Book Review: Chess Story was the final work by Austrian author Stefan Zweig (1881-1942), completed shortly before he and his wife committed suicide in Brazil. Let me first mention that I have seen this work entitled Chess, Chess Story, A Chess Story, and The Royal Game. In the original German it's called Schachnovelle or Chess Novella. The plot consists of the "cold and tenacious" world chess champion, Mirko Czentovic, playing a shipboard game with Dr. B, an unknown Austrian victim of the Nazi regime. It's tempting to see Chess Story as an allegory for the Western response to fascism, with the brutish and stupid Czentovic, a monomaniac and megalomaniac, as the fascists and the cultured and intelligent Dr. B as Western civilization. Typically, the always empathetic Zweig cannot paint any character, even his pawn Czentovic, as wholly bad. In the story, however, the civilized world is not necessarily triumphant. As this novella was written in 1942 while Nazism was still on the upswing, this view may reflect Zweig's belief that this was not a world he wanted to live in and his tragic capitulation. Familiarity with the game is not required, though the greater one's knowledge of chess the more likely the reader is to understand and fully appreciate the work. Having been strongly pushed to play chess as a child (see sisters, Polgár) I enjoyed the chess references, but such experience is unnecessary. Despite being a potentially arid subject, Chess Story is highly suspenseful, building tension to a climactic breaking point. The writing is powerfully emotional, letting us fully understand both antagonists. The reader is in good hands here. [5★]
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