I’ve just begun reading Stefan Zweig’s short book on Montaigne. For those unfamiliar with Zweig, he was an extraordinarily popular writer worldwide in the early 20th century for his novels, plays, biographies and literary criticism. He was born in Austria, but fled as Hitler’s power stretched across Europe, first to Great Britain, shortly to the U.S., eventually to Brazil, where he found a home with numerous German expatriates. The 2014 Wes Anderson film “The Grand Budapest Hotel” stole liberally from Zweig’s stories (which Anderson credited) and captured his whimsical style well.
It was in Brazil where Zweig first came across Montaigne and he was immediately smitten by his prose. This paragraph explains well exactly what Zweig saw in him:
Other, less fraught epochs have concentrated on the literary, moral and psychological heritage of Montaigne, learnedly debating so as to establish whether he was a sceptic or a Christian, an Epicurean or a Stoic, a philosopher or an entertainer, a writer or merely a dilettante of genius. His conceptions of education and religion were pored over and dissected in a raft of theses and doctorates. But all that seems relevant now and occupies my thoughts on Montaigne today is this: how, in a time so reminiscent of our own, did he liberate himself inwardly and how, in reading him, can we fortify ourselves by his example? In him I see the ancestor, the protector and the friend of each “homme libre” on earth, the most adept master at this new yet eternal science, the preserving of oneself above all other concerns. Few men on earth have ever fought with such faithfulness and tenacity to preserve their most intimate selves, their “essences”, from all impurities, from all toxins left by the rank spume of an epoch’s storm waves, and fewer still have managed to rescue from the time in which they lived, and for all time, their deepest selves.
So like many other writers through time, Zweig saw a great deal of his own struggles in Montaigne, and he has plenty of tales from the brutal religious wars and sectarian violence to draw a parallel with the early 20th century.
Zweig is an extremely engaging writer, so even just a few pages into his work I find myself draw in and eager to read more. Only one thing is holding me back—shortly after Zweig penned this book, which was his last, he died by suicide. And it seems likely to me that Montaigne’s many references to self harm had an influence on Zweig’s thinking in his final days.
As much as Zweig writes of Montaigne in a positive light, as someone who spoke of finding freedom in a time of darkness, it wasn’t enough to save him from the final darkness and I fear it may have given him energy that led to his final act. Sadly, it’s something to consider as I read on.
Leave a Reply