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Originally Posted by issybird
I had assumed Gay was from an intellectual family, but in fact they were solidly middle class.
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Are those things mutually exclusive?
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I don't think Zweig is aging well, so I agree with your second comment. That was my real objection to Chess; it came across as rather fusty to me. Good when it was written, but not penetrating or original enough to achieve classic status. But there's nothing wrong with being highly readable and shining a light on contemporary attitudes. Social history more than literature, as it were.
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I can see how I might have found the story more powerful had I been reading it in, say, the late 40s or early 50s. I'm having a hard time finding a synthesis between the chess component and the Nazi component.
ApK