Book Review: Letter from an Unknown Woman by Stefan Zweig

The book is segmented into four stories: the title story and other three stories. First three stories are quite lengthy and build up a point of conflict from one sub plot to main plot, like novella. However, the last story is comparatively shorter one. Let’s discuss all stories one by one.

Letter from an Unknown Woman:

The first story. It is narrated through a letter. It is between a writer and a nameless woman. One day when the writer comes home from walk, he finds a letter with no name and sender’s address on it. However, the handwriting was of a woman. The woman tells that she loves him, and she has been following him or in love with him since a long time. The woman describes the events occurred in her life; how and when they met she without being noticed by him. It is a beautiful, touching story.

A Story told in Twilight:

The second story is about a boy in a castle in Scotland. It is an imaginary kind of story. The boy in the evening takes a stroll and then meets a beautiful woman. The boy is in his late teens but perfectly ready for a romantic hook. They spent good intimate time. Because of darkness, he could not decipher the exact features and outlines of her face. Next morning onward, when he tries to find out that woman, he one by one meets shocking revelations. Read the story to know more about that woman…

A Debt Paid Late:

It is a third story in the book. A woman is tired of her homely duties and thus she takes a break in order to freshen up her mood. She goes up in the mountains on a small village. She takes shelter in an inn. On her mind is to read a book, walk in the grass, and spend time peacefully at least for two weeks. Ironically, there she meets a man whom she knows since her childhood days. What happens next fills the rest of the story.

Forgotten Dreams:

It is the fourth story. The story is about two people: a woman and a man. They meet after many years. They remember their old time, attraction for each other and what possibilities could have been possible in their lives at that point of time.

The first three stories have similar kind of theme: the focus has been given more on identity crises. In the first story, the woman narrator’s identity is discreet, in the second story, the identity of the woman comes out as a big surprise to the boy, and in the third story, the woman finds a man who brings back her memories. The book is vintage Zweig, with beautiful passages, prose, along with a perfect balance between story-narration and the aesthetic beauty.