The World of Yesterday but hated politics and shunned political engagement. His autobiography shows some reluctance to analyse Nazism as a political ideology; he tended simply to regard it as the rule of one particularly evil man, Hitler. Zweig was struck that the "Berghof", Hitler's mountain residence in Berchtesgaden, was just across the valley from his own house outside Salzburg. Berchtesgaden was an area of early Nazi activity. Zweig believed strongly in Europeanism against nationalism. Zweig also describes his passion for collecting manuscripts, mostly literary and musical. Zweig collaborated in the early 1930s with composer Richard Strauss on the opera "Die schweigsame Frau", which
Freilassing–Berchtesgaden railway Bavarian mountains, iron works, and salt works (). The construction of the Reichenhall–Berchtesgaden section was completed in 1884. On 25 October 1888 a festively decorated first train ran from Reichenhall to Berchtesgaden. The travel time for the entire route was initially 90 minutes and it was later reduced to 70 minutes. In 1914 the line was electrified. The AC power was supplied by the Saalach power station in Bad Reichenhall-Kirchberg, which is fed by lake Saalachsee and still supplies power for trains. The electric train operations started in 1916 with specially designed electric locomotives of class EP 3/6. There was