[Relsenlilky]

Thanks, Sybarite, for the thorough appraisal of Thomas Mann. It is hard to imagine what it must have been like for a middle-class German like Mann, who wrote books and never did anyone any harm, suddenly realising (you suggest in the 1920s already), that his country was being taken over by stealth by crooks and murderers.

My pleasure, Eric. Mann's whole background is fascinating (there is much in it that I can personally identify with) ? it was very much an environment of northern European Protestantism; suspicion of sensuality and the sensual life, the 'Protestant work ethic' ? much of it informs his creation of Aschenbach in Death in Venice. The guilt-ridden fear of giving the senses full rein for instance.

In his work, Mann stuck very much to the principles of his upbringing ? that was also partly as a way of trying to avoid 'giving in' to his sexuality. In Death in Venice he seems to argue against his own position ? Aschenbach dies with a smile on his face, having finally experienced a sensual blossoming. The price is not just his life, but the art that he abandons when he eventually pursues his vision of Tadzio. Is death a punishment for Aschenbach or an apotheosis? Does Mann long to be Aschanbach ? to let himself be free to be himself and to experience the sensual side of his nature without guilt or fear?

... I understand the analogy of Christ not bringing on the Inquisition, but the way Communists have organised themselves, in semi-clandestine cells with blind obedience, does suggest that they have a superiority complex, take upon themselves the duty and right to teach the rest of us how to live, and the economics to go with it...

Different communists organise themselves differently, but what you assert could easily be levied at religious groups too ? particularly today, as we see various religious groups attempting to gain political influence in a less-than-honest manner. One of the things that I find annoying about left-wing politics in general is that there is a tendency to treat it all like religion, with all the theological rows, complete with the splits and factionalisation.

... I'm sure Marx identified matters that are valuable, but I am highly suspicious of those intellectuals who try to maintain that Marxism is sound in theory, whereas those silly Russians, Chinese and North Koreans messed it all up, because they were too dumb to do it properly...

But the point is (or one point at least) is that, in effect, Marx didn't tell anyone how to 'do it'. Most of what has come to be viewed as revolutionary theory is from Lenin )particularly What is to be Done?. Marx analysed political-economic relationships and those relationships are still essentially true today, if we wish to understand class etc.

... Christianity is still a faith big time, whereas only shabby dictatorships such as Belarus and North Korea cling to the remnants of Communism...

One could point out that both the senior political figures who launched an illegal war in Iraq are, wait for it, Christians ? and well known for their religiosity. And, without getting completely side-tracked into a different and potentially contentious issue, the fact that millions of people think that McDonalds is good food doesn't make it so.

There are also a number of other countries where communism of one form or another continues ? in India, in the Calcutta region, IIRC, there has been an elected communist regional government for some years. One of its achievements has been in women's education and career opportunities ? which has, in turn, reduced the birth rate. In Nepal, the newly-elected communist government has just held a referendum to become a republic (the party is pluralist, by the way).

The US would still assert that Cuba is a dangerous commie country and they've expended plenty of money and efforts down the years to get rid of democratically-elected left-wing governments that they assert are 'communist'. Indeed, they're not too happy with Venezuela these days.

The reality is simple ? as long as you have vast swathes of the global population disenfranchised and living in abject poverty, in places such as Colombia, murdered for attempting to win basic, decent wages and working conditions, then communism will appeal to people, because it offers the idea of a world that is not run for the few at the expense of the many.

... As you can, however,

If you are going to achieve the dictatorship of the proletariat, you can't afford to have democracy...

Define democracy. What happens in many places in the world effectively disenfranchises people in one way or another. In the US, for instance, people have a choice of, err ... well, not very much of a choice, really. How much difference is there between the Republican and Democrat parties? In the UK< we're increasingly moving toward a simple position ? two main parties and little to choose between them. How democratic is that? It's democracy pretty much in name only. Is democracy really just getting to put a cross on a ballot paper every few years? Is it a democracy when, in order to have any realistic chance of winning seats in an election, you need millions of pounds, and the biggest parties get most of that from big business by way (in effect) of bribes to carry out polices that are friendly to them if elected? How is that democracy?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not proposing a Soviet system. But I do think that people bandy around the word 'democracy' a lot, without actually thinking what it means.

... But to return to that sophisticated author Thomas Mann, I admire someone on another chatsite who has read the whole of Mann's huge "Joseph and His Brothers". As with Kolakowski, I've never had the stamina. My more humble aim is to finish a second reading of "The Magic Mountain" one day, and re-read "Doktor Faustus" as well. It is the very fact that Mann blends in aspects of everyday life with philosophy that attracts me. I cannot read music, and would maybe be handicapped to an extent with musical theory, but I can handle the Settembrini-Naphta verbal duel...

I don't know that I'll ever get through Joseph. I have more of the short stories on my shelf, plus Lotte in Weimar (although I want to read The Troubles of Young Werther first) and The Holy Sinner, but I will probably be tempted back to Death in Venice again very soon. Not for nothing is it regarded by many as the finest short story ever.

... You will note that both Mann and Brecht were very bourgeois, but I prefer the former, who never pretended anything else.

Ah, but what is "bourgeois"? I'm "bourgeois" by most people's definitions ? my cultural interests, for instance, mark me that way for most people. As do my background (daughter of a clergyman) and education (a grammar school ? albeit a state one) and job (the media). However, in terms of a classical understanding of class, I'm also working class. In that I do not own the means to my own production (or have a private income) and do have to sell the labour of my hand or brain in order to keep a roof over my head and food in my belly. That, in essence, is what constitutes working class ? not a lack of education or speaking with a certain kind of accent and preferring watching soap operas on TV to reading a book. Social definitions of class confuse people ? particularly in the UK.

[healty-back]

Good God, woman! You didn't go to a gr?mmar school? Whatever next?

Seriously, I only use the word "bourgeois" to take the piss, but I too would define myself as "middle-class" and did indeed go to a state grammar school (albeit one aping the public school ethos) myself. But I believe in a society where the lower classes (I say!) can rise. My own parents furnish an interesting instance: my mother was born in a patrician bourgeois household, with y'r actual cook and servants; whilst my father came from the household of a coal miner. Diametric opposites.

You mention Mann's sexuality. I think it was, as I said earlier, a question of like father, like son. And I suspect that the fact that the diaries for a number of key years in Thomas' life were destroyed by the author suggests that maybe daddy was a bit too fond of Klaus, who did, after all, end up committing suicide. But among the steamy, unhealthy, incestuous atmosphere that must have informed the Mann household, our patrician chappie did manage, by dint of regular hours, get a lot of works of genius published. Was Katja Pringsheim the downtrodden, docile, loyal wife of feminist clich?, or did she manage to carve out a niche of her own, for herself and the kids? Because in those days, richer people did have servants (home-helps, as we would call them nowadays), so surely women like Katja were not mere baby-making machines.

More later; my post-prandial nap commences.

[actioliGalm]

I recently finished reading this book, and even composed a post for this thread which disappeared into the electronic ether.

I like it a lot. It didn't have the sheer sense of scale of The Magic Mountain, but part of that may have been because it largely attempted to come to terms with the fate of a particular nation rather than an entire continent and the world it dominated at the time.

The Faust legend has always fascinated me (Marlowe's being my favourite version for the power of its opening and closing monologues) as has music theory and music's philsophical and social implications (I read a lot of Adorno a few months back and it did contribute to my understanding of this book).

I'm not sure how good a parallel Leverkuhn's life and notional pact with the devil is with Germany's Nazi misadventure. There are broad strokes but I think the analogy does not correspond well all the way.

I was impressed by the way Mann sustained a dual narrative, Zeitblom's impressions of the years he spends living through the Nazi era and his memories of his friend's life. I also felt that in many ways, Leverkuhn and Zeitblom are involved in as telling a dialogue as Settembrini and Naphta in The Magic Mountain , only presented in more subtle variety of ways than simply a series of conversations.

I found the book both thought-provoking and moving. I also expect I will re-read this one at some point - I've already flipped back and revisited several passages in light of what happens later on.

[healty-back]

I'm glad there's someone else out there that likes Mann. I intend re-reading his Faustus when I've finished re-reading The Magic Mountain. But my reading has its bottlenecks.

It's many years since I read Doktor Faustus but I know what Jayaprakash means about its not having the same sense of scale as The Magic Mountain. The latter book had so many characters, even if they were confined to one sanatorium.

I'm looking forward to re-acquainting myself with the book.