Guus Bosman

When I arrived at my parents house, and at on my usual spot, I reviewed the bookshelves. Last winter they had the livingroom repainted and that meant taking out the books. Thankfully, they were all put in their right place again.

Straight ahead of my are a few books that I have been intimidated by for years, and I decided to tackle this big book by Thomas Mann.

This was not an easy read!

Time in the book passed very slowly. The main characters are in a tuberculose recovery phase and are spending years of their live in this home. Eating, resting, flirting...

Halfway the book a second character appears and many pages are spent of philosophical debates between them. I read that even the Dutch translator thought these sections were overkill, and I'll admit I glanced over some of the longer sections.

It was interesting to read about the medical treatments. Unpleasant, too, obviously.

The ending was sudden, abrupt, but beautiful. The lecture at Princeton, by the author, which is included at the end of the book, was very enriching. Also good to see the translation of the French dialogue.

I read this book in its Dutch translation. For years I've been meaning to keep up my German, and with that in mind I'd have preferred to read this work in its original language, but in practice there is no way I would have been able to complete that -- such rich but complicated language is above my skill level. The translators did an excellent job conveying that richness into Dutch though, which gave me a good sense of the writing style. A rich book, and I'm glad I read it.