This is a short and minor work of Zweig's (although I would have liked it to be longer), made up of a series of short essays on European cities written mainly between the wars and with a good introduction by the translator, Will Stone. There are some interesting observations and lots of familiar scenes and landmarks, all mixed with a sense of foreboding. There are some lovely characterisations here - Bruges "has something of the unreal about it"; Seville is full of memories, even for those visiting for the first time; and after WW1 "all countries are now more national than they were before, and so Italy too is more Italian than it was before". The chapter on Gardens in Wartime is priceless, focusing on the English love of their gardens and the relaxation he associates with this and which he believes "to be at the origin of this marvellous calm the English people enjoy". One of the many ironies which make this book such a pleasure. Thank you to Pushkin Press for reprinting it and for allowing me a preview. Not essential but of value to Zweig enthusiasts and those interested in a slightly peripheral view of this crucial period in 20th century history.

Stefan Zweig takes the reader on a tour of the pre-WWII Europe that he loved. A very good companion piece to "The World of Yesterday." A brilliant mind taken from a world that needed him by terrible events of his time.

In Journeys, Will Stone has translated some more Stefan Zweig for edification and enjoyment. This is my first reading of Zweig’s travelogues, and in some ways, they are surprising.

What is remarkable is how much they are out of date. The towns, like Avignon or Bruges, have not changed. If anything, huge effort has gone in to preserving and restoring anything that smacks of old. Avignon is still very much the city of popes, and Bruges the city of canals. But where Zweig describes a dour, sour and morbid atmosphere in the early 1900s, these locales have reinvented themselves into high living towns of fairs, plays, spectacles and tourism. Where the only thing Zweig finds inspiring in Bruges is a small collection of paintings in a room at St. John’s Hospital, and in Avignon some fountains celebrating historical figures, the towns today fill guidebooks with things to do, see and be a part of. His own hometown of Salzburg gets the same cursory treatment.

The other thing that stands out is the absence of humanity. In Zweig’s biographical works, it’s all people all the time. In these tours of cities, almost no one is named or quoted. There is reference to history and impressions of environment, but the city stories are surprisingly lacking in roundness. He is just passing through.

This is all the more puzzling because Zweig’s passion was travel. He loved nothing better than exploring new towns and writing about them. Yet aside from the historical value of seeing them a hundred years ago, these stories are nowhere as fulfilling as his people stories.

In other words, there are more sides to Stefan Zweig than a simple reading of a book or two would proffer.

David Wineberg

"And if the meaning of life consists in relentlessly discovering in the temporal and intellectual new forms of freedom, it is better perhaps to live with the least possible constraints, the art of leaving behind oneself, without sentimentality, a good portion of one's past."

Unlike typical travel writings, Zweig produces short and poignant essays, all set in Europe, that not only focus on specific places and topics, but also move through historical periods to observe and record significant points.