Rating: 
Summary: A Higher Sanity and Health
Review: This great and literate novel is the tale of Hans Castorp, that "delicate child of life" whom we first meet at the age of twenty-three, ambivalently embarking on a career as a ship-building engineer in his home city of Hamburg, Germany. Before beginning his professional work, however, Hans journeys on what is intended to be a vacation and a pro forma visit to see his tubercular cousin, Joachim Ziemssen, at a sanatorium in the alpine town of Davos, Switzerland. As the train continues on its course through the mountain scenery, Hans and the reader become aware that this is no ordinary journey. The impressionable Hans is transported away from the life and obligations he has known, to the rarefied mountain air and insular community of the sanatorium.At first uneasy, Hans soon becomes fascinated with, and drawn to, the routine established for the "consumptives" and to the social scene which flourishes there. Ordinary life seems increasingly unreal to him; his perceptions are heightened and he becomes aware of his physical, spiritual and emotional vulnerability, as well as his own sexuality. He is greatly attracted to one of the patients, a married woman of Slavic background, Madame Claudia Chauchat. She reminds him of a schoolboy to whom he had been strangely attracted as a child. The turmoil brought on by this romantic obsession seems even to be reflected in Hans' physical state, which becomes increasingly unstable and feverish. Events take an unexpected turn and, as his intended three-week stay draws to a close, Hans is compelled to remain at the sanitorium, a situation for which he is almost grateful as he can now remain close to Madame Chauchat as well as engage in the profound discussions about illness, life, time, death, religion, love and world views initiated by yet another patient, Herr Settembrini. Settembrini is an Italian man of letters and a humanist who believes that reason and the intellect must, and will, prevail, in daily life as well as in world affairs. He is contemptuous of the foolish flirtations and empty talk in which most of the sanitorium inhabitants indulge and warns Hans repeatedly of the dangers inherent in cutting off all ties to real life and responsibility. Hans, however, has ideas of his own. This depiction of sanitorium life was triggered by Mann's own experience when his wife was confined for several months. he began writing The Magic Mountain in 1912, in a humorous vein. His work was interrupted by WWI and, subsequently, the book took him twelve years to complete. The intervening events in Mann's life led him to a major examination of human nature, European history and politics and to ponder the great questions surrounding life and death. (The chapter entitled, Snow, contains a stunningly described flirtation with death.) In this dense and sometimes difficult, though always rewarding, book, Mann's descriptions of institutional life are of interest in themselves; allusions to the dark and irrational forces that lurk within the human psyche at a time when psychoanalysis was just beginning are of interest; considerations of the human condition and of the human spirit make worthwhile reading for any thoughtful person, and for anyone entering a profession centered on illness. In the informative afterword written retrospectively, Mann states that "what (Hans) came to understand is that one must go through the deep experience of sickness and death to arrive at a higher sanity and health..."
Rating:
Summary: Difficult read but a thrilling intellectual ride
Review: I grabbed hold of this novel after I read that Susan Sontag read this aloud when she was an adolescent. Harold Bloom, the literar critic from Yale, said that this book requires considerable learning to read and understand. Having read all of it and understood most of it I feel pretty well. The thrilling part of this novel is when Hans Castrop is educated into the ways of an intellectual life by his mentor Herr Settembrini. In the rarefied air of the mountain sanatorium the two debate art and literature. For an air-chair intellectual like myself it was fun to learn more about the humanities from the discourse of Herr Settembrini. Like all of Mann's novels and short stories the prose is beautifully written. And as Susan Sontag points out "The Magic Mountain" includes it's own built in literary criticism to help you understand the plot and theme. For a homosexual, Thomas Mann knows the heterosexual skill of seducing a female. When Hans Castorp was wooing Madame Chucat I had to look over my shoulder and see if anyone spied my embarrassment as I am sure I was blushing. This was such a beautiful narrative that I wanted to subject it to memory so I could use it in the future. (I have the same goal for some of Shakespeare's sonnets and soliloquoys.) I am still a little confused by the ending. I won't ruin it for you but suffice it to say it is not clear to me which character was the subject of the final few paragraphs. Maybe someone can recommend an Edmund Wilson, Irving Howe, or other informed criticism that I can read.
Rating: 
Summary: A masterpiece that I fail to see the greatness contained
Review: A great novel, or so I've heard. Though I've also heard voiced complaint. Attempting to represent Nietzsche's Eternal Recurrance, Mann indeed went on and on (esp. the political conversations) when he could have done the same, in my opinion, in a more condensed, tighter framework. This edition does translate the French passages as well.
Rating:
Summary: The ONE book for the deserted island
Review: I was 15 years old when I read Mann's 'Magic Mountain' for the first time. And have gone back to it (or at least re-read certain passages of it) uncounted times since. Years ago I decided it would be the one book to take to the infamous deserted island with me if I had to pick only one book. And although the reasons for this choice have changed since, the choice itself hasn't. Why? Because with 'Magic Mountain' Mann has compiled a huge amount of information (and controversial information, for that matter) and an ecclectic variety of subjects: Mathematics, Medicine, Astronomy, Physics, Politics, Astrology, Psychology, Literature, History, Theatre, you name it. Thus, the story line - actually quite thin and simplistic itself - is merely serving as a bracket to hold this immense collections of man's opinions and knowledge together; and thus, btw, the opinion of one of the Amazon.com reviewers saying that the novel is BORING is rendered completely irrelevant --- boring it can only be to somebody who has no interest whatsoever in Modern Man, his failures and his praises. When I moved from Germany to California, I bought a second edition of the book, in English, in addition to my German one --- because the German one was simply so used that it had started to fall apart...
Rating:
Summary: A Fairy Tale
Review: When my book club chose to read Magic Mountain, I had absolutely no idea what it was about. Being a fan of science fiction and fantasy, I guess my interpretation is a bit off the beaten track. After the first couple hundred pages, I thought that perhaps it was a "Haunted House" story, that the sanitorium was exerting some evil influence on the characters. It took me a while to figure out that it was really a fairy tale, one of those stories in which hapless mortals fall into a fairy ring and stay to dance the night away, and afterwards discover that a hundred years have passed in the real world. Last month my whole family got the flu, and we were all in bed for almost a month. Just as with the folks encamped on Magic Mountain, time just seems to stand still as all attention is focused inward, and the real world and its responsibilities just seem to disappear.
Rating:
Summary: Translation PLEASE!
Review: John E. Woods' translation is amazing. The Lowe-Porter translations of all of Mann's books are plodding. They also shy away from his interest in things which might have been judged purient in the 1930's-1950's. Mann's deeply hidden homoeroticism is much more on the surface in Woods' great work. I only wish Woods would translate Death in Venice and Joseph and His Brothers
Rating:
Summary: The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
Review: I was at first very intimidated by this book, but I like challenges so I decided to tough it out and was pleasantly surprised to discover that I was really enjoying it. The debates about progress and religon were very enlightening, as also were Mann's theories about time and space. You must read this book two times though to really get the full benefit of it, I've only read it once but I plan to read it again in the near future.
Rating:
Summary: a tour-de-force
Review: Mann's prose allows the reader such flexibility of thought (not completely lacking direction, however) and an amazing indulgence in the richness of the characters. The Magic Mountain was truly an amazing literary experience, full of philosophical wit, emotional elasticity and faustian dialectics. It is one of the most rewarding novels I have ever read.
Rating: 
Summary: De Toverberg
Review: Hans Castorp, een jonge kerel die op zoek is naar iets, maar nog niet precies weet wat, besluit in het sanatorium te blijven waar hij oorspronkelijk alleen maar zijn neef ging opzoeken. Zijn 7-jaar lange verblijf biedt de lezer een zicht op de Europese geschiedenis en vormt tevens ook een parodie op die geschiedenis. Met allerlei karakters die ver uiteenlopen en soms ook vervaarlijk dicht in elkaars buurt komen, zal hij uiteindelijk als volwassen uit het boek komen. En breekt WOI uit natuurlijk ...
Rating: 
Summary: a few comments on translation
Review: ... I found it to be a challenging, and very rewarding, work. My only disappointment with H.T. Lowe-Porter's translation relates to her reluctance to translate the conversations that take place in languages other than German. A pivotal 9-page conversation takes place mostly in French, and I was forced to find a second copy of the work in the Woods translation in order to read it.
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