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ABOUT THE HOUSE
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In February 1942, a few days after the death pact between Stefan and Lotte, the writer and journalist Raul Azevedo proposed that the house in which the writer lived and died in Petropolis should be transformed into a museum. On the first anniversary of his death (February, 1943) Zweig’s heirs sent a letter of appreciation to the Brazilian government for the last honours paid to the author of Brazil, the land of the Future. In gratitude, they offered the estate that Zweig had left in his house in Bath (UK), including unpublished books, manuscripts, letters, drawings and paintings for the "museum" in Petropolis. By the end of the Second World War, Zweig continued to be a best seller in Brazil. Nevertheless, nothing happened in terms of creating the museum. The house had various owners and finally was declared a national protected landmark in the early 1980’s which, however, did not prevent major structural alterations to the interior and exterior of the property from being made. European tourists, mostly German speaking ones, arrived at the “Duas Portas” neighborhood (now called “Valparaiso”), examined the bronze plaque always hidden by vines, and then walked to the cemetery where the Zweigs were buried to find the writer who had mesmerized their parents and grandparents and still is a major presence in bookstores in Europe. Seventy years later, the idea of the museum has finally become a reality. The house where SZ lived for the last five months of his life, sheltered from the Nazi persecution, was purchased by a group of admirers and transformed into the CASA STEFAN ZWEIG (CSZ), the museum that Brazil owed him. The war exile, who found refuge on the street which honors the author of Cançao do Exílio (The Song of Exile), Gonçalves Dias, finally became part of the landscape, the community and the cultural reality of Petropolis and, by extension, of Brazil.
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