Life at the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette has long captivated readers, drawn by accounts of the intrigues and pageantry that came to such a sudden and unexpected end. Stefan Zweig's Marie Antoinette: The Portrait of an Average Woman is a dramatic account of the guillotine's most famous victim, from the time when as a fourteen-year-old she took Versailles by storm, to her frustrations with her aloof husband, her passionate love affair with the Swedish Count von Fersen, and ultimately to the chaos of the French Revolution and the savagery of the Terror. An impassioned narrative, Zweig's biography focuses on the human emotions of the participants and victims of the French Revolution, making it both an engrossingly compelling read and a sweeping and informative history. "Certainly no one can arise unmoved from the reading of this powerful work." -- The New Republic "Excellent biography." -- The New York Times

斯蒂芬・茨威格：奧地利著名小說傢、傳記作傢，齣身於富裕的猶太傢庭，青年時代在維也納和柏林攻讀哲學和文學，後遊曆世界各地，結識羅曼・羅蘭和羅丹等人，並深受其影響。1934年遭納粹驅逐，先後流亡英國、巴西。1942年在孤寂與理想破滅中與妻子在巴西雙雙自殺。茨威格作品以小說和人物見長。代錶作《人生轉摺點》、《一個陌生女人的來信》、《象棋的故事》、《一個女人一生中的而是小時》、《危險的憐憫》等；迴憶錄《昨日的世界》；傳記《異端的權利》、《麥哲倫航海紀》、《斷頭王後》、《人類群星閃耀的時刻》等。茨威格作品在世界範圍都有著經久不衰的魅力，國內多傢齣版社在近年內齣版過幾乎所有他的傳記著作和小說文集。