Every great city claims to have experienced at least one Golden Moment, and while what it takes to earn that title is open to debate, one thing is clear: legendary destinies often coexist with fierce contradictions.
Vienna in 1900 is a perfect example.
At the start of the 20th century, Vienna was the imperial capital of the Habsburgs and an international centre of European music and entertainment, home to Sigmund Freud and the two Gustavs of music and the arts (Mahler and Klimt), a magnet for poets, composers, literary and theatrical luminaries, immigrants from across the vast Austro-Hungarian Empire, the sixth-largest Jewish population in the world, and an abundance of parks, palaces, coffee houses and delicious pastries.
But as the Vienna-born Stefan Zweig (1881-1942), a member of the city’s Jewish bourgeoisie and well-known writer, well understood, Vienna’s underworld was in turmoil: suicides were rampant, as were syphilis, cholera, tuberculosis and typhoid. Infant mortality was high and life expectancy was low, at just 38 years. Anti-Semitism was on the rise, as was young people’s dissatisfaction with the rules and norms that governed every aspect of their lives.
Zweig’s 450-page 1942 autobiography, Yesterday’s Worldhere are some astute observations on this…
