Synopses & Reviews
Thomas Mann's 1924 novel The Magic Mountain explored the heady intellectual culture of the chaotic and broken Germany that emerged from the First World War. Mann himself considered it his best novel, and along with Buddenbrooks (1900) it won him the Nobel Prize in literature for 1929. But since many now argue that the age of literary modernism is over, how are we to understand Mann's masterpiece today? This volume takes up that question.
Synopsis
Volume offering a guide to and reassessment of Thomas Mann's famous novel.
Thomas Mann was the first writer since Goethe to attract a large international audience to stories written in German, bringing German fiction into the mainstream of European literature. His second major work, The Magic Mountain (1924), explores the heady intellectual culture of the chaotic and broken Germany that emerged from the First World War, and, along with the earlier Buddenbrooks, earned him a Nobel Prize for literature in 1929. Mann himself considered The Magic Mountain to be his greatest novel, and few in his own day doubted the preeminence of this modernist classic; however, many have argued that the age of literary modernism has passed. If this is so, how might we best understand Mann's masterpiece now? Topics covered in this volume, which aims to provide both a survey of and new research into important aspects of the work, include Mann's comic vision, his homosexuality, his fraught attitude toward Jews, the place of his novel in the landscape of postmodern life, the theme of solitude, music in the novel, and technology.
Stephen D. Dowden is Professor of German at Brandeis University. Contributors: David Blumberg, Michael Brenner, Stephen Dowden, Edward Engelberg, Ulker G kberk, Eugene Goodheart, Joseph P. Lawrence, Karla Schultz, Susan Sontag, Kenneth Weisinger.
Stephen D. Dowden is Professor of German at Brandeis University.
Synopsis
Thomas Mann was the first writer since Goethe to attract a large international audience to stories written in German, bringing German fiction into the mainstream of European literature. His second major work, The Magic Mountain (1924), explores the heady intellectual culture of the chaotic and broken Germany that emerged from the First World War, and, along with the earlier Buddenbrooks, earned him a Nobel Prize for literature in 1929. Mann himself considered The Magic Mountain to be his greatest novel, and few in his own day doubted the preeminence of this modernist classic; however, many have argued that the age of literary modernism has passed. If this is so, how might we best understand Mann's masterpiece now? Topics covered in this volume, which aims to provide both a survey of and new research into important aspects of the work, include Mann's comic vision, his homosexuality, his fraught attitude toward Jews, the place of his novel in the landscape of postmodern life, the theme of solitude, music in the novel, and technology. Stephen D. Dowden is Professor of German at Brandeis University. Contributors: David Blumberg, Michael Brenner, Stephen Dowden, Edward Engelberg, Ulker Gokberk, Eugene Goodheart, Joseph P. Lawrence, Karla Schultz, Susan Sontag, Kenneth Weisinger. Stephen D. Dowden is Professor of German at Brandeis University.