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{{Short description|German novelist and Nobel Prize laureate (1875–1955)}}
{{Infobox writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox writer/doc]] -->
| name             = Thomas Mann
| image            = Thomas Mann 1929.jpg
| caption          = Mann in 1929
| birth_date       = {{Birth date|1875|6|6|df=yes}}
| birth_place      = [[Free City of Lübeck]], [[German Empire]]
| death_date       = {{Death date and age|1955|8|12|1875|6|6|df=yes}}
| death_place      = [[Zürich]], Switzerland
| resting_place    = [[Kilchberg, Zürich|Kilchberg]], Switzerland
| occupation       = {{cslist|Writer|journalist|[[literary criticism|literary critic]]}}
| citizenship      = {{ubl|German→|Czech→|American}}
| period           = [[20th century in literature|20th century]]
| alma_mater       = {{ubl|[[University of Munich]]|[[Technical University of Munich]]}}
| genres           = {{hlist|Novel|novella|short story|[[sketch story|sketch]]|play|screenplay|poetry|essay|autobiography|diary|lecture|[[public speaking|oration]]|correspondence}}
| movement         = [[Modernist literature|Modernism]]
| years_active     = 1896–1954
| employer         = {{ubl|[[Princeton University]]|[[Library of Congress]]}}
| notableworks     = ''[[Buddenbrooks]]'', ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'', ''[[Death in Venice]]'', ''[[Joseph and His Brothers]]'', ''[[Doctor Faustus (novel)|Doctor Faustus]]''
| awards           = {{plainlist|
* {{nowrap|[[Nobel Prize in Literature]] (1929)}}
* {{nowrap|[[Goethe Prize]] (1949)}}}}
| spouse           = [[Katia Mann|Katia Pringsheim]]
| children         = [[Erika Mann|Erika]], [[Klaus Mann|Klaus]], [[Golo Mann|Golo]], [[Monika Mann|Monika]], [[Elisabeth Mann Borgese|Elisabeth]], [[Michael Mann (scholar)|Michael]]
| relatives        = Thomas Johann Heinrich Mann (father)<br />[[Júlia da Silva Bruhns]] (mother)<br />[[Heinrich Mann]] (brother)
| signature        = Thomas Mann signature.svg
}}

'''Paul Thomas Mann''' ({{IPAc-en|UK|ˈ|m|æ|n}} {{respell|MAN}}, {{IPAc-en|US|ˈ|m|ɑː|n}} {{respell|MAHN}};<ref>{{cite book|last=Lindsey|first=Geoff|author-link=Geoff Lindsey|year=1990|editor-last=Ramsaran|editor-first=Susan|title=Studies in the Pronunciation of English: A Commemorative Volume in Honour of A.C. Gimson|chapter=Quantity and quality in British and American vowel systems|publisher=Routledge|pages=106–118|isbn=978-0-415-07180-2}}</ref> {{IPA|de|ˈtoːmas ˈman|lang|De-Thomas Mann.ogg}}; 6 June 1875 – 12 August 1955) was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and the [[1929 Nobel Prize in Literature]] laureate. His highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novellas are noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectual. His analysis and critique of the European and German soul used modernized versions of German and Biblical stories, as well as the ideas of [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]], [[Friedrich Nietzsche]], and [[Arthur Schopenhauer]].{{Citation needed|date=March 2025}}

Mann was a member of the [[Hanseaten (class)|hanseatic]] [[Mann family]] and portrayed his family and class in his first novel, ''[[Buddenbrooks]]''. His older brother was the radical writer [[Heinrich Mann]] and three of Mann's six children – [[Erika Mann]], [[Klaus Mann]] and [[Golo Mann]] – also became significant German writers. When [[Adolf Hitler]] [[Adolf Hitler's rise to power|came to power in 1933]], Mann fled to Switzerland. When [[World War II]] broke out in 1939, he moved to the United States, then returned to Switzerland in 1952. Mann is one of the best-known exponents of the so-called ''[[Exilliteratur]]'', [[Contemporary German literature|German literature]] written in exile by those who opposed the Hitler regime.{{Citation needed|date=March 2025}}

==Life==
[[File:Buddenbrookhaus Luebeck (Germany) by night.jpg|thumb|House of the [[Mann family]] in Lübeck ("''Buddenbrookhaus''"), where Thomas Mann grew up; now a family museum]]

Paul Thomas Mann was born to a [[Hanseaten (class)|hanseatic]] family in [[Lübeck]], the second son of Thomas Johann Heinrich Mann (a senator and a [[grain trade|grain merchant]]) and his wife [[Júlia da Silva Bruhns]], a Brazilian woman of German, Portuguese and Native Brazilian ancestry, who emigrated to Germany with her family when she was seven years old. His mother was [[Roman Catholic]] but Mann was baptised into his father's [[Lutheranism|Lutheran]] religion. Mann's father died in 1891, and after that his trading firm was liquidated. The family subsequently moved to [[Munich]]. Mann first studied science at a Lübeck ''[[Gymnasium (school)|Gymnasium]]'' (secondary school), then attended the [[Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich|Ludwig Maximillians University of Munich]] as well as the [[Technical University of Munich]], where, in preparation for a journalism career, he studied history, economics, art history and literature.<ref>{{Cite web| url = http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1929/mann-autobio.html| title = Thomas Mann Autobiography| publisher = Nobel Foundation| access-date = 25 January 2008| archive-date = 31 May 2013| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130531053902/http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1929/mann-autobio.html| url-status = live}}</ref>

Mann lived in Munich from 1891 until 1933,{{clarify|next section says he lived in Davos for a period of time|date=July 2018}} with the exception of a year spent in [[Palestrina]], Italy, with his elder brother, the novelist [[Heinrich Mann|Heinrich]]. Thomas worked at the South German Fire Insurance Company in 1894–95. His career as a writer began when he wrote for the magazine ''[[Simplicissimus]]''. Mann's first short story, "Little Mr Friedemann" (''Der Kleine Herr Friedemann''), was published in 1898.

In 1905, Mann married [[Katia Mann|Katia Pringsheim]], who came from a wealthy, secular Jewish industrialist family. She later joined the [[Lutheran]] church. The couple had six children: [[Erika Mann|Erika]] (b. 1905), [[Klaus Mann|Klaus]] (b. 1906), [[Golo Mann|Golo]] (b. 1909), [[Monika Mann|Monika]] (b. 1910), [[Elisabeth Mann Borgese|Elisabeth]] (b. 1918) and [[Michael Mann (scholar)|Michael]] (b. 1919).<ref>{{cite book
| title      = Thomas Mann: Life as a work of art: A biography
| first      = Hermann
| last      = Kurzke
| isbn      = 978-0-691-07069-8
| location      = Princeton, New Jersey
| publisher      = Princeton University Press
| year      = 2002
| url      = https://archive.org/details/thomasmannlifeas00kurz
}} Translation by Leslie Willson of ''Thomas Mann: Das Leben als Kunstwerk'' (München C. H. Bick'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1999).</ref>

Due to the [[Alfred Pringsheim|Pringsheim family's]] wealth, Katia Mann was able to purchase a summer property in [[Bad Tölz]] in 1908, on which they built a country house the following year, which they kept until 1917.<ref>[https://www.bad-toelz.de/de/entdecken/kunst-literatur-1/thomas-mann-in-bad-toelz/thomas-mann-villa.html Mann country home] in [[Bad Tölz]] on the website of the municipality of Bad Tölz</ref> In 1914 they also purchased a villa in Munich (at Poschinger Str in the borough of [[Bogenhausen]], today 10 Thomas-Mann-Allee) where they lived until 1933.

===Pre-war and Second World War period===
In 1912, Katia was treated for tuberculosis for a few months in a [[sanatorium]] in [[Davos]], Switzerland, where Thomas Mann visited her for a few weeks. This inspired him to write his 1924 novel ''[[The Magic Mountain]]''. He was also appalled by the risk of international confrontation between Germany and France, following the [[Agadir Crisis]] in Morocco, and later by the outbreak of the [[First World War]]. The novel ends with the outbreak of this war, in which the hero perishes.

As a "German patriot", Mann had the proceeds from their summer house used in 1917 to subscribe to war bonds, which lost their face value after the war was lost. His father-in-law did the same, which caused a loss of a major part of the Pringsheim family's wealth. The disastrous [[Hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic|inflation of 1923 and 1924]] resulted in additional high losses. The sales success of his novel ''The Magic Mountain'', published in 1924, improved his financial situation again, as did the award of the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]] in 1929. He used the prize money to build a [[:File:House_of_Thomas_Mann_in_Nida_02.jpg|cottage]] in the fishing village of [[Nida, Lithuania|Nida]], Lithuania on the [[Curonian Spit]], where there was a German art colony and where he spent the summers of 1930–1932 working on ''[[Joseph and His Brothers]]''. Today, the cottage is a cultural center dedicated to him, with a small memorial exhibition.

In February 1933, while having finished a book tour to Amsterdam, Brussels and Paris, Thomas Mann recovered in [[Arosa]] (Switzerland) when [[Nazi seizure of power|Hitler took power]] and Mann heard from his eldest children, Klaus and Erika in Munich, that it would not be safe for him to return to Germany. His political views (see [[#Political views|chapter below]]) had made him an enemy of the Nazis for years. He was doubtful at first, because, with a certain naïveté, he could not imagine the violence of the overthrow and the persecution of opponents of the regime, but the children insisted, and their advice later turned out to be accurate when it emerged that even their driver-caretaker had become an [[informant]] and that Mann's immediate arrest would have been very likely.<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter XIV: ''Under ostracism and ban'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> The family (except these two children who went to Amsterdam) emigrated to [[Küsnacht]], near [[Zürich]], Switzerland, after a stopover in [[Sanary-sur-Mer]], France. The son Golo managed, at great risk, to smuggle the already completed chapters of the ''Joseph'' novel and the (sensitive) diaries into Switzerland. The [[Bavarian Political Police]] searched Mann's house in Munich and confiscated the house, its inventory and the bank accounts. At the same time, an [[Protective custody (Nazi Germany)|arrest warrant]] was issued. Mann was also no longer able to use his holiday home in Lithuania because it was only a few hundred yards from the German border and he seemed to be at risk there. When all members of the Poetry Section at the [[Prussian Academy of Arts]] were asked to make a declaration of loyalty to the National Socialist government, Mann declared his resignation on March 17, 1933.

The writer's freedom of movement was reduced when his German passport expired. The Manns traveled to the United States for the first two times in 1934 and 1935. There was great interest in the prominent writer; the authorities allowed him entry without a valid passport. He received [[Czechoslovakia|Czechoslovak]] citizenship and a passport in 1936, even though he had never lived there. A few weeks later, his German citizenship was revoked – at the same time as his wife Katia and their children Golo, Elisabeth and Michael. Furthermore, the Nazi government now expropriated the family home in Munich, which [[Reinhard Heydrich]] in particular insisted on. It had already been confiscated and forcibly rented out in 1933.<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter XIV: ''Under ostracism and ban'', introduction: Chronicle 1933–1936, Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> In December 1936, the [[University of Bonn]] withdrew Mann's honorary doctorate, which he had been awarded in 1919.<ref>After the war, on December 13, 1946, this withdrawal was reversed.</ref>

In 1939, following the [[German occupation of Czechoslovakia]], Mann immigrated to the United States, while his in-laws only managed thanks to high-ranking connections to leave Germany for Zurich in October 1939. The Manns moved to [[Princeton, New Jersey]], where they lived on 65 Stockton Street<ref>[https://www.mercerhill.org/Stockton%20Street/65_stockton_st_.htm 65 Stockton Street], Princeton, New Jersey, on the website of the Mercer Hill Historic District Association</ref> and he began to teach at [[Princeton University]].<ref>{{cite web| url = http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/mann_thomas.html| title = Source: Alexander Leitch, 1978| access-date = 5 January 2019| archive-date = 1 July 2014| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20140701000437/http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/mann_thomas.html| url-status = dead}}</ref> In 1941 he was designated consultant in German Literature, later Fellow in Germanic Literature, at the [[Library of Congress]].<ref>Spiegel, Taru (1920). "[https://blogs.loc.gov/international-collections/2020/12/thomas-mann-and-the-library-of-congress/ Thomas Mann and the Library of Congress.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231029014827/https://blogs.loc.gov/international-collections/2020/12/thomas-mann-and-the-library-of-congress/ |date=29 October 2023 }}" Library of Congress (18 December).</ref> In 1942, the Mann family moved to [[Thomas Mann House|1550 San Remo Drive]] in the [[Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles|Pacific Palisades]] neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The Manns were prominent members of the German expatriate community of Los Angeles and would frequently meet other emigres at [[Salka and Berthold Viertel House|the house of Salka and Bertold Viertel]] in Santa Monica, and at the [[Villa Aurora]], the home of fellow German exile [[Lion Feuchtwanger]].<ref name="JWA">Jewish Women's Archive: [https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/viertel-salka Salka Viertel | Jewish Women's Archive] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230727235234/https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/viertel-salka |date=27 July 2023 }}. Retrieved 19 November 2016.</ref><ref name="DW">{{cite news|url=http://www.dw.com/en/intellectuals-call-on-german-government-to-rescue-thomas-manns-california-villa/a-19475828|title=Intellectuals call on German government to rescue Thomas Mann's California villa|work=[[Deutsche Welle]]|first=Stefan|last=Dege|date=15 August 2016|access-date=17 November 2016|archive-date=18 November 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161118224532/http://www.dw.com/en/intellectuals-call-on-german-government-to-rescue-thomas-manns-california-villa/a-19475828|url-status=live}}</ref> Thomas Mann's always difficult relationship with his brother [[Heinrich Mann|Heinrich]], who envied Thomas's success and wealth and also differed politically, hardly improved when the latter arrived in California, poor and sickly, in need of support.<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter XVI: ''Hatred of Hitler'', subchapter ''Heinrich'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> On 23 June 1944, Thomas Mann was naturalized as a citizen of the United States. The Manns lived in Los Angeles until 1952.<ref name="Bahr2007">{{cite book|author=Bahr, Ehrhard |title=Weimar on the Pacific: German Exile Culture in Los Angeles and the Crisis of Modernism|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=LsxGVAg2SAUC|date= 2007|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-25128-1|page=170}}</ref>

===Anti-Nazi broadcasts===
The outbreak of World War II, on 1 September 1939, prompted Mann to offer anti-Nazi speeches (in German) to the German people via the [[BBC]]. In October 1940, he began monthly broadcasts, recorded in the U.S. and flown to London, where the [[BBC German Service]] broadcast them to Germany on the [[longwave]] band. In these eight-minute addresses, Mann condemned Hitler and his "paladins" as crude philistines completely out of touch with European culture. In one noted speech, he said: "The war is horrible, but it has the advantage of keeping Hitler from making speeches about culture."<ref>''Deutsche Hörer 25 (recte: 55) Radiosendungen nach Deutschland.'' Insel Verlag, Leipzig 1970.</ref>

Mann was one of the few publicly active opponents of Nazism among German expatriates in the U.S.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/|title=Thomas Mann's War|last=Boes|first=Tobias|date=2019|website=Cornell University Press|language=en-US|access-date=16 January 2020|archive-date=19 February 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210219093640/https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/|url-status=live}}</ref> In a BBC broadcast of 30 December 1945, Mann expressed understanding as to why those peoples that had suffered from the Nazi regime would embrace the idea of [[German collective guilt]]. But he also thought that many enemies might now have second thoughts about "revenge". And he expressed regret that such judgement cannot be based on the individual:

{{blockquote|Those, whose world became grey a long time ago when they realized what mountains of hate towered over Germany; those, who a long time ago imagined during sleepless nights how terrible would be the revenge on Germany for the inhuman deeds of the Nazis, cannot help but view with wretchedness all that is being done to Germans by the Russians, Poles, or Czechs as nothing other than a mechanical and inevitable reaction to the crimes that the people have committed as a nation, in which unfortunately individual justice, or the guilt or innocence of the individual, can play no part.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Suppan |first1=Arnold|author-link=Arnold Suppan|title-link=Hitler–Beneš–Tito |title=Hitler–Beneš–Tito: National Conflicts, World Wars, Genocides, Expulsions, and Divided Remembrance in East-Central and Southeastern Europe, 1848–2018 |date=2019 |publisher=[[Austrian Academy of Sciences Press]] |location=Vienna |isbn=978-3-7001-8410-2 |jstor=j.ctvvh867x|pages=739–740|doi=10.2307/j.ctvvh867x |s2cid=214097654 }}</ref>}}

=== Houses that the Manns lived in ===
{| class="wikitable" style="font-size:88%; float:right; margin-left:1em"
|+ Children of Thomas Mann and Katia Pringsheim
! Name || Birth || Death
|-
| [[Erika Mann|Erika]]|| 9 November 1905 || 27 August 1969
|-
| [[Klaus Mann|Klaus]] || 18 November 1906 || 21 May 1949
|-
| [[Golo Mann|Golo]] || 29 March 1909 || 7 April 1994
|-
| [[Monika Mann|Monika]] || 7 June 1910 || 17 March 1992
|-
| [[Elisabeth Mann Borgese|Elisabeth]] || 24 April 1918 || 8 February 2002
|-
| [[Michael Mann (scholar)|Michael]] || 21 April 1919 || 1 January 1977
|}
<gallery>
Reconstruction of the Thomas Mann mansion.jpg|The family lived in this villa in Munich from 1914 to 1933. Partially destroyed in World War II, it was later reconstructed.
Ehem. Villa Thomas Mann - 2022-04-22 - 147d.jpg|The family country house in [[Bad Tölz]], Bavaria
Nida-Thomas-Mann-Haus01.jpg|Mann's summer cottage in Nidden, [[East Prussia]] (now [[Nida, Lithuania|Nida]], Lithuania), now a memorial museum
200729 Thomas Mann House ml.jpg|[[Thomas Mann House]], Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles. Residence in exile from 1942 until 1952
Thomas Manns Haus in Kilchberg-2.jpg|House in Kilchberg, Switzerland. Last residence 1954–1955
</gallery>

===Last years===
[[File:Thomas Mann Grave 2005-03-26.jpeg|thumb|The grave of Thomas, Katia, Erika, Monika, Michael, and Elisabeth Mann, in [[Kilchberg, Zürich|Kilchberg]], Switzerland. The gravestone is modeled on a Roman [[stele]].]]
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-32373-0006, Schweiz, Beisetzung Thomas Mann.jpg|thumb|Mann's funeral, 1955]]
With the start of the [[Cold War]], he was increasingly frustrated by rising [[McCarthyism]]. As a "suspected communist", he was required to testify to the [[House Un-American Activities Committee]], where he was termed "one of the world's foremost apologists for Stalin and company".<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.upi.com/Marking-writer-Thomas-Manns-life/79951123853113/|title=Marking writer Thomas Mann's life|website=UPI|date=12 August 2005|access-date=27 November 2017|archive-date=1 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171201031330/https://www.upi.com/Marking-writer-Thomas-Manns-life/79951123853113/|url-status=live}}</ref> He was listed by HUAC as being "affiliated with various peace organizations or Communist fronts". Being in his own words a non-communist, rather than an [[anti-communist]], Mann openly opposed the allegations: "As an American citizen of German birth, I finally testify that I am painfully familiar with certain political trends. Spiritual intolerance, political inquisitions, and declining legal security, and all this in the name of an alleged 'state of emergency'. ... That is how it started in Germany." As Mann joined protests against the jailing of the [[Hollywood Ten]] and the firing of schoolteachers suspected of being Communists, he found "the media had been closed to him".<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Meyers|first=Jeffrey|date=Fall 2012|title=Thomas Mann in America|journal=[[Michigan Quarterly Review]]|volume=51|hdl=2027/spo.act2080.0051.419}}</ref> Finally, he was forced to quit his position as Consultant in Germanic Literature at the [[Library of Congress]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/m/the-magic-mountain/thomas-mann-biography|title=Thomas Mann Biography|website=Cliffs Notes|access-date=27 November 2017|archive-date=1 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171201043837/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/m/the-magic-mountain/thomas-mann-biography|url-status=live}}</ref> and in 1952, he returned to Europe, to live in [[Kilchberg, Zürich|Kilchberg, near Zürich]], Switzerland. Here he initially lived in a rented house and bought his last house there in 1954 (which later his widow and then their son Golo lived in until their deaths). He never again lived in Germany, though he regularly traveled there. His most important German visit was in 1949, at the 200th birthday of [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]], attending celebrations in [[Frankfurt am Main]] (then [[West Germany]]) and [[Weimar]] (then [[East Germany]]), as a statement that German culture extended beyond the new political borders.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=H|first=Marcus Kenneth|date=2014|title=The International Relations of Thomas Mann in Early Cold War Germany|url=https://ideas.repec.org/a/bpj/nglost/v8y2014i1p15n4.html|journal=New Global Studies|language=en|volume=8|issue=1|pages=1–15|doi=10.1515/ngs-2014-0007|s2cid=155039470|access-date=19 September 2020|archive-date=5 May 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240505193743/https://ideas.repec.org/a/bpj/nglost/v8y2014i1p15n4.html|url-status=live|url-access=subscription}}</ref> He also visited Lübeck, where he saw his parents' house, which was partially destroyed by the [[bombing of Lübeck in World War II]] (and only later rebuilt). The city welcomed him warmly, but the patrician [[Hanseaten (class)|hanseatic]] families gave him a reserved welcome, since the publication of ''Buddenbrooks'' they had resented him for daring to describe their caste with some mockery, as they at least felt about it.

Along with [[Albert Einstein]], Mann was one of the sponsors of the [[Peoples' World Convention]] (PWC), also known as Peoples' World Constituent Assembly (PWCA), which took place in 1950–51 at Palais Electoral, [[Geneva]], Switzerland.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Einstein |first1=Albert |url=http://archive.org/details/einsteinonpeace00eins |title=Einstein on peace |last2=Nathan |first2=Otto |last3=Norden |first3=Heinz |date=1968 |publisher=New York, Schocken Books |others=Internet Archive |pages=539, 670, 676}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=[Carta] 1950 oct. 12, Genève, [Suiza] [a] Gabriela Mistral, Santiago, Chile [manuscrito] Gerry Kraus. |url=http://www.bibliotecanacionaldigital.gob.cl/bnd/623/w3-article-137193.html |access-date=19 October 2023 |website=BND: Archivo del Escritor |archive-date=28 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231028194759/http://www.bibliotecanacionaldigital.gob.cl/bnd/623/w3-article-137193.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Death===
Following his 80th birthday, Mann went on vacation to [[Noordwijk]] in the Netherlands. On 18 July 1955, he began to experience pain and unilateral swelling in his left leg. The condition of [[thrombophlebitis]] was diagnosed by Dr. Mulders from Leiden and confirmed by Dr. [[Wilhelm Löffler (doctor)|Wilhelm Löffler]]. Mann was transported to a Zürich hospital, but soon developed a state of [[shock (circulatory)|shock]]. On 12 August 1955, he died.<ref name=Bollinger1999>Bollinger A. [The death of Thomas Mann: consequence of erroneous angiologic diagnosis?]. ''[[Wiener Medizinische Wochenschrift]]'', 1999; 149(2–4):30–32. {{PMID|10378317}}</ref> Postmortem, his condition was found to have been misdiagnosed. The pathologic diagnosis, made by Christoph Hedinger, showed he had actually suffered a perforated [[iliac artery (disambiguation)|iliac artery]] [[aneurysm]] resulting in a [[retroperitoneal]] [[hematoma]], compression and [[thrombosis]] of the iliac vein. (At that time, lifesaving vascular surgery had not been developed.<ref name=Bollinger1999 />) On 16 August 1955, Thomas Mann was buried in the Kilchberg village cemetery.<ref>Wilson, Scott. ''Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons'', 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 29777). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.</ref>

===Legacy===
Mann's work influenced many later authors, such as [[Yukio Mishima]]. Joseph Campbell also stated in an interview with Bill Moyers that Mann was one of his mentors.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Starrs|first=Roy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=szFvvhpAVtQC|title=Deadly Dialectics: Sex, Violence, and Nihilism in the World of Yukio Mishima|date=1994|publisher=University of Hawaii Press|isbn=978-0-8248-1631-5|language=en}}</ref> Many institutions are named in his honour, for instance the [[Thomas Mann Gymnasium (Budapest)|Thomas Mann Gymnasium]] of [[Budapest]].

==Career==
[[File:Thomas Mann early.jpg|thumb|Mann in the early period of his writing career]]
[[File:Mann, Thomas – Buddenbrooks, 1909 – BEIC 3277013.jpg|thumb|''Buddenbrooks'' (1909)]]
[[Blanche Knopf]] of [[Alfred A. Knopf]] publishing house was introduced to Mann by [[H. L. Mencken|H.L. Mencken]] while on a book-buying trip to Europe.<ref name="Claridge-2016">{{Cite book|title=The lady with the Borzoi : Blanche Knopf, literary tastemaker extraordinaire|last=Claridge|first=Laura|publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux|year=2016|isbn=978-0-374-11425-1|edition= 1st |location=New York|pages=70–71|oclc=908176194}}</ref> Knopf became Mann's American publisher, and Blanche hired scholar [[Helen Tracy Lowe-Porter]] to translate Mann's books in 1924.<ref>Horton, David (2013), ''Thomas Mann in English. A Study in Literary Translation'', London, New Delhi, New York, Sydney: Bloomsbury. {{ISBN|978-1-4411-6798-9}}</ref> Lowe-Porter subsequently translated Mann's complete works.<ref name="Claridge-2016" /> Blanche Knopf continued to look after Mann. After ''Buddenbrooks'' proved successful in its first year, the Knopfs sent him an unexpected bonus. Later in the 1930s, Blanche helped arrange for Mann and his family to emigrate to America.<ref name="Claridge-2016" />

===Nobel Prize in Literature===
Mann was awarded the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]] in 1929, after he had been nominated by [[Anders Österling]], member of the [[Swedish Academy]], principally in recognition of his popular achievements with ''[[Buddenbrooks]]'' (1901), ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'' (''Der Zauberberg'', 1924), and his numerous short stories.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show.php?id=7347|title=Nomination Database|date=April 2020|publisher=nobelprize.org|access-date=14 June 2017|archive-date=19 December 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161219131319/http://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show.php?id=7347|url-status=live}}</ref> (Due to the personal taste of an influential committee member, only'' Buddenbrooks'' was cited at any great length.)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1929/index.html|title=The Nobel Prize in Literature 1929|website=The Nobel Prize|access-date=11 November 2007|archive-date=26 December 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181226103331/https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1929/summary/|url-status=live}}</ref> Based on Mann's own family, ''Buddenbrooks'' relates the decline of a merchant family in Lübeck over the course of four generations. ''The Magic Mountain'' (''Der Zauberberg'', 1924) follows an engineering student who, planning to visit his [[tuberculosis|tubercular]] cousin at a Swiss [[sanatorium]] for only three weeks, finds his departure from the sanatorium delayed. During that time, he confronts medicine and the way it looks at the body and encounters a variety of characters, who play out ideological conflicts and discontents of contemporary European civilization. The tetralogy ''Joseph and His Brothers'' is an epic novel written over a period of sixteen years and is one of the largest and most significant works in Mann's oeuvre. Later novels included ''[[Lotte in Weimar: The Beloved Returns|Lotte in Weimar]]'' (1939), in which Mann returned to the world of Goethe's novel ''[[The Sorrows of Young Werther]]'' (1774); ''[[Doctor Faustus (novel)|Doctor Faustus]]'' (1947), the story of the fictitious composer Adrian Leverkühn and the corruption of [[Culture of Germany|German culture]] in the years before and during World War II; and ''[[Confessions of Felix Krull]]'' (''Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull'', 1954), which was unfinished at Mann's death. These later works prompted two members of the [[Swedish Academy]] to nominate Mann for the Nobel Prize in Literature a second time, in 1948.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show_people.php?id=5871|title=Thomas Mann Nomination archive|date=April 2020|publisher=nobelprize.org|access-date=16 June 2021|archive-date=30 June 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210630160818/https://www.nobelprize.org/nomination/archive/show_people.php?id=5871|url-status=live}}</ref>

==Influence==
The writer [[Theodor Fontane]], who died in 1898, had a particular stylistic influence on Thomas Mann. Of course, Mann always admired and emulated [[Goethe]], the German "poet prince". The Danish author [[Herman Bang]], with whom he felt a kindred spirit, had a certain influence, especially on the novellas. The pessimistic philosopher [[Arthur Schopenhauer]] provided philosophical inspiration for the ''Buddenbrooks''' narrative of decline, especially with his two-volume work ''[[The World as Will and Representation]]'', which Mann studied closely while writing the novel. Russian narrators should also be mentioned, he admired the [[Russian Literature]]'s ability for self-criticism, at least during the 19th century, in [[Nikolai Gogol]], [[Ivan Goncharov]] and [[Ivan Turgenev]]. Mann believed that in order to make a [[Russian Revolution|bourgeois revolution]], the Russians had to forget [[Dostoevsky]].<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter IX: ''Orientation attempts'', subchapter ''Revolution in Russia'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> He particularly loved [[Leo Tolstoy]], whom he considered an anarchist and whom he lovingly and mockingly admired for his "courage to be boring."

Throughout Mann's [[Dostoevsky]] essay, he finds parallels between the Russian and the sufferings of [[Friedrich Nietzsche]]. Speaking of Nietzsche, he says, "his personal feelings initiate him into those of the criminal ... in general all creative originality, all artist nature in the broadest sense of the word, does the same. It was the French painter and sculptor [[Edgar Degas|Degas]] who said that an artist must approach his work in the spirit of the criminal about to commit a crime."<ref>{{Cite book|title= The Thomas Mann reader|last= Mann|first= Thomas|editor1-first= Joseph|editor1-last= Warner Angell|year= 1950|publisher= Knopf|location= New York|page= 440|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Wc-zAAAAIAAJ}}</ref> Nietzsche's influence on Mann runs deep in his work, especially in Nietzsche's views on decay and the proposed fundamental connection between sickness and creativity. Mann believed that disease should not be regarded as wholly negative. In his essay on Dostoevsky, we find: "but after all and above all it depends on who is diseased, who mad, who epileptic or paralytic: an average dull-witted man, in whose illness any intellectual or cultural aspect is non-existent; or a Nietzsche or Dostoyevsky. In their case something comes out in illness that is more important and conducive to life and growth than any medical guaranteed health or sanity.... [I]n other words: certain conquests made by the soul and the mind are impossible without disease, madness, crime of the spirit."<ref>{{Cite book|title= The Thomas Mann reader|last= Mann|first= Thomas|editor1-first= Joseph|editor1-last= Warner Angell|year= 1950|publisher= Knopf|location= New York|page= 443|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Wc-zAAAAIAAJ}}</ref>

== Thematic and stylistic focuses ==
Many of Thomas Mann's works have the following similarities:

* A "gravely-mischievous" style that is very popular with readers, with superficial solemnity and an underlying ironic humor, mostly benevolent, never drastic or bitter and only rarely degenerating into the macabre. Thomas Mann took this "mild irony" from his literary predecessor and role model [[Theodor Fontane]],<ref>See: Nadine Taylor, [https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:22d5d619-74e4-47d3-91c5-8f7236d1f25d/files/m7b2b1c072c9e9594792b4a87a7757527 The Creation of Literary Character in the Fiction of Theodor Fontane], University of Oxford, Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, 2016</ref> at first in ''[[Buddenbrooks]]'' where it is modified into local sedateness through [[Low German]] sprinkles and quotations. He continued this style, with variations, throughout his life (the contemporary, much more avant-garde author [[Alfred Döblin]] mocked that Mann had "elevated the ''pressed crease'' to a style principle").<ref>[https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/thomas-mann-originalton-edition-aus-kalter-perfektion-wird-100.html Aus „kalter Perfektion“ wird ein Wärmestrom] (“Cold perfection” becomes a flow of heat), Commentary on the original sound edition of the readings by Wolfgang Schneider, 2015.</ref> In ''[[Joseph and His Brothers]]'' the tone takes on something fairytale-biblical, but here too the irony often shines through. In ''[[Doctor Faustus (novel)|Doctor Faustus]]'', Thomas Mann adopts a predominantly serious tone in view of the sinister theme, although the critical irony does not completely disappear there either, for which the description of the nationalist milieu in the [[Weimar Republic]] in particular provides ample reason.
* The amusingly entertaining, mostly ironic descriptions of contemporaries as well as people of the past and their views and lifestyles based on his own observations or research, often very detailed, similar to his contemporary [[Marcel Proust]], are combined with various profound components: in ''Buddenbrooks'' with the motif of economic and spiritual decline of a family, in ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'' with the philosophical disputes of the time before the First World War, in ''[[Lotte in Weimar: The Beloved Returns|Lotte in Weimar]]'' with the circumstances of [[Goethe]]'s [[Weimar Classicism]] and the complicated effect between real and literary love, in ''Joseph and his brothers'' with biblical-mythical motifs and the question of origins as well as the eternal recurrence of the same "mythical" stories, in ''Doctor Faustus'' with the historical-political circumstances of the rise, success and fall of Nazism.
* Attachment to home regions: Lübeck (Buddenbrooks, Tonio Kröger) and Munich (Gladius Dei, At the Prophet, Disorder and Early Suffering) are in the foreground of important works.
* [[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-R15883, Thomas Mann.jpg|thumb|Thomas Mann with his [[gramophone]] in his Munich house (1932)]]Classical music already plays a central role in ''Buddenbrooks'' and ''[[Tristan (novella)|Tristan]]'' (Mann loved [[Richard Wagner]]'s operas and, in his 1933 essay ''The Suffering and Greatness of Richard Wagner'', defended him against the Nazis' attempt to appropriate Wagner as a nationalist icon) and [[Neue Musik]] plays the main role in ''Doctor Faustus'' (about which Mann sought advice from [[Theodor W. Adorno]] and gave his hero's music features of [[Arnold Schoenberg]]'s compositional style).
* Central to Thomas Mann's thoughts and work is the mutual relationship between art and life: ''Ambiguity as a system'' is also the title of an essay.
* Conscientiousness: Thomas Mann always wrote his works after long and thorough research into the facts and the atmospheric circumstances.
* Political commitment (see below: Political views): His – mostly indirect – commitment runs through many of his works, from the ''Buddenbrooks'' (covering the revolutionary and counter-revolutionary shifts of the entire 19th century) to ''[[Mario and the Magician]]'' (mocking the atmosphere of 1920s [[Italian fascism]]) to ''Doctor Faustus''. In contrast to his brother Heinrich and his children Erika and Klaus, Thomas Mann at first advocated a rather conservative stance, especially in the ''[[Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man]]'' (1918), later and in his major works, however, a moderate, centrist and occasionally progressive attitude, while they were more "left-leaning".
* Homoerotic allusions are also common and recur in many works (see below: Sexuality and literary work).

==Political views==
{{Conservatism in Germany|Intellectuals}}
During World War I, Mann supported the conservatism of [[Kaiser Wilhelm II]], attacked liberalism, and supported the war effort, calling the [[Great War]] "a purification, a liberation, an enormous hope". In his 600-page-long work ''[[Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man]]'' (1918), Mann presented his conservative, anti-modernist philosophy: spiritual tradition over   material progress, German patriotism over egalitarian internationalism, and rooted culture over rootless civilisation.<ref>{{cite journal|title=Thomas Mann on the Artist vs. the State|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/17/books/review/reflections-of-a-nonpolitical-man-thomas-mann.html|journal=The New York Times|date=17 September 2021|access-date=24 January 2023|issn=0362-4331|first=Christopher|last=Beha|archive-date=5 November 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221105215251/https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/17/books/review/reflections-of-a-nonpolitical-man-thomas-mann.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=Thomas Mann and Spengler|journal=The German Quarterly|year=1985|issn=0016-8831|pages=361–374|volume=58|number=3|doi=10.2307/406568|first=Roger A.|last=Nicholls|jstor=406568}}</ref>

In "[[On the German Republic]]" ({{lang|de|Von Deutscher Republik}}, 1922), Mann called upon German intellectuals to support the new [[Weimar Republic]]. The work was delivered at the Beethovensaal in Berlin on 13 October 1922, and published in ''[[Die neue Rundschau]]'' in November 1922. In the work, Mann developed his eccentric defence of the Republic based on extensive close readings of [[Novalis]] and [[Walt Whitman]]. Also in 1921, he wrote an essay ''Mind and Money'' in which he made a very open assessment of his family background: "In any case, I am personally indebted to the capitalist world order from the past, which is why it will never be appropriate for me to spit on it as it is ''à la mode'' these days." Thereafter, his political views gradually shifted toward [[liberal-left]]. He especially embraced democratic principles when the Weimar Republic was established.<ref>See for a 2007 translation of this lecture by Lawrence S. Rainey: {{Cite journal |translator-last=Rainey |translator-first=Lawrence Scott |last=Mann |first=Thomas |author-link=Thomas Mann |date=2007 |orig-date=1922 |title=On the German Republic |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/article/209161 |journal=[[Modernism/modernity]] |volume=14 |issue=1 |pages=109–132 |doi=10.1353/mod.2007.0017 |issn=1080-6601|url-access=subscription }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|page=35|title=The First World War: Germany and Austria-Hungary 1914–1918|author=Herwig, Holger H.|publisher=[[Bloomsbury Publishing]]|date=2014|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4fTCAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA35|isbn=978-1-4725-1081-5}}</ref>

Mann initially gave his support to the left-liberal [[German Democratic Party]] before urging unity behind the [[Social Democratic Party of Germany|Social Democrats]],<ref>{{cite book |last1=Jones |first1=Larry Eugene |title=German Liberalism and the Dissolution of the Weimar Party System, 1918–1933 |date=2017 |publisher=UNC Press Books |page=212}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Vaget |first1=Hans Rudolf |title=Thomas Mann: Enlightenment and Social Democracy |journal=Publications of the English Goethe Society |date=2017 |volume=86 |issue=3 |pages=193–204|doi=10.1080/09593683.2017.1368931 |s2cid=171525633 }}</ref> probably less for ideological reasons, but because he only trusted the political party of the workers to provide sufficient mass and resistance to the growing [[Nazism]]. In 1930, he gave a public address in Berlin titled ''An Appeal to Reason'', in which he strongly denounced Nazism and encouraged resistance by the working class. This was followed by numerous essays and lectures in which he attacked the [[Nazi Party|Nazis]]. At the same time, he expressed increasing sympathy for [[socialist]] ideas. When the Nazis came to power in 1933, Mann and his wife were on holiday in Switzerland. Due to his strident denunciations of Nazi policies, his son Klaus advised him not to return. In contrast to those of his brother Heinrich and his son Klaus, Mann's books were not among those burnt publicly by Hitler's regime in May 1933, possibly since he had been the Nobel laureate in literature for 1929. In 1936, the Nazi government officially revoked his German citizenship.

During the war, Mann made a series of anti-Nazi radio-speeches, published as ''[[Listen, Germany!]]'' in 1943. They were recorded on tape in the United States and then sent to the United Kingdom, where the [[British Broadcasting Corporation]] transmitted them, hoping to reach German listeners.

=== Views on Soviet communism and German National-Socialism ===
Mann expressed his belief in the collection of letters written in exile, ''Listen, Germany!'' (''Deutsche Hörer!''), that equating [[Soviet communism]] with Nazi fascism on the basis that both are [[totalitarian]] systems was either superficial or insincere in showing a preference for [[nazism]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Mann|first=Thomas|year=1942|title=Deutsche Hörer! – 25 Radiosendungen nach Deutschland|trans-title=[[Listen, Germany!|German listeners!]] – 25 radio broadcasts to Germany|language=de|location=Stockholm|publisher=Bermann-Fischer}}{{page needed|date=October 2020}}</ref> He clarified this view during a German press interview in July 1949, declaring that he was not a communist but that [[communism]] at least had some relation to ideals of humanity and of a better future. He said that the transition of the [[communist revolution]] into an autocratic regime was a tragedy while Nazism was only "devilish [[nihilism]]".<ref>{{cite news |date=25 July 1949 |title=Soviet ideology rated over Nazi |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1350&dat=19490725&id=S1hOAAAAIBAJ&pg=4441%2C5691900 |newspaper=Toledo Blade |access-date=17 December 2016 |archive-date=19 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230119220404/https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1350&dat=19490725&id=S1hOAAAAIBAJ&pg=4441%2C5691900 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Kennedy |first=Howard |date=26 July 1949 |title=Author Thomas Mann distinguishes between Nazism, pure communism |url=http://www.stripes.com/news/author-thomas-mann-distinguishes-between-nazism-pure-communism-1.15197 |newspaper=Stars and Stripes |access-date=17 December 2016 |archive-date=20 December 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161220230933/http://www.stripes.com/news/author-thomas-mann-distinguishes-between-nazism-pure-communism-1.15197 |url-status=live }}</ref>

==Sexuality and literary work==
Mann's diaries reveal his struggles with his [[bisexuality]], his attraction to men finding frequent reflection in his works, most prominently through the obsession of the elderly Aschenbach for the 14-year-old Polish boy Tadzio in the novella ''[[Death in Venice]]'' (''Der Tod in Venedig'', 1912).<ref>{{cite book |last= Mann |first= Thomas |title= Diaries 1918–1939 |year=1983|page = 471 |isbn=978-0-233-97513-9 |publisher= A. Deutsch}}, quoted in e.g. {{cite book |first1=Hermann |last1=Kurzke |first2=Leslie |last2=Wilson |title=Thomas Mann. Life as a Work of Art. A Biography |page=[https://archive.org/details/thomasmannlifeas00kurz/page/752 752] |publisher=Princeton University Press |year=2002 |isbn=978-0-691-07069-8 |url=https://archive.org/details/thomasmannlifeas00kurz/page/752 }} For a discussion of the relationship between his homosexuality and his writing, also see {{cite book |title=Thomas Mann: Eros and Literature|first= Anthony |last= Heilbut |isbn= 978-0-333-67447-5|page =647 |publisher= Humanity Press/Prometheus |year= 1997}}</ref> [[Anthony Heilbut]]'s biography ''Thomas Mann: Eros and Literature'' (1997) uncovered the centrality of Mann's sexuality to his oeuvre. [[Gilbert Adair]]'s work ''The Real Tadzio'' (2001) describes how, in 1911, Mann had stayed at the [[Grand Hôtel des Bains]] on the [[Venice Lido]] with his wife and brother, when he became enraptured by the angelic figure of [[Władysław Moes|Władysław (Władzio) Moes]], a 10-year-old Polish boy ([[Death in Venice#The real Tadzio|the real Tadzio]]).

[[File:Thomas Mann 1900 cropped.jpg|thumb|Thomas Mann in 1900 when he completed ''Buddenbrooks'']]
In the autobiographical novella ''[[Tonio Kröger]]'' from 1901, the young hero has a crush on a handsome male classmate (modeled after real-life Lübeck classmate Armin Martens). In the novella ''With the prophet'' (1904) Mann mocks the believing disciples of a neo-Romantic "prophet" who preaches asceticism and has a strong resemblance to the real contemporary poet [[Stefan George]] and his ''[[George-Kreis]]'' ("George-Circle"). In 1902, George had met the fourteen-year-old boy [[Maximilian Kronberger]]; He made an idol of him and after his early death in 1904 transfigured him into a kind of [[Antinous]]-style "god".

Mann had also started planning a novel about [[Frederick the Great]] in 1905/1906, which ultimately did not come to fruition. The [[sexuality of Frederick the Great]] would have played a significant role in this, its impact on his life, his political decisions and wars. In late 1914, at the start of World War I, Mann used the notes and excerpts already collected for this project to write his essay ''Frederick and the grand coalition'' in which he contrasted Frederick's soldierly, male drive and his literary, female connotations consisting of "decomposing" skepticism.<ref>''Frederick and the grand coalition, an outline for the day and the hour''. The essay was first published in ''Der Neue Merkur'' (January/February 1915), and Mann himself later included it in an anthology ('Old and New', 1953). See: [https://www.fischerverlage.de/buch/thomas-mann-friedrich-und-die-grosse-koalition-9783104004075 ''Friedrich und die große Koalition, Ein Abriß für den Tag und die Stunde''], Fischer Verlag</ref> A similar "decomposing skepticism" had already estranged the barely concealed gay novel characters ''Tonio Kröger'' and ''Hanno [[Buddenbrooks|Buddenbrook]]'' (1901) from their traditional upper class family environments and hometown (which in both cases is Lübeck). The ''[[Confessions of Felix Krull]]'', written from 1910 onwards, describes a self-absorbed young dandyish imposter who, if not explicitly, fits into the gay typology. The 1909 novel ''[[Royal Highness (novel)|Royal Highness]]'', which describes a young unworldly and dreamy prince who forces himself into a marriage of convenience that ultimately becomes happy, was modeled after Mann's own romance and marriage to Katia Mann in February 1905. In ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'', the enamored Hans Castorp, with his heart pounding, asks Pribislav Hippe if he could lend him his pencil, of which he keeps a few scraps like a relic. Borrowing and returning are poetic masks for a sexual act. But it is not just a poetic symbol. In his diary entry from September 15, 1950, Mann remembers "Williram Timpe's scraps from his pencil", referring to a classmate from Lübeck.<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter II: ''Williram Timpe'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> The novella ''[[Mario and the Magician]]'' (1929) ends with a murder due to a male-male kiss.

Numerous homoerotic crushes are documented in his letters and diaries, both before and after his marriage. Mann's diary records his attraction to his own 13-year-old son, "Eissi" – Klaus Mann: "Klaus to whom recently I feel very drawn" (22 June). In the background conversations about man-to-man eroticism take place; a long letter is written to Carl Maria Weber on this topic, while the diary reveals: "In love with Klaus during these days" (5 June). "Eissi, who enchants me right now" (11 July). "Delight over Eissi, who in his bath is terribly handsome. Find it very natural that I am in love with my son ... Eissi lay reading in bed with his brown torso naked, which disconcerted me" (25 July). "I heard noise in the boys' room and surprised Eissi completely naked in front of Golo's bed acting foolish. Strong impression of his premasculine, gleaming body. Disquiet" (17 October 1920).<ref>{{cite book |last1= Kurzke |first1= Herrmann |title= Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art : a Biography |date= 2002 |publisher= Princeton University Press |isbn= 978-0-691-07069-8 |pages= [https://archive.org/details/thomasmannlifeas00kurz/page/346 346–347] |url= https://archive.org/details/thomasmannlifeas00kurz/page/346 }}</ref>

[[File:Ludwig von Hofmann, Die Quelle (1913).jpg|thumb|[[Ludwig von Hofmann]]: ''The Spring'' (1913). The picture, purchased in 1914, hung in Mann's study until his death.<ref>The painting is currently part of the Thomas Mann Archive at [[ETH Zurich]].</ref>]]

Mann was a friend of the violinist and painter [[Paul Ehrenberg]], for whom he had feelings as a young man (at least until around 1903 when there is evidence that those feelings had cooled). The attraction that he felt for Ehrenberg, which is corroborated by notebook entries, caused Mann difficulty and discomfort and may have been an obstacle to his marrying an English woman, Mary Smith, whom he met in 1901.{{Sfn | Mundt | 2004 | p = [https://books.google.com/books?id=p2TsRx0wascC&pg=PA6 6]}} In 1927, while on summer vacation in [[Kampen (Sylt)]], Mann fell in love with 17-year-old Klaus Heuser, to whom he dedicated the introduction to his essay ''"[[Heinrich von Kleist|Kleist's]] Amphitryon, a Reconquest"'' in the fall of the same year, which he read publicly in Munich in the presence of Heuser. [[Jupiter (god)|Jupiter]], who has transformed himself into the form of the general [[Amphitryon]], tries to seduce his wife Alcmene when the real Amphitryon returns home and Alcmene rejects the god. Mann understands Jupiter as the "lonely artistic spirit" who courts life, is rejected and, "a triumphant renouncer", learns to be content with his divinity.<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter XIII: ''Midlife homosexuality'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> In 1950, Mann met the 19-year-old waiter Franz Westermeier, confiding to his diary "Once again this, once again love".<ref name="mundt">{{Citation |last =Mundt |first =Hannelore |title =Understanding Thomas Mann |date =2004 |publisher =The University of South Carolina Press |url =https://books.google.com/books?id=p2TsRx0wascC |isbn =978-1-57003-537-1}}.</ref> He immediately processed the experience in his essay ''"[[Michelangelo]] in his poems"'' (1950) and was also inspired to write ''[[The Black Swan (short story)|The Black Swan]]'' (1954). In 1975, when Mann's diaries were published, creating a national sensation in Germany, the retired Westermeier was tracked down in the United States: he was flattered to learn he had been the object of Mann's obsession, but also shocked at its depth.<ref name="fintimes">{{cite web |last= Paul |first= James|title= A man's Mann |date=5 August 2005|work=[[Financial Times]] |url=https://www.ft.com/content/1c4baa2a-05ce-11da-883e-00000e2511c8|archive-url=https://archive.today/20210324003045/https://www.ft.com/content/1c4baa2a-05ce-11da-883e-00000e2511c8|archivedate=24 March 2021|url-status=live|access-date=23 March 2021 }}</ref>

Mann's infatuations probably remained largely [[Platonic love|platonic]]. Katia Mann tolerated these love affairs, as did the children, because they knew that it didn't go too far. He exchanged letters with Klaus Heuser for a while and met him again in 1935. He wrote about the Heuser experience in his diary on May 6, 1934: "In comparison, the early experiences with Armin Martens and Williram Timpe recede far into the childlike, and that with Klaus Heuser was a late happiness with the character of life-relevant fulfillment... That's probably how it is humanly, and because of this normality I can feel my life is more canonical than through marriage and children." In the entry from February 20, 1942, he spoke again about Klaus Heuser: "Well, yes − lived and loved. Black eyes that shed tears for me, beloved lips that I kissed − it was there, I had it too, I'll be able to tell myself when I die."<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter XIII: ''Homoeroticism in midlife'', subchapter “Klaus Heuser and Amphitryon”, Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> He was partly delighted, partly ashamed of the depth of his own emotions in these cases and mostly made them productive at some earlier or later date, but the experiences themselves were not yet literary. Only in retrospective, he converted them into literary production and sublimated his shame into the theory that "a writer experiences in order to express himself", that his life is just material. Mann even went so far as to accuse his brother [[Heinrich Mann|Heinrich]] of his "aestheticism being a gesture-rich, highly gifted impotence for life and love."<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter II: ''First love: Armin Martens'' (in: [[Tonio Kröger]]), Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> When Mann met the aging bachelor Heuser, who had worked in China for 18 years, for the last time in 1954, his daughter Erika scoffed: "Since he (Heuser) couldn't have the magician (= Thomas Mann's nickname with his children), he preferred to give it up completely."<ref>Thomas Mann's diary entry from August 29, 1954. In fact, Klaus Heuser is said to have had a lover named Anwar. See the 2013 novel ''Königsallee'' by Hans Pleschinski under ''Cultural references - other''.</ref>

Although Mann had always denied his novels had autobiographical components, the unsealing of his diaries revealing how consumed his life had been with unrequited and sublimated passion resulted in a reappraisal of his work.<ref name="fintimes" /><ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.schwulesmuseum.de/ausstellungen/archives/2016/view/applaus-muss-sein-hommage-zum-50-todestag-von-thomas-mann/|title= Norbert Heuler – Houseboys|publisher= Schwules Museum|access-date= 18 July 2016|archive-date= 15 September 2016|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160915030640/http://www.schwulesmuseum.de/ausstellungen/archives/2016/view/applaus-muss-sein-hommage-zum-50-todestag-von-thomas-mann/|url-status= live}}</ref> Thomas Mann had burned all of his diaries from before March 1933 in the garden of his home in Pacific Palisades in May 1945. Only the booklets from September 1918 to December 1921 were preserved because the author needed them for his work on ''[[Doctor Faustus (novel)|Doctor Faustus]]''. He later decided to have them − and his diaries from 1933 onwards – published 20 years after his death and predicted "surprise and cheerful astonishment". They were published by [[Peter von Mendelssohn]] and [[Walter Jens|Inge Jens]] in 10 volumes.

From the very beginning, Thomas' son [[Klaus Mann]] openly dealt with his own homosexuality in his literary work and open lifestyle and referred critically to his father's "[[Sublimation (psychology)|sublimation]]" in his diary. On the other hand, Thomas's daughter [[Erika Mann]] and his son [[Golo Mann]] came out only later in their lives. Thomas Mann reacted cautiously to Klaus's first novel ''The Pious Dance, Adventure Book of a Youth'' (1926), which is openly set in [[LGBT culture in Berlin|Berlin's homosexual milieu]]. Although he embraced male-male eroticism, he disapproved of gay lifestyle. The [[Eulenburg affair]], which broke out two years after Mann's marriage, had strengthened him in his renunciation of a gay life and he supported the journalist [[Maximilian Harden]], who was friends with Katia Mann's family, in his denunciatory trial against the gay [[Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg|Prince of Eulenburg]], a close friend of Emperor [[Wilhelm II]].<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter VII: ''Jews'', subchapter ''The Harden trial'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> Thomas Mann was always concerned about his dignity, reputation and respectability; the "poet king" [[Goethe]] was his role model. His horror at a possible collapse of these attributes found expression in the character of Aschenbach in ''Death in Venice''. But as time went on Mann became more open. When the twenty-two-year-old novelist [[Gore Vidal]] published his third novel ''[[The City and the Pillar]]'' in 1948, a love-story between small-town American boys and a portrait of homosexual life in New York and Hollywood in the forties, a highly controversial book even among the publishers, not to mention the press, Mann called it a "noble work".<ref>[https://search.worldcat.org/de/title/1244514936 The city and the pillar and seven early stories : revised, with a new preface by the author], book summary from publisher [[Random House]], New York 1995</ref>

When the physician and pioneer of gay liberation [[Magnus Hirschfeld]] sent another petition to the [[Reichstag (Weimar Republic)|Reichstag]] in 1922 to abolish [[Paragraph 175|Section 175]] of the German Criminal Code, under which many homosexuals were imprisoned simply because of their inclinations, Thomas Mann also signed.<ref>Hermann Kurzke, ''Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography'', chapter XIII: ''Against § 175'', Princeton University Press (2002).</ref> However, criminal liability among adults was only abolished through a change in the law on June 25, 1969 − fourteen years after Mann's death and just three days before the [[Stonewall riots]]. This legal situation certainly had an impact throughout his life; the man whom the Nazis labeled a traitor never had any desire to be incarcerated for "criminal acts".

==Cultural references==
===''The Magic Mountain''===
Several literary and other works make reference to Mann's book ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'', including:
*[[Frederic Tuten]]'s 1993 novel ''Tintin in the New World'' features many characters (such as Clavdia Chauchat, Mynheer Peeperkorn and others) from ''The Magic Mountain'' interacting with [[Tintin (character)|Tintin]] in Peru.
*[[Andrew Crumey]]'s novel ''[[Mobius Dick]]'' (2004) imagines an alternative universe where an author named Behring has written novels resembling Mann's. These include a version of ''The Magic Mountain'' with [[Erwin Schrödinger]] in place of Castorp.
*[[Haruki Murakami]]'s novel ''[[Norwegian Wood (novel)|Norwegian Wood]]'' (1987), in which the main character is criticized for reading ''The Magic Mountain'' while visiting a friend in a sanatorium.
*The song "Magic Mountain" by the band [[Blonde Redhead]].
*The painting ''Magic Mountain (after Thomas Mann)'' by [[Christiaan Tonnis]] (1987). "The Magic Mountain" is also a chapter in Tonnis's 2006 book ''Krankheit als Symbol'' ("Illness as a Symbol").<ref>Tonnis, Christiaan (2006). ''Krankheit als Symbol: "Der Zauberberg"'', Westarp Buchshop, pp. 26–27. ISBN 978-3-939533-34-4.</ref>
*The 1941 film ''[[49th Parallel (film)|49th Parallel]]'', in which the character Philip Armstrong Scott unknowingly praises Mann's work to an escaped World War II Nazi [[U-boat]] commander, who later responds by burning Scott's copy of ''The Magic Mountain''.
*In [[Ken Kesey]]'s novel ''[[Sometimes a Great Notion]]'' (1964), character Indian Jenny purchases a Thomas Mann novel and tries to find out "just where was this mountain full of magic..." (p.&nbsp;578).
*[[Hayao Miyazaki]]'s 2013 film ''[[The Wind Rises]]'', in which an unnamed German man at a mountain resort invokes the novel as cover for furtively condemning the rapidly arming Hitler and Hirohito regimes. After he flees to escape the Japanese secret police, the protagonist, who fears his own mail is being read, refers to him as the novel's Mr. Castorp. The film is partly based on another Japanese novel, set like ''The Magic Mountain'' in a tuberculosis sanatorium.
*[[Father John Misty]]'s 2017 album ''[[Pure Comedy]]'' contains a song titled "So I'm Growing Old on Magic Mountain", in which a man, near death, reflects on the passing of time and the disappearance of his Dionysian youth in homage to the themes in Mann's novel.<ref>{{Cite web | url=https://genius.com/Father-john-misty-so-im-growing-old-on-magic-mountain-lyrics | title=Father John Misty – So I'm Growing Old on Magic Mountain | access-date=29 December 2018 | archive-date=30 December 2018 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181230080735/https://genius.com/Father-john-misty-so-im-growing-old-on-magic-mountain-lyrics | url-status=live }}</ref>
*[[Viktor Frankl]]'s book ''[[Man's Search for Meaning]]'' relates the "time-experience" of Holocaust prisoners to TB patients in ''The Magic Mountain'': "How paradoxical was our time-experience! In this connection we are reminded of Thomas Mann's ''The Magic Mountain'', which contains some very pointed psychological remarks. Mann studies the spiritual development of people who are in an analogous psychological position, i.e., tuberculosis patients in a sanatorium who also know no date for their release. They experience a similar existence—without a future and without a goal."
*The movie [[A Cure For Wellness]], directed by [[Gore Verbinski]], was inspired by and is somewhat a modernization, somewhat a parody, of ''The Magic Mountain''.<ref name=han>{{cite web|url=http://www.slashfilm.com/a-cure-for-wellness-gore-verbinski-interview/|title=Interview: Gore Verbinski on Returning to Horror With 'A Cure for Wellness'|date=21 December 2016|last=Han|first=Angie|access-date=2 March 2017|quote=Gore Verbinski: Well, there's this book by Thomas Mann called ''The Magic Mountain'' that we're both fans of, and that book deals with people in a sanitarium in the Alps, clutching on to their sickness like a badge before the outbreak of World War I. We wanted to explore this sense of denial and say, well, what if that was a genre?|archive-date=21 February 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170221073428/http://www.slashfilm.com/a-cure-for-wellness-gore-verbinski-interview/|url-status=live}}</ref> In one scene, an orderly at the asylum can be seen reading ''Der Zauberberg''.
*The album cover for [[Peter Schickele]]'s recording of [[P.D.Q. Bach]]'s "[[Bluegrass Cantata]]" shows an illustration of the 18th Century German bluegrass ensemble Tommy Mann and his Magic Mountain Boys.
*The 2022 novel [[The Empusium]] by [[Olga Tokarczuk]] reprises key plot elements from The Magic Mountain, including an alpine sanatorium for the treatment of tuberculosis, a time setting of 1913 which precedes World War I, a protagonist who is a young engineer and an isolated health resort as a [[Microcosm–macrocosm analogy|microcosm]] of society.

===''Death in Venice''===
[[File:Thomas Mann 1937.jpg|thumb|Mann, 1937]]
Many literary and other works make reference to ''Death in Venice'', including:
*[[Luchino Visconti]]'s 1971 famous film version of Mann's novella: [[Death in Venice (film)]]
*[[Benjamin Britten]]'s 1973 operatic adaptation in two acts of Mann's novella.
*[[Woody Allen]]'s film ''[[Annie Hall]]'' (1977) refers to the novella.
*[[Joseph Heller]]'s 1994 novel, ''[[Closing Time (novel)|Closing Time]]'', which makes several references to Thomas Mann and ''Death in Venice''.
*[[Alexander McCall Smith]]'s novel ''[[Portuguese Irregular Verbs]]'' (1997) has a final chapter entitled "Death in Venice" and refers to Thomas Mann by name in that chapter.
*[[Philip Roth]]'s novel ''[[The Human Stain]]'' (2000).
*[[Rufus Wainwright]]'s 2001 song "Grey Gardens", which mentions the character Tadzio in the refrain.
*[[Alan Bennett]]'s 2009 play ''[[The Habit of Art]]'', in which [[Benjamin Britten]] is imagined paying a visit to [[W. H. Auden]] about the possibility of Auden writing the libretto for Britten's opera ''[[Death in Venice]]''.
*[[David Rakoff]]'s essay "Shrimp", which appears in his 2010 collection ''Half Empty'', makes a humorous comparison between Mann's Aschenbach and [[E. B. White]]'s Stuart Little.
* Two main characters in ''[[Me and Earl and the Dying Girl]]'' make a spoof film titled ''Death in Tennis''.
* 'A Good Year' 2006 film.
* In the MTV animated series [[Daria]], [[Daria Morgendorffer]] receives from Tom Sloane a first-edition English translation as a present ("One J at a Time, Season 5, Episode 8, 2001) and is ridiculed by her sister, Quinn, for having a boyfriend who only gives her "a used book".

===Other===
[[File:Printing4 Walk of Ideas Berlin.JPG|thumb|"Modern Book Printing" from the [[Walk of Ideas]] in Berlin, Germany – built in 2006 to commemorate [[Johannes Gutenberg]]'s invention, {{circa|1445}}, of western movable printing type]]
*''Hayavadana'' (1972), a play by [[Girish Karnad]], was based on a theme drawn from ''The Transposed Heads'' and employed the folk theatre form of ''[[Yakshagana]]''. A German version of the play was directed by [[Vijaya Mehta]] as part of the repertoire of the [[Deutsches Nationaltheater and Staatskapelle Weimar|Deutsches National Theatre, Weimar]].<ref name="hin">{{usurped|[https://web.archive.org/web/20011230180843/http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1603/16031170.htm Awards: The multi-faceted playwright]}} ''[[Frontline (magazine)|Frontline]]'', Vol. 16, No. 03, 30 January – 12 February 1999.</ref> A staged musical version of ''The Transposed Heads,'' adapted by [[Julie Taymor]] and [[Sidney Goldfarb]], with music by [[Elliot Goldenthal]], was produced at the [[American Music Theater Festival]] in Philadelphia and the [[Lincoln Center]] in New York in 1988.
*Mann's 1896 short story "Disillusionment" is the basis for the [[Leiber and Stoller]] song "[[Is That All There Is?]]", famously recorded in 1969 by [[Peggy Lee]].<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://harpers.org/blog/2014/12/time-out-of-joint-in-richard-mcguires-here/|date=24 December 2014|title=Time Out of Joint in Richard McGuire's ''Here''|first=Tim|last=Peters|magazine=[[Harper's Magazine|Harper's]]|access-date=15 November 2019|archive-date=15 November 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191115191310/https://harpers.org/blog/2014/12/time-out-of-joint-in-richard-mcguires-here/|url-status=live}}</ref>
*In a 1994 essay, [[Umberto Eco]] suggests that the media discuss "Whether reading Thomas Mann gives one erections" as an alternative to "Whether [[James Joyce|Joyce]] is boring".<ref>{{cite web|last=Eco|first=Umberto|title=La bustina di Minerva|url=http://www.themodernword.com/eco/eco_mac_vs_pc.html|work=[[L'Espresso]]|access-date=29 August 2011|date=30 September 1994|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110820032059/http://www.themodernword.com/eco/eco_mac_vs_pc.html|archive-date=20 August 2011}}</ref>
*Mann's life in California during World War II, including his relationships with his older brother [[Heinrich Mann]] and [[Bertolt Brecht]] is a subject of [[Christopher Hampton]]'s play ''Tales from Hollywood''.<ref>{{Cite web|date=2 May 2001|title=Theatre: Tales From Hollywood|url=http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2001/may/03/theatre.artsfeatures2|access-date=19 September 2020|website=The Guardian|language=en|archive-date=28 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728124934/https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2001/may/03/theatre.artsfeatures2|url-status=live}}</ref>
* Hans Pleschinski's 2013 novel ''Königsallee'' fictionalizes an actual visit by Thomas Mann to Klaus Heuser's parents in Düsseldorf in 1954. He lets Mann's former lover come along with his boy named Anwar, as well as Mann's children Erika and Golo. Everything gets complicated.<ref>See German article: [[:de:Königsallee (Roman)|Königsallee (Roman)]]</ref>
*[[Colm Tóibín]]'s 2021 fictionalised biography ''The Magician'' is a portrait of Mann in the context of his family and political events.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/sep/17/the-magician-by-colm-toibin-review-inside-the-mind-of-thomas-mann|title=''The Magician'' by Colm Tóibín review – inside the mind of Thomas Mann|first=Lucy|last=Hughes-Hallett|author-link=Lucy Hughes-Hallett|newspaper=[[The Guardian]]|date=17 September 2021|access-date=17 November 2021|archive-date=17 November 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211117041052/https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/sep/17/the-magician-by-colm-toibin-review-inside-the-mind-of-thomas-mann|url-status=live}}</ref>

==See also==
{{Portal|Biography|Literature|Germany|LGBTQ|
}}
* [[Erich Heller]] (esp. ''s.v.'' "Writings on Thomas Mann", "Life in letters")
* [[Patrician (post-Roman Europe)]]
* [[Terence James Reed]]'s ''Thomas Mann: The Uses of Tradition'' (1974)

==Literary works==
===Short stories===
*1893: "A Vision (Prose Sketch)"
*1894: "Fallen" ("Gefallen")
*1896: "The Will to Happiness"
*1896: "Disillusionment" ("Enttäuschung")
*1896: "[[Little Herr Friedemann]]" ("Der kleine Herr Friedemann")
*1897: "Death" ("Der Tod")
*1897: "[[The Clown (short story)|The Clown]]" ("Der Bajazzo")
*1897: "The Dilettante"
*1897: "Luischen" ("Little Lizzy") – published in 1900
*1898: "[[Tobias Mindernickel]]"
*1899: "The Wardrobe" ("Der Kleiderschrank")
*1899: "Avenged (Study for a Novella)" ("Gerächt")
*1900: "The Road to the Churchyard/The Way to the Churchyard" ("Der Weg zum Friedhof")
*1903: "The Hungry/The Starvelings"
*1903: "The Child Prodigy/The Infant Prodigy/The Wunderkind" ("Das Wunderkind")
*1904: "A Gleam"
*1904: "At the Prophet's"
*1905: "A Weary Hour/Hour of Hardship/Harsh Hour"
*1907: "Railway Accident"
*1908: "Anecdote" ("Anekdote")
*1911: "The Fight between Jappe and the Do Escobar"

===Novellas===
*1902: ''{{Ill|Gladius Dei|de}}''
*1903: ''[[Tristan (novella)|Tristan]]''
*1903: ''[[Tonio Kröger]]''
*1905: ''[[The Blood of the Walsungs]]'' (''Wӓlsungenblut'') (2nd Edition: 1921)<ref>{{cite web|title=1905 – Thomas Mann, Blood of the Walsungs|url=https://web.duke.edu/secmod/primarytexts/mann1905.html|publisher=Duke University|access-date=18 November 2014|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141129025805/https://web.duke.edu/secmod/primarytexts/mann1905.html|archive-date=29 November 2014}}</ref>
*1911: ''Felix Krull'' (''Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull'') – published in 1922
*1912: ''[[Death in Venice]]'' (''Der Tod in Venedig'')
*1918: ''[[A Man and His Dog (narrative)|A Man and His Dog/Bashan and I]]'' (''Herr und Hund'')
*1925: ''[[Disorder and Early Sorrow|Disorder and Early Sorrow/Chaotic World and Childhood Sorrow]]'' (''Unordnung und frühes Leid'')
*1930: ''[[Mario and the Magician]]'' (''Mario und der Zauberer'')
*1940: ''[[The Transposed Heads]]'' (''Die vertauschten Köpfe – Eine indische Legende'')
*1944: ''[[The Tables of the Law]]'' (''Das Gesetz'') – a contribution for the anthology ''The Ten Commandments'' edited by Armin L. Robinson
*1954: ''[[The Black Swan (short story)|The Black Swan]]'' (''Die Betrogene: Erzählung'')

===Novels===
====Standalone novels====
*1901: ''[[Buddenbrooks]]'' (''Buddenbrooks – Verfall einer Familie'')
*1909: ''[[Royal Highness (novel)|Royal Highness]]'' (''Königliche Hoheit'')
*1924: ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'' (''Der Zauberberg'')
*1939: ''[[Lotte in Weimar: The Beloved Returns]]''
*1947: ''[[Doctor Faustus (novel)|Doctor Faustus]]'' (''Doktor Faustus'')
**1949: ''The Origin of [[Doctor Faustus (novel)|Doctor Faustus]]'' (''Die Entstehung des Doktor Faustus'') – autobiographical non-fiction book about the novel
*1951: ''[[The Holy Sinner]]'' (''Der Erwählte'')
*1954: ''[[Confessions of Felix Krull]]'' (''Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull. Der Memoiren erster Teil''; expanded from 1911 short story), unfinished

====Series====
*''[[Joseph and His Brothers]]'' (''Joseph und seine Brüder'') (1933–43)
#''The Stories of Jacob'' (''Die Geschichten Jaakobs'') (1933)
#''Young Joseph'' (''Der junge Joseph'') (1934)
#''Joseph in Egypt'' (''Joseph in Ägypten'') (1936)
#''Joseph the Provider'' (''Joseph, der Ernährer'') (1943)

===Plays===
*1905: ''[[Fiorenza (play)|Fiorenza]]''
*1954: ''Luther's Marriage'' (''Luthers Hochzeit'') (fragment – unfinished)

===Poetry===
*1919: The Song of the Child: An Idyll (Gesang vom Kindchen)
*1923: Tristan and Isolde

===Essays===
*1915: "Frederick and the Great Coalition" ("Friedrich und die große Koalition")
*1918: ''[[Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man]]'' ("Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen")
*1922: "[[On the German Republic]]" ("Von deutscher Republik")
*1930: "A Sketch of My Life" ("Lebensabriß") – autobiographical
*1933: "The Suffering and Greatness of Richard Wagner" ("Leiden und Größe Richard Wagners")
*1937: "The Problem of Freedom" ("Das Problem der Freiheit"), speech
*1938: ''[[The Coming Victory of Democracy]]'' – collection of lectures
*1938: "This Peace" ("Dieser Friede"), pamphlet
*1938: "Schopenhauer", philosophy and music theory on [[Arthur Schopenhauer]]
*1940: "This War!" ("Dieser Krieg!")
*1943: ''[[Listen, Germany!]]'' (Deutsche Hörer!) – collection of radio broadcasts
*1947: [https://archive.org/details/essaysofthreedec0000unse_q1q9 ''Essays of Three Decades''], translated from the German by H. T. Lowe-Porter. [1st American ed.], New York, A. A. Knopf, 1947. Reprinted as Vintage book, K55, New York, Vintage Books, 1957. Includes "Schopenhauer"
*1948: "Nietzsche's Philosophy in the Light of Recent History"
*1950: "Michelangelo according to his poems" ("Michelangelo in seinen Dichtungen")<ref>The original text is available [http://www.e-periodica.ch/cntmng?pid=dkm-001:1950:10::1500 ''here''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170413072051/http://www.e-periodica.ch/cntmng?pid=dkm-001:1950:10::1500 |date=13 April 2017 }}</ref>
*1958: ''Last Essays''. Includes "Nietzsche's Philosophy in the Light of Recent History"

===Compilations in English===
*1922: [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.124817 ''Stories of Three Decades''] (trans. [[Helen Tracy Lowe-Porter|H. T. Lowe-Porter]]). Includes 24 stories written from 1896 to 1922. First American edition published in 1936.
*1963: [https://archive.org/details/deathinvenicesev00thom ''Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories''] (trans. [[Helen Tracy Lowe-Porter|H. T. Lowe-Porter]]). Includes: "Death in Venice"; "Tonio Kröger"; "Mario and the Magician"; "Disorder and Early Sorrow"; "A Man and His Dog"; "The Blood of the Walsungs"; "Tristan"; "Felix Krull".
*1970: [https://archive.org/details/toniokrgerothe00mann/page/n5/mode/2up ''Tonio Kröger and Other Stories''] (trans. David Luke). Includes: "Little Herr Friedemann"; "The Joker"; "The Road to the Churchyard"; "Gladius Dei"; "Tristan"; "Tonio Kroger". 
**Republished in 1988 as "Death in Venice and Other Stories" with the addition of the eponymous story.
*1997: [https://archive.org/details/sixearlystories00mann/page/n7/mode/2up ''Six Early Stories''] (trans. Peter Constantine). Includes: "A Vision: Prose Sketch"; "Fallen"; The Will to Happiness"; "Death"; "Avenged: Study for a Novella"; "Anecdote".
*1998: [https://archive.org/details/deathinveniceoth00mann_1/mode/2up ''Death in Venice and Other Tales''] (trans. Joachim Neugroschel). Includes: "The Will for Happiness"; "Little Herr Friedemann"; "Tobias Mindernickel"; "Little Lizzy"; "Gladius Dei"; "Tristan"; "The Starvelings: A Study"; "Tonio Kröger"; "The Wunderkind"; "Harsh Hour"; "The Blood of the Walsungs"; "Death in Venice".
*1999: [https://archive.org/details/deathinveniceot000mann ''Death in Venice and Other Stories''] (trans. Jefferson Chase). Includes: "Tobias Mindernickel"; "Tristan"; "Tonio Kröger"; "The Child Prodigy"; "Hour of Hardship"; "Death in Venice"; "Man and Dog".
*2023: ''New Selected Stories'' (trans. [[Damion Searls]]). Includes: "Chaotic World and Childhood Sorrow";<ref>Previously translated as "Early Sorrow" and as "[[Disorder and Early Sorrow]]"</ref> "A Day in the Life of Hanno Buddenbrook" (excerpt from ''[[Buddenbrooks]]''); "Louisey";<ref>Previously translated as "Little Lizzy"</ref> "Death in Venice"; "Confessions of a Con Artist, by Felix Krull—Part One: My Childhood". [https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/26/books/review/thomas-mann-new-selected-stories.html Review] by [[Colm Tóibín]]
* [[Lesley Chamberlain]] writes that, because Mann's works [https://www.the-tls.co.uk/regular-features/letters-to-the-editor/history-wars "have come out of copyright in the US, and will do so in the UK from the start of 2026"], "[m]y own translations of ''[[Death in Venice]]'', and separately of three of the short stories, will appear soon after that date, to be followed by a new English version of ''[[Buddenbrooks]]''".<ref>''TLS'', December 20 / 27, 2024.</ref> In addition, in 2024, [[Susan Bernofsky]] was reported to be working on a translation of ''[[The Magic Mountain]]'',<ref>{{cite news |last1=McGee |first1=Celia |title=The Secret of Thomas Mann's Translator |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/30/books/booksupdate/mrs-lowe-porter-jo-salas.html |access-date=2 October 2024 |work=The New York Times |date=30 January 2024}}</ref> as was Simon Pare.<ref>Watroba, Karolina (29 November 2024). [https://www.the-tls.co.uk/literature-by-region/european-literature/mann-and-the-main-man-essay-karolina-watroba "Mann and the main man: ''The Magic Mountain'' at 100: a century of literary rivalries.] ''TLS''.</ref>

== Research ==
=== Databases ===
==== TMI Research ====
The metadatabase TMI-Research<ref>{{Cite web |title=Research platform – Thomas Mann international |url=https://thomasmanninternational.com/en/research-platform |access-date=27 September 2022 |website=thomasmanninternational.com |language=en |archive-date=25 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220925150418/https://thomasmanninternational.com/en/research-platform |url-status=live }}</ref> brings together archival materials and library holdings of the network "Thomas Mann International". The network was founded in 2017 by the five houses Buddenbrookhaus/Heinrich-und-Thomas-Mann-Zentrum (Lübeck), the [[Monacensia|Monacensia im Hildebrandhaus]] (Munich), the Thomas Mann Archive of the ETH Zurich (Zurich/Switzerland), the [[Thomas Mann House]] (Los Angeles/USA) and the Thomo Manno kultūros centras/Thomas Mann Culture Centre (Nida/Lithuania). The houses stand for the main stations of Thomas Mann's life. The platform, which is hosted by [[ETH Zurich]], allows research in the collections of the network partners across all houses. The database is freely accessible and contains over 165,000 records on letters, original editions, photographs, monographs and essays on Thomas Mann and the Mann family. Further links take you to the respective source databases with contact options and further information.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* {{Cite book |last=Corngold |first=Stanley |year=2022 |title=The Mind in Exile: Thomas Mann in Princeton |location=Princeton, NJ |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=9780691201641}}
* {{Cite book |last=Hamilton |first=Nigel |author-link=Nigel Hamilton (author) |year=1978 |title=The Brothers Mann: The Lives of Heinrich and Thomas Mann |location=New Haven, Conn. |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-02668-9}}
* {{Cite book |last=Hayman |first=Ronald |author-link=Ronald Hayman |year=1996 |title=Thomas Mann: A Biography |publisher=Bloomsbury |isbn=978-0-74752-531-8}}
* {{Cite book |last=Heilbut |first=Anthony |author-link=Anthony Heilbut |year=1997 |title=Thomas Mann: Eros and Literature |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0520209114}}
* {{Cite book |last=Heller |first=Erich |author-link=Erich Heller |year=1981 |title=Thomas Mann: The Ironic German |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-28022-8}}
* {{Cite book |last=Horton |first=David |year=2013 |title=Thomas Mann in English: A Study in Literary Translation |location=London, New Delhi, New York, Sydney |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |doi=10.5040/9781472544087 |isbn=978-1-4411-6798-9 }}
* {{Cite book |last=Kurzke |first=Hermann |year=2002 |title=Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art: A Biography |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=0-691-07069-5}}
* {{Cite book |last=Mauthner |first=Martin |year=2007 |title=German Writers in French Exile 1933–1940 |url=https://archive.org/details/germanwritersinf0000maut |location=London |publisher=Vallentine Mitchell in association with the European Jewish Publication Society |isbn=978-0-85303-540-4}}
* {{Cite book |last=Prater|first=Donald|year=1995 |title=Thomas Mann: A Life |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0198158615}}
* {{Cite book |last=Tóibín |first=Colm |author-link=Colm Tóibín |year=2021 |title=The Magician |publisher=Viking |isbn=9780241004616}} (A novel of Mann's life)
* {{Cite book |last=von Gronicka |first=André |author-link=André von Gronicka |year=1970 |title=Thomas Mann: Profile and Perspectives with Two Unpublished Letters and a Chronological List of Important Events |url=https://archive.org/details/thomasmannprofil0000vong |location=New York |publisher=Random House |isbn=0394308433}}

===Letter collections===
* {{Cite book |editor-last=Winston |editor-first=Richard and Clara |year=1971 |title=Letters of Thomas Mann, 1889–1955}}
* {{Cite book |editor-last=Wysling |editor-first=Hans |year=1998 |title=Letters of Heinrich and Thomas Mann, 1900–1949}}
* {{Cite book |editor-last=Wegener |editor-first=Herbert |year=1960 |title=Thomas Mann: Letters to Paul Amann 1915–1952}}
* {{Cite book |editor-last=Newton |editor-first=Caroline |year=1971 |title=The Letters of Thomas Mann to Caroline Newton}}
* {{Cite book |editor-last=Winston |editor-first=Richard and Clara |year=1975 |title=An Exceptional Friendship: The Correspondence of Thomas Mann and [[Erich Kahler]]}}
* {{Cite book |editor-last=Gelley |editor-first=Alexander |year=1975 |title=Mythology and Humanism: The Correspondence of Thomas Mann and [[Károly Kerényi|Karl Kerényi]]}}

==External links==
{{wikisource|works=or}}

{{wikiquote}}
{{Commons category|Thomas Mann}}
* [http://www.famousauthors.org/thomas-mann Thomas Mann's Profile on FamousAuthors.org]
* {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040810031859/http://foia.fbi.gov/foiaindex/thommann.htm |date=10 August 2004 |title=FBI File on Thomas Mann }}
* [http://de.wikiversity.org/wiki/Erstausgaben_Thomas_Manns._Ein_bibliographischer_Atlas._%C3%9Cbersicht. First prints of Thomas Mann. Collection Dr. Haack, Leipzig (Germany)]
* [http://www.theeuropeanlibrary.org/tel4/newspapers/search?query=%22thomas%20mann%22 References to Thomas Mann in European historic newspapers]
* {{PM20}}
*[http://noblib.internet-box.ch/NLEW.php?authorid=29 List of Works]
* {{Nobelprize}}
* [[hdl:10079/fa/beinecke.mann|Thomas Mann Collection]]. Yale Collection of German Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
* [https://thomasmanninternational.com/en/research-platform TMI Research] by [https://thomasmanninternational.com/en/home Thomas Mann International]: Cross-house research in the archive and library holdings of the network partners in Lübeck, Munich, Zurich and Los Angeles

===Electronic editions===
* {{StandardEbooks|Standard Ebooks URL=https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/thomas-mann}}
* {{Gutenberg author | id=4200}}
* {{FadedPage|id=Mann, Thomas|name=Thomas Mann|author=yes}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Thomas Mann}}
* {{Librivox author |id=10558}}
* {{OL author}}

{{Thomas Mann}}
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{{Nobel Prize in Literature Laureates 1926–1950}}
{{1929 Nobel Prize winners}}
{{German literature}}
{{Modernism}}
{{Buddenbrooks}}
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[[Category:Thomas Mann| ]]
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