I’m a fan of his short stories. But this novel didn't particularly impress me. A screed of sorts against capitalism, the story is almost unbelievably melodramatic: the rural post-office girl in post World War I Austria who gets exposed to exceptional wealth in a one-week vacation to St. Moritz (courtesy of an estranged aunt). She later meets a veteran nearly crushed by the capitalist system and they…. Well, that would be telling. The overwrought description on the jacket says “Cinderella meets Bonnie and Clyde.” Uh, no. Wonderful writing, but not up to the quality of his short stories, imho. ( )

Las dos partes de la novela, cuya acción se desarrolla en el año 1926, guardan una estrecha relación, pero están claramente separadas en cuanto a los hechos y al ambiente. Así como al principio el núcleo está constituido por las experiencias vividas en el mundo brillante de una estación de verano suiza, en la segunda parte, la atención se centra en la atmósfera opresiva de la época de postguerra y de una existencia pequeño burguesa, que hace madurar el proyecto de un desfalco de grandes proporciones.

This has been on my shelf for years, and I'm kicking myself for letting it languish there for so long. It's a Cinderella story with a twist.

Christine lives an impoverished life with her mother in a small Austrian village, barely eking out a living as the postmistress. Then one day a postcard arrives from a long-forgotten aunt, who left for America years before under questionable circumstances, inviting Christine to visit at a luxurious resort in the Alps.

Christine arrives at the resort, and Zweig is masterful at describing her embarrassment at her own shabbiness and awe at the luxury and wealth surrounding her. But soon, after her aunt has purchased her beautiful clothes, and has treated her to the beauty parlor, Christine is having the time of her life.

Unfortunately, it doesn't last, and Christine must return to her desolate life, only now more disheartened. Then she meets Ferdinand, and things take a surprising turn.

This book was unpublished at the time of Zweig's death (a suicide after the rise of Hitler), and was not published until about 40 years after his death. Because of this, and because of the somewhat abrupt ending, there are some who question whether the book was actually finished. I actually liked the way it ended.

4 stars ( )

this made me want to quit my job. There was a lot of parts of this that were really astute especially if you've worked customer service. the bit where she is caught up in the frivolities of being rich and so is the reader then suddenly the perspective switches to the aunt and you see how she's changed was genius, it reminded me of the part in Mean Girls when linsday lohan becomes a bitch. ( )

We cannot rewind self-awareness! Once we have that glimpse of ourselves, deleting is not an option. But, is oblivion bliss? Are the self-ignorant happier?

Zweig doesn’t try to answer this question explicitly, his focus remains in the protagonist, Christine, and her late coming of age self-discovery and her sudden awareness of the limited life she leads on post WWI Austria.

What happens if after the ball, Cinderella returns to the cinders, rejected by the prince? What happens when war robs our youth, and post war society remains drowned in poverty? What happens when economic poverty translates into intellectual and emotional poverty?

What would I do if like Christine and her – justly so - disgruntled boy-friend, the prospects in front of me were so bleak? Would I contemplate suicide, like they do? Or would I contemplate robbery, as they also do? Would either ever be justifiable, though?

Corruption is a theme that consumes me. Brazil, my birth country is ripe with corruption, and it sadden and irate me in the same proportion. Most Brazilians feel justified in robbing the state, from the highest paid politician to the small clerk taking a miniscule bribe for whatever reason. But maybe my comparison is unfair. In Christine’s case it is not a matter of corruption, but of life or death – existentialism in its most radical form. I don’t know. I am unsure of the ethics of it. Unsure if I have a right to judge. Those are fictional characters, but – in a very surreal correspondence - they do mirror the life story of the author, who at the end did chose suicide.

I should just be grateful that my own life was not wrecked by war and poverty. I should also realize that if totalitarian governments are not ruling Europe any longer, war and totalitarianism still rages in third world countries. Poverty abounds bellow the Equator. How many Christines are there in Haiti, Sudan, or Brazil?

Back to the book, it won the Pen Best Translation of the year sometime ( I am too lazy to find out when). The prose does sound effortless, and very contemporary. The end is too abrupt though, and I am struggling with the idea that it was intentional. This book was published after Zweig’s death, and I have to wonder that he would polish it more had he intended on publishing it. There is a difference in the writing, the first pages where he describes so completely and with the most literary care the post-office of the title differs too much from the point form format of the end. One could argue that it reflects his brilliance, as the vocabulary and pace of his prose seem to change with the changes on Christine. Well, maybe... but I am not convinced.

I am putting his other books published in English on books to check it out.
( )