Customer Reviews

Thomas Mann: A Biography

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This is clearly the definitive biography of Thomas Mann ...by perhaps this era's leading biographer .....to be sure there are several bios out there ....but having read the most recent two ....i must say they were merely an excursus compared to Mr. Heymans outstanding effort ! his is both comprehensive and perspicuous ....not an easy task when being an exegete of Mann's life and works ....Mann was both an accomplished author and prescient political analyst .....and led a long and complicated life .....which Mr. Heyman documents with unusual clarity and verve!.. of the three major biographies on T.Mann recently published ....his (heymans) is the best of the trio ....the other two being discursive and garbled thus confusing to the common reader by all means read this edition if you have any interest in T. Mann's work and life...it's COMPLEAT ! thankyou Mr. Heyman !

If you're looking to find the connection between T Mann's great books and his amazing life, this is the book to read! Though this book does emphasize his bisexual tendencies, this is really done in a limited way, mainly in explaining his real experiences in "Death in Venice", and the very late edition to "Felix Krull", easily his most amusing book! Oddly, this man of phenomenal powers of observation was duped at a seance, the experience leading to spiritualist scene (Highly Questionable) in the Magic Mountain. The author does not mention Mann's own observations on this odd subject. in his Essays for 3 Decades. Even more than Hemingway, his family had severe suicidal tendencies, including his sister, sister in law, and two children, including Klaus, a renowned author in his own right. T. Mann was surely an imperious father, distant and aloof, and had his disputes with his older brother , Heinrich, mainly during the great war. Thomas was a great defender of German Kulture, Heinrich an international socialist. Still, his leading role as an anti-Nazi "Good German" cannot be denied, and after the war, he was subject to anti-communist hysteria rumor-mongering in the USA, so he moved back to Switzerland. He was an inveterate traveller, often ill, but still managed to find the time to write some of the greatest literature ever. In sum, an excellent bio of a rare, though flawed, genius!

I have read most of Mann's works, including his diaries, and countless biographies and commentaries on his novels. This particular "biography" managed to alienate me so much (in the prologue already!) that I decided not to read any further. Time is precious! Clearly the author has no positive feelings towards Mann, which begs the question why he decided to invest the effort in writing a 600-page tome about him. The prologue is an unstructured and silly rambling about Mann's sexuality, spiced with downright vicious remarks about his alleged "fakeness", selfishness and superficially hidden monstrosity.

Some excerpts from the first 5 pages:
"The diaries reveal that there were no limits to Mann's self-absorption etc."
"Crude and callow though it is, "Little Herr Friedemann" represents a turning point in Thomas Mann's development: He could go on releasing guilt feelings by offloading them on characters"
"Dapper, dignified, and charming, he made a good impression socially, presenting a facade that had little to do with the emotional turmoil in which repressed sexuality, guilt feelings, and literary ambitions were bubbling in a witch's cauldron."

I hope this gives an impression of the literary and human quality of this book. If you are interested in a fair, sophisticated and intellectually deep biography, I would refer you to Hermann Kurzke's beautiful "Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art. A Biography ".