The Magic Mountain by Mann, Thomas - 1996

Vintage. 1996. Paperback. Good. In this dizzyingly rich novel of ideas, Mann uses a sanatorium in the Swiss Alps--a community devoted exclusively to sickness--as a microcosm for Euro pe, which in the years before 1914 was already exhibiting the first symptom s of its own terminal irrationality. The Magic Mountain is a monumental wor k of erudition and irony, sexual tension and intellectual ferment, a book t hat pulses with life in the midst of death. Editorial Reviews From Publishers Weekly New translation of Mann's classic novel. Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library Journal One of the most influential and celebrated German works of the 20th century has been newly rendered in English by Woods, twice winner of the PEN Trans lation Prize. First published in 1929, Mann's novel tells the story of Hans Castorp, a modern everyman who spends seven years in an Alpine sanatorium for tuberculosis patients, finally leaving to become a soldier in World War I. Isolated from the concerns of the everyday world, he is exposed to the wide range of ideas that shaped a world on the verge of explosion. Consider ing what was to follow, the most poignant moment comes when Naphta, a Jewis h-born Jesuit, defends the use of terror and the taking of life for the sak e of an all-encompassing idea. Woods's work reads more naturally than the o riginal translation, which, while faithful to the German, was stiff and for bidding. A necessary addition to any fiction collection. Michael T. O'Pecko, Towson State Univ., Md. Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.