Readers have scolded me gently for too much optimism over the past year, wondering why I refuse to see that the world economy is in dire trouble and that the international order is coming apart at the seams.
So for
Christmas reading I have retreated to the "World of Yesterday", the
poignant account of Europe's civilisational suicide in the early 20th
century by the Austrian writer Stefan Zweig - the top-selling author of
the inter-war years.
From there it
is a natural progression to Zweig's equally poignant biography of
Erasmus, who saw his own tolerant Latin civilization smothered by
fanatics four centuries earlier.
Zweig's description of Europe in the years leading up to 1914 is
intoxicating. Everything seemed to be getting better: wealth was
spreading, people were healthier, women were breaking free.
He could travel anywhere without a passport, received with open arms in Paris, Milan or Stockholm by a fraternity of writers and artists. It was a cheerful, peaceful world that seemed almost untainted by tribal animosities.
Read the rest here.
He could travel anywhere without a passport, received with open arms in Paris, Milan or Stockholm by a fraternity of writers and artists. It was a cheerful, peaceful world that seemed almost untainted by tribal animosities.
Read the rest here.
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