Product Description

On a cruiseship bound for Buenos Aires, a wealthy passenger challenges the world chess champion to a match. He accepts with a sneer. He will beat anyone, he says. But only if the stakes are high. Soon, the chess board is surrounded. At first, the challenger crumbles before the mind of the master. But then, a soft-spoken voice from the crowd begins to whisper nervous suggestions. Perfect moves, brilliant predictions. The speaker has not played a game for more than twenty years, he says. He is wholly unknown. But somehow, he is also entirely formidable…

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8310 in Books
• Published on: 2006-01-26
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 80 pages

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. Anthea Bell translated E. T. A. Hoffman's The Life and Opinions of the Tomcat Murr for Penguin Classics and has received a number of translation awards.

Customer Reviews

Gripping novella by a master storyteller
This is a little gem of a book. I was intrigued the moment I read the blurb and I wasn't disappointed. This is a compelling story told by a master storyteller. The book was written in 1942 while the author was in exile in Brazil. It was completed just days before he committed suicide.

The story centres around an eccentric character who, despite lack of any discernible intellectual prowess, turns out to be a master chess player. On board a ship to Buenos Aires he is challenged to a game by some of the passengers who are curious about his character. All opponents are duly overcome until a mysterious man steps forward to prompt one of the players and it becomes clear that his grasp of the game is enough to defeat the grandmaster. We are then taken into the back story of this character and the secret behind his abilities at the chess board. To say that this is a page turner is a serious understatement. I challenge anyone not to finish it in one go.

A dark, gripping book
I first read Chess: A Novel, in High School and I have loved it ever since. It is extremely difficult to put it down as it delves so much into the human psyche and the power to survive, the need to focus on something, anything, to still find a purpose in life. What makes this book even more interesting is that, if my memories are right, this book was written before the end of the second world war, but also that Stefan Zweig committed suicide not long after writing this book. It is quite small and quickly read, so if you fancy an excellent quick read which will really make you think, don't look any further.

Unforgettable book with psychological impact
Few novellas impress me, but this is a masterpiece of psychological drama. From the outset I was hooked.I wanted to know more about this mysterious chess player, who he is and why he is going to Buenos Aires, but I was also thoroughly gripped by his back story, his predicament, his arrogance, his strategies, his decisions, his slow descent into madness and the reactions of those around him. This is also a mystery story and one that is powerfully told. So much is packed into just 75 pages. I don't think I have ever read anything like it for sheer impact.
This is a classic of German literature but there is nothing that matches it in English either. Unforgettable.