Scan barcode
michareads's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.5
A mesmerising memoir that captures the zeitgeist of the collapse of the pluriforme Danube monarchy and the turbulent years that follow, through the lives of his nuclear family.
The cyclical narrative style, heavy prose and continual use of abstract concepts clearly taken from the 'ideenraum' of continental philosophy sometimes makes for a challenging read.
It's a book I had to grow into, but I was rewarded in the end. I have learned to love it as a beautiful and tender personal counterpart to Stefan Zweigs grander 'The World of Yesterday'.
The cyclical narrative style, heavy prose and continual use of abstract concepts clearly taken from the 'ideenraum' of continental philosophy sometimes makes for a challenging read.
It's a book I had to grow into, but I was rewarded in the end. I have learned to love it as a beautiful and tender personal counterpart to Stefan Zweigs grander 'The World of Yesterday'.
(Disclaimer: I read the book in Dutch, in a quite literral word-to-word translation. I read a sample of the English translation and it was a lot friendlier due to necessary sentence restructuring.)
christopherc's review
4.0
Gregor von Rezzori was born in 1913, and his childhood saw his hometown of Czenowitz pass from Austro-Hungary to Romania in the wake of World War I. This region, Bucovina, which is now split between Romania and Ukraine, was host to a remarkable diversity: Germans, Ruthenians (Rusyns), Romanians, (Yiddish-speaking) Jews, Poles, Russians and Armenians lived side by side in Czernowitz. In his memoir THE SNOWS OF YESTERYEAR (originally published in German as Blumen im Schnee), Rezzori depicts the changing ethnic and political landscape of the town until roughly the mid-1940s, with reminisces that continue into the post-war era and an epilogue from 1989 seeing him return to Czernowitz after five decades away.
But this is mainly a family chronicle. Rezzori divides the book into five parts focusing on a particular member of his household. His nanny Cassandra was illiterate and brutish, hired out of some isolated place in the Carpathians. His mother is remembered as overprotective and more than a little neurotic, tragically trapped in a loveless relatioship with Rezzori's father. That father was obsessed with hunting, using his business trips as a government functionary to bag all kinds of animals in the vastness of the Carpathians. His dislike for the Jews was great, but he stayed forever faithful to Austro-Hungarian values and was aghast at the rise of the Nazis and German agression. His sister, four years old than him and a perennial but beloved rival, died in young adulthood after a long illness. Finally, his governess Ms. Lina Strauss (nicknamed "Bunchy" in a German-language pun) brought a cosmopolitan flair to his home.
Rezzori mentions Marcel Proust early on in this book, but even if he didn't, many readers would think of Proust nonetheless. Rezzori has the same passion for introspection on the most mundane issues of childhood. I must admit, his reveries and his psychological analyses of his family do tend to drag, especially in the last third or so of the book. I must admit to skimming for long passages about his sister and Bunchy.
However, as a source of first-hand information on the dying of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and a cosmopolitan Bucovina that is now gone forever, this is a valuable book, and however frustrating its longwindedness might be, I am very glad I read it.
But this is mainly a family chronicle. Rezzori divides the book into five parts focusing on a particular member of his household. His nanny Cassandra was illiterate and brutish, hired out of some isolated place in the Carpathians. His mother is remembered as overprotective and more than a little neurotic, tragically trapped in a loveless relatioship with Rezzori's father. That father was obsessed with hunting, using his business trips as a government functionary to bag all kinds of animals in the vastness of the Carpathians. His dislike for the Jews was great, but he stayed forever faithful to Austro-Hungarian values and was aghast at the rise of the Nazis and German agression. His sister, four years old than him and a perennial but beloved rival, died in young adulthood after a long illness. Finally, his governess Ms. Lina Strauss (nicknamed "Bunchy" in a German-language pun) brought a cosmopolitan flair to his home.
Rezzori mentions Marcel Proust early on in this book, but even if he didn't, many readers would think of Proust nonetheless. Rezzori has the same passion for introspection on the most mundane issues of childhood. I must admit, his reveries and his psychological analyses of his family do tend to drag, especially in the last third or so of the book. I must admit to skimming for long passages about his sister and Bunchy.
However, as a source of first-hand information on the dying of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and a cosmopolitan Bucovina that is now gone forever, this is a valuable book, and however frustrating its longwindedness might be, I am very glad I read it.
tsharris's review against another edition
4.0
A fantastic memoir of a lost world, namely the multiethnic world that existed between Prussia, Austria, and Russia and which came to an end between the wars. Also a touching, and sad family memoir, with unsparing portraits of his parents, his sister, and himself. Dragged a bit at times, otherwise would have been a full five stars.