Chess Story

By Stefan Zweig
Introduction by Peter Gay
New translation by Joel Rotenberg

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.

Reviews

Zweig possesses a dogged psychological curiosity, a brutal frankness, a supreme impartiality...[a] concentration of talents.
— Herbert Gorman, The New York Times Book Review

Also see:

Beware of Pity By Stefan Zweig Translated from the German by Phyllis and Trevor Blewitt Introduction by Joan Acocella The most widely read author writing in German prior to the rise of the Nazis, Zweig captures the torment of betrayal in a powerful study of affliction.

The Post-Office Girl By Stefan Zweig Translated from the German by Joel Rotenberg Zweig's posthumously discovered novel, about the rise and fall of a provincial Austrian girl invited to the Swiss Alps by her wealthy American aunt, is available in English for the first time.

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