Chess Story (New York Review Books Classics)
Chess Story, also known as The Royal Game, is the Austrian master Stefan Zweig's final achievement, completed in Brazilian exile and sent off to his American publisher only days before his suicide in 1942. It is the only story in which Zweig looks at Nazism, and he does so with characteristic emphasis on the psychological.
Travelers by ship from New York to Buenos Aires find that on board with them is the world champion of chess, an arrogant and unfriendly man. They come together to try their skills against him and are soundly defeated. Then a mysterious passenger steps forward to advise them and their fortunes change. How he came to possess his extraordinary grasp of the game of chess and at what cost lie at the heart of Zweig's story.
This new translation of Chess Story brings out the work's unusual mixture of high suspense and poignant reflection.
Travelers by ship from New York to Buenos Aires find that on board with them is the world champion of chess, an arrogant and unfriendly man. They come together to try their skills against him and are soundly defeated. Then a mysterious passenger steps forward to advise them and their fortunes change. How he came to possess his extraordinary grasp of the game of chess and at what cost lie at the heart of Zweig's story.
This new translation of Chess Story brings out the work's unusual mixture of high suspense and poignant reflection.
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Community Reviews
A neat little novella about a strange chess match on a cruise ship. Completely days before Zweig committed suicide.
this has been so difficult to rate and review since I was so conflicted about what my actual feeling about this book was. In short words, I liked this book but some minor (??) things bugged me a lot namely the practicality of Dr B's chess excellence and the demonstration of his skill in the match. The second thing would be skipping any exploration of Czentovic's character and the things that I really liked the exploration of the aftermath of torture in the theme of chess, the description of Dr B's gradual descent into monomania and ptsd books that have the depiction of war crimes and human suffering occupy a special place in my heart although it's not on my top tier, its certainly on a high place.
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