Letter from an Unknown Woman

Book summary

A well-known novelist comes home on his birthday and finds a long letter from a woman whose name he does not know. In it she tells her whole life, from the day when, still a girl, she watched him move into her building in Vienna. For years she loved him without making herself known, met him without being recognised, and now writes to say everything. The story explores one-sided passion, anonymity and a life arranged around someone unaware of it. Zweig holds to a single voice throughout, in a confession that never pauses for breath.