Zweigs Freudianism: you’re not the only one. When the biography came out, Feuchtwanger snarked that if you believe Stefan Zweig, the French Revolution would not have happened if only teen Louis XVI had been able to ejaculate properly. This said, and aside from it being with the spirit of the times, it’s worth remembering that Stefan Zweig wasn’t just into Freud as part of being a writer of the first half of the 20th century. No, he was actually a Viennese going to Freud for therapy and corresponding with him when not in the same city. Zweig’s arch rival in the biographie romancee area, Emil Ludwig, said that Zweig’s eventual suicide proved Freud was rubbish, which I always thought was unfair. There’s such a lot you can critisize Sigmund Freud and his theories for, but Stefan Zweig killing himself while in exile, with WWII going on (and Hitler still in power unchecked), with Zweig in Brasil and Freud in England, really isn’t one of them.
I don't think I've ever seen a historian ship any pairing as hard as Zweig ships MA and Axel von Fersen, zomg.
LOL, well, for starters, he wasn’t a historian. He was a poet and a novelist - and occasional librettist, Cahn, he wrote the libretto for Richard Strauss’ opera Die Schweigsame Frau, which he started pre Hitler but which had its premiere post January 1933, and because Zweig was Jewish Strauss had to ask for a special license from Hitler to get his opera produced as scheduled, but Zweig’s name was forbidden to be mentioned in the program - who also now and then wrote historical non-fiction. But yes, he ships MA/ Axel von Fersen mightily.
Mirabeau: it’s been so long since I read Zweig’s MA book, I honestly don’t remember, but I can believe it. Incidentally, I recently read a review of two new Lafayette biographies, an American and a French one, which brought up the different way Lafayette is treated by US writers seeing him in the context of American history vs French and other continental European writers. Since he has a walk-on part in MA’s story, did this strike you as well?
Re: Zweig
I don't think I've ever seen a historian ship any pairing as hard as Zweig ships MA and Axel von Fersen, zomg.
LOL, well, for starters, he wasn’t a historian. He was a poet and a novelist - and occasional librettist, Cahn, he wrote the libretto for Richard Strauss’ opera Die Schweigsame Frau, which he started pre Hitler but which had its premiere post January 1933, and because Zweig was Jewish Strauss had to ask for a special license from Hitler to get his opera produced as scheduled, but Zweig’s name was forbidden to be mentioned in the program - who also now and then wrote historical non-fiction. But yes, he ships MA/ Axel von Fersen mightily.
Mirabeau: it’s been so long since I read Zweig’s MA book, I honestly don’t remember, but I can believe it. Incidentally, I recently read a review of two new Lafayette biographies, an American and a French one, which brought up the different way Lafayette is treated by US writers seeing him in the context of American history vs French and other continental European writers. Since he has a walk-on part in MA’s story, did this strike you as well?