Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

[a reread, my 8th presumably I've lost count, first read when I was in highschool, have finally overcome the reviewer's block to such an extent I've gone over this website's word count]

Dearest Hans, he is my most tragi-comically endearing character. I've gotten to know him quite well over the years, I can quite easily picture him (see ), a young 23 year old stepping outside the train at Davos, wearing his youthful arrogance on his posh sleeve and his Maria Mancini cigarettes in his pocket. Mann's tone is quite clear, ironic and cutthroat from the very start: Hans is a dumbass, through and through. And therein lies the potential.

"They stopped at a small station. Hans Castorp heard his name called out, Joachim Ziemssen saying: “Hullo, there you are! Here’s where you get out!�
“But I’m not there yet!� said Hans Castorp, taken aback, and still seated."

But at what thread to pull, when discussing The Magic Mountain? Which branch of Daphne's hand (see ) to follow? Which of her tendon sheaths ought we glide through, all the way to the tip that turns into a bough sprouting other branches? Shall we follow the flexor digitorum profundus, the one branching out into the patient in Hans at the fifth distal phalanx? Or digitorum superficialis, where the pulleys burst into Hans's transmutation by the passing of Time while he is descended in the heights of mountains where Time appears nonexistent, yet still affects reality?
(view spoiler)[Voilà Herr Mann, Gleiches mit Gleichem vergelten. (hide spoiler)]

We will consider each of Daphne's original digits. The right hand, just for giggles.

Daphne's thumb - the bildungsroman

When we meet Hans, even with his poshy Maria Mancini, he is a silly little boy, his world is so abysmally small that it requires climbing down the mountain (for Settembrini is right, going up to Berghof is a descent) and enclosing himself in the confines of a tuberculosis sanatorium to discover what an ignorant way of thinking he had down there. Berghof is the place that makes him truly question himself.

The problem is that Hans is incapable of making tough decisions that affect him personally, from childhood to the sanatorium he is encouraged to pick a cause for himself and instead chooses Non-involvement. This is purposefully genius of Mann, Hans is exposed to so much and learns so much that he is confronted with endless choices and overshoots the limit. He is constantly suspended between his teachers (Settembrini, Naphta, Peeperkorn), again intentional of Mann to illustrate how Non-involvement will work against you if taken to the extreme.

During the 'Snow' chapter, he moves around in circles and loses his sense of time, this is Schopenhauer's philosophy about the soothing quality of death, but then he has his own Visione - springing from exhaustion, consistent with the idea dominant in the novel that disease/suffering can be a positive force serving spiritual growth. Hans decides Settembrini and Naphta's intellectual efforts are in vain because they do not include Love, if abstracts can only be created by man, he must be superior to them. He chooses to side with Man and not let Death guide his thoughts. But by the evening, all these epiphanies seem to fade away...

When Hans thinks of Clawdia, he refers to this as "taking stock" (in the English translation), something that initially started as a "serious mental preoccupation" that mostly turns to Clawdia. Here, somewhere around page 188 is when I got annoyed and busted out the original German for clarity:

"Doch fand er es nicht unschicklick, dass die mit dieser Tatigkeit verbundene Anstrengung ihn notigte, sich der Kinnstutze zu bedienen, die das "Regieren" angesichts des vorschwebenden Hochgebildes ihm innerlich verlieh.

But he didn't think it was improper that the exertion associated with this activity compelled him to rest his chin, because this attitude probably agreen with the dignity that "taking stock" gave him in the face of the high structure hovering in front of him."

Regieren - meaning to govern, to rule, to reign over, to take stock of.

To this reader, regieren should here be translated as "oversee" (observing, perceiving, mapping). Hans believes in the Homo Dei within him, he convinces himself he would stay to oversee, but at this point a clear Munchausen syndrome overtakes him and he conditions his temperature to rise. Obviously he must stay, he is ill. Right? Might as well do some mapping, some perceiving of things, while we are at it.

But actually, Herr Castorp regiert nichts.

Or, if he does perform some active mapping/perceiving, he oversees everything but what is truly important: himself. He does not see the forest from the trees.

Daphne's index - The micro universe

Take Dante. He produced a work that would express a sum of knowledge in compact form in his Visione, through a unitary mode of thought - a journey. Equally, Mann here creates an open encyclopaedia of clashing schools of thought, encased in the small world of an alpine sanatorium, through a plurality of languages "as a guarantee of a truth that is not merely partial", according to Italy Calvino.

Mann encloses a macrouniverse in a microuniverse of a sanatorium. In short: it's bigger on the inside. Hans meets an impressive number of different nationalities (list at the end), people that, as he says about Settembrini, down below he wouldn't have met. And definitely wouldn't have understood. Or bothered to.

Settembrini, the Italian pedagogue with ideals of Western civilization and Enlightenment, insists on seeing humanity as pure rationality and serves as Hans's greatest teacher, even though he himself fails by overshooting the limit with his extremist attitude and complete disregard for the sensual, a topic of personal importance to Hans.

"Humanist - yes, certainly, I am a humanist. You could never convict me of ascetic inclinations. I affirm, honour, and love of the body and I protest I affirm, honour and love of the body, and love form, beauty, freedom, gaiety, the enjoyment of life. I represent the world, the interest in this life, against a sentimental withdrawal and negation, classicism against romanticism. I think my position is unequivocal. But there is one power, one principle, which commands my deepest assent, my highest and fullest allegiance and love; and this power, this principle, is the intellect."

Daphne's middle finger - the war

This book isn't necessarily about politics, but it is once more intentional that Mann drops his character in the middle of a microuniverse of the world in Switzerland, he wants to paint the picture of Europe's changing moods that led to a war that crippled the entire continent, all the way to the end when even the inhabitants of Berghof were engulfed in a state of perpetual rage.

The 'Snow' chapter contains many symbols pointing towards Mann's belief in the rational and peaceful quality of Western life and his disgust over the decayed world of political reaction in the face of possible war.

Joachim, the victim of fanatic call of duty, the one who they call a deserter for leaving to not be a deserter, he is most illustrative of the condition of self-deception that grasped Europe at the time.

Why? Again, Hans excuses himself in the name of Homo Dei. Where Joachim the soldier always considers his position at the sanatorium as an "interim profession", Hans is a civilian who sees leaving Berghof as desertion, an abandonment of comprehensive responsibilities as a patient.

"Joachim deserted - deserted to the colours - funny, but it can be done."

Dying, Joachim grows confused and talks of the military, Behrens saying "this condition of credulous self-deception" is to be the end. He no longer shaves, he has a soldier's beard. For what is dying but war in the body? It is pertinent of Behrens to declare him dead in the field.

Daphne's ring finger - Madame Clawdia Chauchat/Pribislav

Speaking of intentional things, "I too was created by eternal love". - Dante.

Drawing hard on Schopenhauer, in his Seminars VII, VIII and XVI, Lacan expands on the notion of ἄγαλμ�, Agalma, with various historical translations, of which one is 'to attract divine attention' or from the word agazos - to bear with pain.

Here, Lacan dwells on the Odyssey’s original description of the Trojan horse, in Homer’s words, “the horse which once Odysseus led up into the citadel as a thing of guile […] The Trojans themselves had dragged it into the citadel. There it stood, while the people sat round it, discussing it endlessly to no conclusion. Three suggestions found favour: to cut through the hollow timber with pitiless bronze, or drag it to the edge of the rock and over the cliff, or let it stand there, as a grand offering [ἄγαλμα] to the gods, in propitiation, which is what happened in the end�.

Lacan singles out the richness and complexity of the enigmatic ἄγαλμ�. In the Odyssey and elsewhere, the term does not simply designate a grand “offering�, but also a “trap for gods�, and a “device that catches the eye�. In short, the agalma is a “charm� � which is what prevents the Trojans from ripping it apart to see what lies inside.

Agalma, the ornament, the jewel, the precious object that is within the Self that points towards what we want. But is there a desire that is truly ours? Or is it an agalma, the fetishist function of an object of desire? An object that can assume, in relation to the subject, the essential value that constitutes the fundamental fantasy.

In Hans's case, witchy Kirghiz eyes. Tartar physiognomy and prairie-wolf's eyes. On a boy called Pribislav in the schoolyard or a female patient at Berghof. Hans has been subconsciously idolising said type of face since childhood, he unbeknownst to himself safeguards within himself this object of desire. And this is key to human desire, where pathological love actively finds its terminus.

And the healing process can begin.

But this implies getting worse before getting better.

During "Walpurgis Nacht", Hans enjoys the "pomegranates of sensuality" and according to Settembrini, one who tastes the fruit is lost, but Settembrini does not see that it is Hans's involvement with Clawdia that kickstarts his search for knowledge and insight. The day Hans connects Pribislav's eyes with Clawdia's is the day he finally starts to know himself. It is a pity he does not confide in Settembrini about Pribislav, it would have been marvellous to see the Stoic rip the subject to pieces with his purely ethical approach to life:

"Eh! Ingegnere! Un po di ragione, sa! "

But Hans doesn't listen anyway, even if he connects Pribislav with Clawdia, so he takes the harder route. This is intentional of Mann, and I have yet to discover anyone else to draw such a sharp delimitation alongside the connection between man's conscious and subconscious: when Clawdia speaks, she uses Pribislav's voice. When she looks at him, she looks with Pribislav's eyes.

"Unmißverständlich und streng persönlich zu ihm herübergeblickt, ein Lächeln um die geschlossenen Lippen und in ihren schmalgeschnittenen Pribislav-Augen, als wollte sie sagen: "Nun? Es ist Zeit. Wirst du gehen?" (denn wenn nur die Augen sprechen, geht ja die Rede per Du, auch wenn der Mund noch nicht einmal >Sie< gesagt hat) � und das war ein Zwischenfall gewesen, der Hans Castorp in tiefster Seele verwirrt und entsetzt hatte, � kaum hatte er seinen Sinnen getraut und entgeistert zuerst in Frau Chauchats Angesicht und dann, die Augen hebend, über ihre Stirn und ihr Haar hin ins Leere geblickt. Wußte sie denn, daß er sich auf zwei Uhr zur Untersuchung hatte bestellen lassen? Genau so hatte es ausgesehen.

Unequivocally and intimately, glancing over at him, a smile on her closed lips and in her narrow-set Pribislav eyes, as she wanted to say: 'Well? It's time. Will you go?' (because if only the eyes speak, the speech goes by first person singular, even if mouth didn't even say 'You') � and that had been an incident that Hans Castorp was confused and horrified by, deep in his soul - he had scarcely believed his senses and was aghast at first in Frau Chauchat's face and then, raising her eyes, across her forehead and hair, stared at emptiness. Did she know that he was getting ready for the two o'clock investigation? That's what it looked like.

Hans confuses his lovesick state illness "that shatters the nervous system and wrings tears from grown men" with his physical illness, he allows himself to anguish over his object of desire, Clawdia - his ill comrade in arms. He has no control over his thoughts for her, nor does he want to - he is ill (is he though?). If Settembrini is right and illness is slackness, then by the end Hans is right there with them. He ceases to exercise any judgement, grows a soldier's beard and starts slamming doors, Clawdia style. And finds it feels good.

Unfortunately Hans does not realise he doesn't know enough about himself. Lacan asks how far would you go in questioning the Self, at the risk of you yourself disappearing. Hans is afraid to go farther than his agalma. Agalma, from the word agazos, also meaning the pupil of the eye.

Daphne's little finger - the patient, the medicine

Berghof is an expensive scam, trapping the patient in like clients in a casino where there are no windows or clocks, nothing to show for the passage of Time, something that Mann concerns himself with deeply in this novel. Even the weather is confusing at Berghof, Mann places the sanatorium in the Swiss Alps intentionally, where summer starts in October and there is heavy snow for more than half a year.

Hans Castorp is an easy medium through which to objectively see a patient, Mann makes him so with his pedantic ways that border to the ridiculous. I had to hit 27% for Hans to officially become a patient, but Mann had been mapping him from page 1 with the coldness of a physician, taking notes in his file.

Hans had just become a patient and my tediousness in reading began, like clockwork. Being a patient is actually so tedious, each day the same scheduled rubbish, but one grows fond of it for it is the only thing that marks the passage of Time. His main sin is definitely my favourite one, Vanity: he takes pleasure in being part of a group. Even if it's a group of sick people.

Settembrini warns him of these dangers, that the patients complain but actually love it there, living a loose, idyllic life and imagine themselves entitled to pity and justified in their bitterness and cynicism, but Hans does not truly comprehend.

On the 7th week, Hans asks to see his Hand under an x-ray and for the first time, he understands that he would eventually die. Later, he is mostly interested in learning about Tendons, especially of the hand and arm.

On a personal note, one could never quite endure the commanding, drill-sergeant attitude and godlike syndrome that was fashionable in the medical community in the past. The general attitude that patients are considered too ignorant to understand the condition of their illness or recovery. The patient is too empty-headed to be given all the information in fear of clouding a judgement that is already clouded. And how to not be consternated by this when I have Settembrini's warning story about the Baltic woman who almost died at Berghof because medics were not listening to her describing her symptoms as worse, and instead were telling her that 'only the physician can judge how she is - she herself only knows how she feels, which does not signify!'?

How to not be consternated at Hans listening to this as if it were a story to tell around a campfire and how to not conclude that in the end, it's true? Hans is arrogant, know-it-all, easily swayed, the worst type of patient, the vain dumbass who doesn't know it. He is stupid as a patient because he takes nothing personally, apart from all the wrong things.

"Stupid - well there are so many kinds of stupidity, and cleverness is one of the worst!"

On the other side of this coin however, is the disgusting Dr. Krokowski, he who brings the occult-babble in the picture, his treatments are nothing short of a criminal act, with his hypnosis and the deliberate exploitation of Ellen Brand, he is the vulgar and intentional distortion of psychoanalysis in the name of perversion and fame.

***

History itself does not look kindly on these tuberculosis sanatoriums. Ultimately described as severely unhealthy places of decadence for the ill, Mann has first hand experience by staying in Davos with his wife who was being treated for tuberculosis herself. And he wants his readers to experience it first hand, with him, through Hans Castorp. This is why this novel is 'difficult' to read - Mann insists we come to Davos with him, be ill with him, take the rest with him, be confused by Naphta and Settembrini's conversations with him, be amazed by the whistling artificial pneumothorax with him. In the same way as, in the end, he insists we leave Davos as quickly as possible. For he is already gone.

***

Nationalities Hans meets at Berghof: Italian, German, Russian, Dutch, Mexican, Greek, French, Swedish, Jewish, Polish, Czech, Scottish, English, Egyptian, Romanian, Chinese, Hungarian, Finnish, Kurdish, Moroccan .

***

Quotes:

Che guazzabuglio proprio stomachevole!

I gave back to the ailing Clawdia Chauchat Pribislav Hippe's lead-pencil.

You're a bit of a hypocrite, Castorp, and a bit of a coward; your cousin puts it very euphemistically when he calls you a civilian.

[about Peeperkorn's end] C'est une abdication.

But he who knows the body, who knows life, also knows death. Except that's not the whole thing - but merely a beginning, pedagogically speaking. You have to hold it up to the other half, to its opposite. Because our interest in death and illness is nothing but a way of expressing an interest in life.

Hast du nicht vielleicht einen Bleistift?

***

Reader, make no mistakes though; this time round, the novel has consumed me.

***

I wish il Signor Settembrini would come in suddenly to turn on the light, to let reason and convention reign- it is a weakness of his. But since he is not here, I follow Hans's example and turn it on myself.