional blackmail, this is a book which turns every reader into a fanatic. --JULIE KAVANAGH, Intelligent Life (The Economist)
Beware of Pity is the most exciting book I have ever read...a feverish, fascinating novel. --Anthony Beevor, Sunday Telegraph
An unremittingly tense parable about emotional blackmail, this is a book which turns every reader into a fanatic. --JULIE KAVANAGH, Intelligent Life (The Economist)
About the Author
Stefan Zweig was born in 1881 in Vienna, a member of a wealthy Austrian-Jewish family. He studied in Berlin and Vienna and was first known as a translator and later as a biographer. Zweig travelled widely, living in Salzburg between the wars, and enjoying literary fame. His stories and novellas were collected in 1934. In the same year, with the rise of Nazism, he briefly moved to London, taking British citizenship. After a short period in New York, he settled in Brazil where in 1942 he and his wife were found dead in bed in an apparent double suicide.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
45 of 47 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I came to this book with some trepidation, firstly because it looked rather long and dense (long is fine, but long and dense maybe not) and secondly because the topic of a mistaken love affair is not really up my street. However, it was the January choice of my book group, so I had to read it. Within a few pages I was hooked. The novel, set in the Austro-Hungarian empire in the early part of the 20th century, tells the story of a young second lieutenant who finds himself embroiled in a relationship with a partly paralysed 17 year old girl. Her family encourage the relationship and it is only when it is too late that he discovers the girl's love for him and also the impossibility of breaking her heart at a time she is about to embark on a new course of medical treatment, so she can get better "just for him". The novel is not just about love, it is about obsession, guilt, and the way the expectations of others can so easily dominate our choices so that we act as others expect us rather than as we want to. It is interesting to view this story in the light of modern assertiveness training, because all the way through the reader can see that Toni, the young officer, is subjugating his own needs for the needs of someone to whom he has no obligations whatsoever - he is in fact ruled only by her fantasies and the expectations of her father and sister.
The novel is remarkably suspenseful because the plot unfolds gradually and at each stage the reader cringes as the net of this sick love slowly ensnares him. It is full of strong characters: the doctor who treats the young woman and slowly enveigles Toni in her treatment regime; the old brutal colonel who turns out to be more wise than the other characters; the girls father who's whole life is a quest for his daughter's well-being. Different aspects of these characters are revealed as the novel slowly travels towards its inevitable conclusion and each one has a unique role in the ensnarement and ultimate release of the young officer.
The novel is beautifully produced by Pushkin press - the clear typeface, fine paper and strong cover makes this a pleasure to read. Alas, this is Zweig's only novel and I was left thirsting for more from this fine writer.
69 of 73 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
There are two reasons to buy this book:
1)The edition is exquisite. Pushkin Press (a small publishing house based in London devoted to the publishing of great, but forgotten C20th European novels) produce books of great taste; free of blurbs, unsightly reviews and garish shiny covers. The translations are always top quality, the leetering is great, printed on thick textured paper.
These books WILL become collectors items. Buy them and support this forward looking publishing house.
1)The edition is exquisite. Pushkin Press (a small publishing house based in London devoted to the publishing of great, but forgotten C20th European novels) produce books of great taste; free of blurbs, unsightly reviews and garish shiny covers. The translations are always top quality, the leetering is great, printed on thick textured paper.
These books WILL become collectors items. Buy them and support this forward looking publishing house.
2)The book is exceptional. Unlike his contemporary Thomas Mann, Zweig never wastes a word; this is an exciting, enthralling page turner. It is also a very sensitive psychological study; of pity and its implications, obsession, vanity and despair; surely the only important issues for art. You will be moved to tears, you will scream at the characters and you will be glad that you have bought this masterpiece.
Zweig is a truly great novelist and I can assure you that after you buy this novel, you will buy all his other work
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It is impossible to commend this wonderful book too highly. All praise to the Pushkin Press for letting us have this and so many other great, neglected works available in translation. The plot is utterly gripping - there are no chapter divisions and none are needed for one turns the pages feverishly and breathlessly, yet space for the profoundest reflections on love, pity and sympathy opens in the flow so that there is never a claustrophobic sense. In its pyschological penetration, in its understanding of the relations of the moral, the religious and the sensuous and the corruption that can arise in each sphere it is up there with Kierkegaard or Dostoyevsky. Deeply embedded in the structure of the Austrian Empire the book is absolutely universal with an intensity and breadth of sympathy for its characters that seems to belong at once to the hothouses world of Freud and and to the inspirations of the mystics. Don't read anything else before you read this.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
A summit of literary sophistication
This is heavyweight, sophisticated artwork literature at its best.
What other medium, other than the book, can render with such convincing fidelity the internal workings... Read more
What other medium, other than the book, can render with such convincing fidelity the internal workings... Read more
Published 8 days ago by Joseph Smith
5.0 out of 5 stars
Irresistible
This novel offers a profound examination of the psychology of a young man's emotions
when he encounters a young woman tragically trapped in her paralysed body. Read more
when he encounters a young woman tragically trapped in her paralysed body. Read more
Published 25 days ago by Dympna O'Dea
5.0 out of 5 stars
A little gem of European culture
A brilliant and mesmerising book which gallops along but also clinically dissects the failings of the human heart in pre-WW1 Austria. Read more
Published 28 days ago by Mr. Donald Thomson
3.0 out of 5 stars
A pity perhaps
This is the only full novel by this novella writing Austrian author Zweig in 1939. I'm not familiar with his other works. Read more
Published 1 month ago by H. Tee
4.0 out of 5 stars
Pitfalls of Pity
Set in the Austro-Hungarian Empire just before the outbreak of the First World War, a story which you might expect to find dated proves very gripping. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Antenna
3.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting
Had to read for book group and found it interesting. Good historical info and had to see what happened next
Published 1 month ago by northernsky
5.0 out of 5 stars
Haven't read it yet
But my friend recommended it and says it is a great book. I have bought it for a friend to read
Published 1 month ago by Natalie
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brilliant - Conrad lovers will appreciate
If you appreciate the writing flair of Joseph Conrad and his insights into the human condition you will enjoy this impressive and ultimately tragic tale.
Published 2 months ago by CMickell
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good, if depressing read
I read this after reading THe Post Office Girl, and I'm glad I did, because if I had read this first, I probably wouldn't have experienced the other. Read more
Published 2 months ago by LadyJaguar
4.0 out of 5 stars
Old Vienna and a tale of emotions in conflict...
Stefan Zweig is one of those writers who knows how to get his claws into a reader and sweeps them along to the last page. Read more
Published 2 months ago by J. H. Bretts
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