The World of Yesterday

By Stefan Zweig 
Translated by Anthea Bell 
Cover illustration by Edward Steichen 

Written as both a recollection of the past and a warning for future generations, The World of Yesterday recalls the golden age of literary Vienna—its seeming permanence, its promise, and its devastating fall. 

Surrounded by the leading literary lights of the epoch, Stefan Zweig draws a vivid and intimate account of his life and travels through Vienna, Paris, Berlin, and London, touching on the very heart of European culture. His passionate, evocative prose paints a stunning portrait of an era that danced brilliantly on the edge of extinction. 

This new translation by award-winning Anthea Bell captures the spirit of Zweig’s writing in arguably his most revealing work.

Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) was born in Vienna, a member of a wealthy Austrian-Jewish family. He studied in Berlin and Vienna and was first known as a poet and translator, then as a biographer. Zweig traveled widely, living in Salzburg between the wars, and enjoyed literary fame. His stories and novellas were collected in 1934. In the same year, with the rise of Nazism, he briefly moved to London, taking British citizenship. After a short period in New York, he settled in Brazil where in 1942 he and his wife were found dead in bed in an apparent double suicide.

Also available in German here.

Paperback
472 pages
Nebraska University Press, 2013
Originally published in 1941
5.5 x 1 x 8.5 inches
ISBN 9780803226616
Biography, History, Travel