Sennaciulo, 21(1950)542, p. 8, Gastono Varengjeno

Beginnendes Erkennen der Gefühle.,

Gefühle zu spüren, in ihrer ganzen Vielschichtigkeit, auf den Stufen vor dem eigentlichen körperlichen Begehren, dies ist Inhalt dieser Novelle.

Die Welt aus der Sicht eines bald verstehenden, aber jetzt noch ahnungslosen, träumenden Jungen: Stefan Zweig versteht es meisterhaft, zwischen der Liebe zur und die Angst um die Mutter zu wechseln, seine Sprache trifft mitten und kommt mitten aus dem Herzen. Das Brennen des Jungen lodert durch die Sätze, er versteht noch wenig, ahnt Vieles - alles erklärt in Formulierungen ohne nebelige Satzungetüme, natürlich verbunden mit sehnend wissen wollenden Gedanken.

Die Höhen und Tiefen der Vorpubertät - angeschoben durch ein schönes und ein danach folgendes, gefahrvolles Erlebnis - beginnen hin und herzuwehen, die Bindung zur Mutter hebt sich auf ein neues, nicht gekanntes Niveau.

September 2014

Over the past months I've read a number of Zweig's short stories and novellas and I've been struck by a common pattern. Zweig's settings and characters are almost invariably old-world Mitteleuropean but, on the other hand, the author's quasi-Freudian approach to analysing the conflicting emotions of his protagonists is very modern for its time. Zweig was writing against the backdrop of the rapidly changing world of the inter-war years and it seems that his books, with their internal friction between setting and style, reflect a feeling of flux, of being on the cusp of great upheavals, a tug-of-war between the old and the new.

"Burning Secret" is no exception. It tells of a member of the minor aristocracy, "the Baron", who is a guest at an Austrian hotel/sanatorium and who attempts to seduce a beautiful and seemingly well-off woman who is staying there with her twelve-year old son. The Baron at first successfully manipulates the son to get to the mother. The boy however soon realises that he is being used, and although he is still sexually innocent, he realises that the drama unfolding before him is part of a secret adult world to which he has not yet gained access. He spends the rest of the novella playing the "terzo incomodo", as the Italians say, getting a perverse kick out of thwarting the adults' attempts to spend time together.

The book is an often intense coming-of-age novella, a psychological study of an adolescent's roller-coaster of emotions and the mental turmoil which precedes young adulthood. Veteran translator Anthea Bell brilliantly conveys Zweig's highly-charged writing in this attractive Pushkin Collection edition. ( )

This story about an adult relationship observed from the perspective of an innocent but curious child is wonderful. The child's relationships with the adults in his life are examined too. Sweig is a great writer with an accessible style and sympathetic observations about his characters. Once started, it is hard to stop a Sweig story. My only issue is with the very last chapter which stretched credulity a little - surely someone would have gone out to search. ( )

Over the past months I've read a number of Zweig's short stories and novellas and I've been struck by a common pattern. Zweig's settings and characters are almost invariably old-world Mitteleuropean but, on the other hand, the author's quasi-Freudian approach to analysing the conflicting emotions of his protagonists is very modern for its time. Zweig was writing against the backdrop of the rapidly changing world of the inter-war years and it seems that his books, with their internal friction between setting and style, reflect a feeling of flux, of being on the cusp of great upheavals, a tug-of-war between the old and the new.

"Burning Secret" is no exception. It tells of a member of the minor aristocracy, "the Baron", who is a guest at an Austrian hotel/sanatorium and who attempts to seduce a beautiful and seemingly well-off woman who is staying there with her twelve-year old son. The Baron at first successfully manipulates the son to get to the mother. The boy however soon realises that he is being used, and although he is still sexually innocent, he realises that the drama unfolding before him is part of a secret adult world to which he has not yet gained access. He spends the rest of the novella playing the "terzo incomodo", as the Italians say, getting a perverse kick out of thwarting the adults' attempts to spend time together.

The book is an often intense coming-of-age novella, a psychological study of an adolescent's roller-coaster of emotions and the mental turmoil which precedes young adulthood. Veteran translator Anthea Bell brilliantly conveys Zweig's highly-charged writing in this attractive Pushkin Collection edition. ( )