Thomas Mann's novel “The Magic Mountain” was published 100 years ago. To mark the anniversary, the museum will exhibit copies of the novel in different languages from its archive in 2024.
Originally published in November 1924 in Germany, the novel “The Magic Mountain” was created in two stages, the first spanning from 1913 to 1915 and the second from 1919 to 1924. The result was a large-scale novel or so called Bildungsroman.
Mann penned the novel over the course of eleven years, during which he experienced the horrors of the First World War, as well as the upheavals caused by revolution and the change in the form of government. Not surprisingly, the concept of the work also changed. “The Magic Mountain” is closely linked to two different works by Thomas Mann, namely the novella “Death in Venice” and the essay “Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man”. The author has always emphasized that “The Magic Mountain” cannot be viewed in isolation from his earlier and later works.
The impetus for writing this novel was an autobiographical incident: in 1912, Thomas Mann traveled to a sanatorium in Davos, Switzerland, where his wife was being treated and where he himself almost became a patient. The author stated: “The idea of turning my Davos impressions and experiences into a story soon took hold in me.”
