The Magic Mountain (Paperback)
Thomas Mann (author)Published: 29/07/1996
Humorous, philosophical and filled with a cast of unforgettable characters, Mann’s modernist masterpiece spans themes of time, love, imagination, illness and death through a story of a young man whose visit to see his cousin at a sanatorium turns into a seven-year stay.
This European masterpiece from the Nobel prizewinner explores the lure and degeneracy of ideas in an introverted community on the eve of World War I.
Hans Castorp is 'a perfectly ordinary, if engaging young man' when he goes to visit his cousin in an exclusive sanatorium in the Swiss Alps. What should have been a three week trip turns into a seven year stay. Hans falls in love and becomes intoxicated with the ideas he hears at the clinic - ideas which will strain and crack apart in a world on the verge of the First World War.
Publisher: Vintage Publishing
ISBN: 9780749386429
Number of pages: 752
Weight: 540 g
Dimensions: 198 x 129 x 38 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
'Magnificent... a beautiful, feverish account of obsessive love' - Jonathan Coe
'Featuring lengthy debates between humanist freemasons and Jews-turned-Catholics, a long love-scene written entirely in French and a brilliant hallucinatory journey down the snowy slopes, it merits multiple readings. A novel for a lifetime not just a rainy afternoon' - Guardian
'A monumental writer' - Sunday Telegraph
You may also be interested in...
“The Magic Mountain”
At the risk of being labelled a Philistine, I declare that this book is one of the most insufferably boring tomes that has ever made it onto my bedside table. I admit that I only struggled my way through the first 170... More
“A questionable read”
I've some sympathy for the reviewer who gave this book a one star review but on the other hand I usually enjoy this sort of thing, and I'm enjoying this though not as much as I'd hoped. I suppose it all... More
“A worthwhile climb”
This book is tough: there is no getting around it and I defy anyone who has read it to have breezed through it. It is however a fantastic book that combines fairytale magic with philosophy and reminds me of a rather... More
Please sign in to write a review
Sign In / Register
Sign In
Download the Waterstones App
Would you like to proceed to the App store to download the Waterstones App?