C1The first two sentences of the novel's foreword deserve special attention, for they contain the hero's characterization as "simple-minded." As the story progresses, we become increasingly aware that Hans Castorp is by no means a "simple-minded" young man in the derogatory sense of the term. Mann merely mentions Castorp's simplicity to emphasize his faculty of meeting the countless influences to which he is exposed and to resist the many temptations to commit himself permanently to any view or cause. This is, of course, the major theme of the novel: the lengthy, cumbersome, and perilous road of Hans Castorp's self-education.The opening sentences also contain the novel's other major theme: the complexity and mystery of time. Throughout this book are countless, recurring variations on the theme of time. As a newcomer, Hans Castorp is exposed, first of all, to the thin air of the Berghof and the bizarre silhouettes of dense forests and snowcapped peaks surrounding it. Mann uses nature here to evoke new, unfamiliar feelings in Hans, feelings of vagueness and timelessness feelings which will he intensified later on as he ventures higher into the regions of eternal snow and ice.Besides using nature to introduce the newcomer to the sanatorium, Mann also uses Joachim Ziemssen, Castorp's cousin. Unknowingly Joachim has taken on some of the characteristics of the mode of life at the Berghof. And, one thing in particular which confuses Hans about Joachim is the latter's concept of time. It strikes Hans that Joachim's sense of time is very haphazard. In fact, their conversation soon dwells on the nature of time, so treasured in the "world below" and so meaningless "up here" where there is little to demand its observance except the routine of taking one's temperature. These reflections on time now focus on the static quality of duration; soon, however, Mann will be concerned with the linear and circular aspects of time in the course of Castorp's growing self-awareness.Hans Castorp is both appalled and intrigued by Joachim's use of the collective "we" and his reference to life at the sanatorium as "life up here." Mann's objective in having Joachim express this sharp differentiation between the world "above" and that "below" is twofold: On a philosophical level, it underlines the deep gap between the artistic-intellectual realm and the "normal" realm of average people. Here we have the author's early romantic concept of the dichotomy between art on the one hand and life on the other. On a political level, the sharp differentiation of "above" and "below" points to the fact that the Berghof is a sanctuary of disease and death. It stands as the symbol of the sick, chauvinistic European society before World War I; its isolation from the "normal" world is symptomatic of the advanced stage of its disease.In terms of technique, the continued use of "up here" as opposed to "down there" is interesting as an example of Mann's basic irony, which the reader should bear in mind regardless of how involved the political and philosophical battles will become as the story moves on. Irony is, of course, based on the insight that something is not necessarily and exclusively so, and that sometimes, or at the same time, it is very different. In other words, "up here" where the idle, sick, and decadent predominate, Hans Castorp, though sick himself, will be physically cured and morally uplifted in the end. "Down there" where "normal" people are supposedly healthy, carefree, and thoroughly bourgeois, disease and war abound.Joachim, Hans' cousin, speaks in terms of "up here" and "down below," and, in matters of disease and death, he has acquired a nonchalance which is typical of the whole atmosphere. Here Mann lashes out at the decadence of society which, while taking death for granted, nevertheless does everything in its power to conceal it as shocking or thought-provoking. To Mann, life and death are two aspects of one perennially recurring process, a process which will figure prominently later on during the discussion between Settembrini and Naphta.Dr. Krokowski is the first major figure of the mountain world whom Hans meets. He is characterized as the perfect personification of the Berghof, where the sympathy of those in charge is not with life but with disease and death. He has so morally deteriorated that he does not even believe that a person can be completely healthy. He laughs at Hans, who insists he came to pay a three-week visit and not for treatment. Krokowski stands as the apostle of doom in a world where physical, mental, and moral decay go hand in hand. As are many other scenes, the dialogue between Castorp and Dr. Krokowski is autobiographical in origin. During his three-week visit to a sanatorium, Thomas Mann actually contracted a serious cough and was advised by the assistant of the institution to join his wife in her rest cure. Certainly sensitive and possibly even susceptible to the lures of life at a tuberculosis sanatorium, he declined. "I preferred to composeThe Magic Mountaininstead," he declared, "for had I agreed to stay there, I may still be up there now."It is not by accident that the political dimension of this novel, which will assume a central position in Hans Castorp's educational process, is introduced through an Austrian aristocrat. The Austro-Hungarian monarchy is regarded as the chief bulwark against democracy by Settembrini, perhaps Castorp's most influential mentor. The aristocrat's deep-seated cough, indicative of the advanced stage of his disease, irritates Hans considerably. The war at the end will irritate him even more because he will be forced to take up arms. Ironically, he will be killed in it in a war which was caused, to a substantial degree, by the reactionary forces of the once glorious and now quickly deteriorating Hapsburg empire, of which the aristocrat is a symbol.Throughout this chapter, Mann already employs the technique of the leitmotif (a short musical phrase representing and recurring with a given character, situation, or emotion). He uses it to point to similarities and changes in the conduct of the characters or to tie together elements of dreams and visions with others experienced in real life. Joachim, for instance, keeps shrugging his shoulders in a manner he never used to in the "world below," and Castorp unpacks the same brand of cigars that he used to enjoy at his great uncle's and that he will still smoke when the sanatorium will have taken to playing "seventeen-and-four" in Chapter 7. The face cream Hans applies on his sunburned cheeks reappears in his first dream at the Berghof. The image of Joachim also appears in Hans' dream; Joachim's face is as translucently pale as that of Dr. Krokowski. In Castorp's dream, Joachim and the Austrian aristocrat ride down the mountain side together on a bobsled. In this fashion, the other sanatorium carries its dead down the mountain. Thus, by means of the leitmotif, we get a forewarning of Joachim's death in the future. It is easy to spin the theme of their joint ride down the mountain a little further, charging it with political implication. They head toward death together: Joachim, the German soldier, willing to live and die for a cause, and the Austrian aristocrat, symbol of the crumbling monarchy. Yet we should always bear in mind that Joachim is not decadent and that Mann never condemns him. He is merely less complex than Castorp, and when the latter or Clavdia Chauchat teases him about his bourgeois values, they do so with a considerable amount of envy.Joachim, in fact, is the only character in the entire novel who does not tempt our hero. And he is the only one who is not tempted by the various educators.Here, as throughout the story, dreams and visions yield strangely fused images by drawing on Castorp's past experiences and presenting them in new contexts.C2This chapter is a flashback into Hans Castorp's (and Thomas Mann's) childhood and adolescence, using the approach employed inBuddenbrooksof trying to explain a man's thoughts and actions in terms of those of his ancestors. More than all other chapters of the novel, this one brings to mind Mann's observation that it is difficult and not at all desirable to talk aboutThe Magic Mountainwithout being aware of its indebtedness toBuddenbrooks.The present chapter may not be as intellectually brilliant as subsequent ones, but when it comes to humor, wisdom, and perceptive observations on the species of the bourgeois, it certainly measures up to Mann's first success.The autobiographical elements of this chapter are as numerous as they are obvious. The characterization of Hans' grandfather, Senator Castorp, as a man holding family traditions and old institutions in far higher esteem than the insane expansion of harbor facilities and the godless sophistication of modern big cities corresponds to the picture we have of the author's father, Senator Thomas Heinrich Mann of Lbeck. Hans decides to take up shipbuilding as a career, but from the outset he does not really care for his work. He merely respects it.Here is a parallel to Mann's early experience as an employee in an insurance agency. Just as Mann quit the insurance business to lead the "useless" life of an artist, so Hans never gets beyond taking his textbookOcean Steamshipsup to the Berghof, where he forgets about it. Hans abandons his studies because he thinks his "love of idle hours" will not permit him to work hard. Mann, wondering what a working mood really is, answered his own question in the form of a little essay in which he asserts that "the mood to work that's having slept well, good books, fresh air, few people, and peace."As the narrator points out, however, there is also a deeper reason for Hans Castorp's dissatisfaction with his envisioned profession, and it is not exaggerating to see as his credo throughout the novel: "A man lives not only his personal life, as an individual, but also, consciously or unconsciously, the life of his epoch and his contemporaries. . . . It is quite conceivable that he may be vaguely conscious of the deficiencies of his epoch and find them prejudicial to his own moral well-being." As the most perfect proof of this insight, Castorp will continue his ambivalence and indecision even after catching a glimpse of truth in the snow dream.Thus this chapter becomes the true starting point of the educational journey of Hans. The close relationship between him and his grandfather, meticulously dealt with and culminating in the treatment of the family christening basin, reflects the tradition of conservative values in which Hans (and Thomas Mann) was reared. The detailed description of Hans' life with Joachim at the home of Consul Tienappel also reflects the conservative tradition; the atmosphere radiates gentility. Since Hans has embarked upon a journey of self-education and, eventually, meaningfulness, these descriptions serve to point to his indebtedness to the "normal world below," which he never really abandons. Hans, not at all "simple," can empathize with Joachim, his clear-cut opposite in so many ways. And Mann, despite his often-revised views and later engagement for the liberal cause, never ceased to think of himself as rooted in his conservative upbringing.Castorp's reminiscences extend to his early and repeated experiences with death. Having lost his father, mother, and now his grandfather, he has had ample opportunity to find out that there is more to death than the mournfulness and solemnity of funerals There is also a physical aspect to it, almost ordinary and common in its raw materiality Dead bodies, he reasons, cannot be truly a sad affair because sadness only prevails where life is concerned. These reflections are on Castorp's mind as he stands by his dead grandfather, who appears to be a life size wax doll to him, nothing but lifeless material. Here Mann's favorite theme of the polarity of life and death comes in. The noble and ignoble aspects of death which little Hans experiences are the basis of the novel's progression by opposites and contrasts. Throughout the book, the discussion of these ennobling and dehumanizing aspects of disease and death will be continued. Castorp himself is aware of these dual aspects which predestine him for his intense sensual, intellectual, and moral adventures.Of the many motifs Mann employs, that of the recurring number seven stands out. Before Hans' time,sevengenerations were initiated into Christian life by being sprinkled with water from the family basin, andsevenyears have elapsed since his own christening.Sevencontinues to play an important role until the end of the novel: the patients of the sanatorium are seated aroundseventables, which is significant because of the function of food asthe"time killer" in the boredom of the Berghof; the name of Castorp's great educator will be Settembrini,settemeaningsevenin Italian; aftersevenweeks, Castorp ponders how quickly time has elapsed for him, and at the night of the carnival he will tell Clavdia Chauchat thatsept moisunder her eyes have made him fall in love with her; when the thunderbolt of the war awakens Hans from hisseven-yearspell on the Magic Mountain, the narrator refers to him as aSeven-Sleeper.(A literal translation of the GermanSiebenschlaferrefers to a rodent known for its long hibernation period of seven months.) Plunged into the war, Hans will have to march forsevenhours to reach the battle scene. Finally, the novel is divided into seven chapters.

C3This chapter serves two main functions: that of introducing Hans Castorp to real life at the Berghof and its director, Hofrat Behrens, as well as to the two characters who will vie for his attention from now on Settembrini and Clavdia Chauchat. Second, the chapter opens the discussion on the nature of time, the novel's other major theme.The peculiar impressions Hans Castorp collects characterize the atmosphere of physical and moral decay prevailing at the sanatorium. When Joachim introduces his cousin to several patients at their first breakfast together, the array of characters they meet affords them a glimpse of all the misery and falseness that they will live with throughout their stay. Quaint little habits, distinct accents, gross flaws, and most unusual looks identify each of those assembled as the representative of his specific profession or corner of the continent. All of them are sick members of society. The fact that they are all extremely wealthy is by no means a coincidence and adds to the vital social and political implications of the book.Most memorable among the minor characters Castorp meets here is perhaps Frau Sthr, whose unbelievable stupidity and coarseness puts her on the lowest rank of the social ladder at the Berghof. It is important to note that, sterile, sick, and half-dead though the patients here may be, socializing and the sham accompanying it does interest them as if they needed it to simulate ordinary life "below." Like so many other patients, Frau Sthr is forever anxious to cover up her total lack of intelligence and education by carrying on high-brow conversations and acting sophisticated. Her overly cultured ways, which cannot hide her countless gaucheries, are symptomatic of her society's essential barbarism. Here Mann proves himself a perfect caricaturist, employing recurring leitmotifs and picking picturesque, appropriate names. The consistently stupid expression of Frau Sthr's face, for instance, is described in terms of her "rodentlike teeth." As the story goes on, this set of teeth becomes Frau Sthr. Also, her name means "sturgeon" in German and, spelled slightly differently, "stubborn," which provides ample leeway for the (German-speaking) reader's punning imagination. To top it all off, Frau Sthr keeps boasting of the twenty-eight different fish sauces she can fix.Thus, she is a perfect example of a patient whose insensitivity and total lack of potential keep her disease from working in her favor. In sensitive people like Castorp, a rise in the fever curve signifies growing awareness, a sharpening of intelligence. In the case of Frau Sthr, on the other hand, all there is for tuberculosis to bring out is the purely physical aspect of disease. She remains gross and stupid until the end. The same will be true of Clavdia Chauchat, although her deficiency is not one of intelligence. She will remain sensual and passive throughout the book.There are other, more shocking instances of the sham facade of the sanatorium world, such as the threats of Herr Albin, a hopeless case, to commit suicide. Playing with his gun, the young man meets nothing but angry protests from his fellow patients, who are extremely eager to avoid any thought of death. When they insist he will be cured if he only stopped toying with his weapon, it is their cowardice they show and not their sympathy for him. The more they pretend to console him, the more he feels challenged to uncover their unwillingness to face reality. More than that, Albin says that he is content with his fate because now certain of his impending death, he can resign himself to idleness such as he did in school when the teacher would not call upon him anymore because his failure was a fact. Herr Albin's mention of his high school days triggers a faint, first picture of Castorp's own school days; he is startled by a "wild wave of sweetness which swept over him." The remembering of his school days, of his school friend Hippe, and the foreshadowing of the exchange of the pencil with Clavdia has begun. This is one of the book's major motifs.Joachim casually tells his cousin that many patients die without anybody knowing anything about it because such "unpleasant" events are handled with utmost discreetness. Physical illness, in other words, is treated exactly like the moral sickness of exaggerated class-consciousness; it is ignored. The doctors of the sanatorium (the ruling politicians of the "world below") are anxious to conceal death (moral bankruptcy) from the public. As a result, the climate of pretense at the Berghof (in prewar Europe) stands in eerie contrast to death, which rules supreme.The theme of the ennobling and dehumanizing aspects of death, touched upon previously in connection with Frau Sthr, figures prominently in Castorp's reaction to Behrens' brutal treatment of dying patients. Hans Castorp insists that a dying human being should be treated with respect because he is always more venerable than "a chap going about, laughing and earning his living, and eating three meals a day." The sensitivity he showed long ago at his grandfather's deathbed is still there, though he seems to have become less certain that "sadness can only prevail where life is concerned." He has begun to view life and death as two aspects of one and the same thing.In connection with his heart palpitations, Castorp's preoccupation with this subject comes out again. Later, Mann will transfer its discussion to the level of purely philosophical discourses between Settembrini and Naphta, but for the time being Hans worries about his palpitations and remarks to Joachim, "it is disturbing and unpleasant to have the body act as though it had no connection with the soul." The dichotomy between body and soul, life and death, is beginning to strike him as something to give more thought to, something he will transcend as his self-awareness grows.Joachim introduces his cousin to Settembrini, an Italian gentleman of fine features and great learning. The apostle of reason, progress, and humanism, he is one of Hans' chief mentors throughout the novel. Revealing himself as a man of letters, he goes about reciting Italian poetry and telling the cousins of his translations of liberal thinkers. One of these men he translated had composed a hymn to Satan himself-Satan in the form of unbridled revolution. The Italian baffles Castorp by comparing his visit to the Berghof with Odysseus' venture into the realm of shadows. To Hans' objection that he hascome upseveral thousand feet, Settembrini cynically replies that Hans has been a victim of an illusion.Settembrini's admiration for Renaissance poetry and figures of Greek mythology shows how much he lives in the liberal Greco-Roman tradition. It also reflects Mann's sympathy with this view, which he considered the most powerful reservoir of democratic thought. Yet the lines of the Italian song, a fervent glorification of revolution, point to the one shortcoming in Settembrini which renders his views deficient and unacceptable as such to our hero. Like so many front-line liberals, Settembrini cannot extricate himself from the paradox of having to be dogmatic about his liberalism. He is rather willing to wage war against Austria, Russia, and the church. But his fanaticism also has a pedantic side to it; insisting to Castorp that smoking has been despised by the most brilliant thinkers in history because it befogs the mind, he declares it a vice.Hans Castorp, the avid consumer of Maria Mancini cigars, does not appreciate this at all, and we may rest assured that Thomas Mann, a connoisseur of cigars himself, intended this to be a bit of criticism of Settembrini. This will be extremely important later on because it will supply Naphta, Settembrini's reactionary adversary, with arguments he could barely have found himself. Mann himself never advocated liberalism to the point of condoning revolution, and, in his attempts to help democratize Germany, he never ceased to be extremely critical of those who would transplant Western-style democracy on German society without modifying it to suit a different mentality. It would be Germany's role to mediate between East and West, according to Mann, but never to copy a political system. This mediating role, by the way, is one aspect of Castorp's dream of the rising moon in the east and the setting sun in the west (Chapter 4).No sooner has Settembrini, whose exterior is described as forcing Castorp to "mental alertness and clarity," entered into our hero's life than he begins to use his keen powers of observation in Hans' favor. He inquires about the "term" Hans has been sentenced to by "Minos and Rhadamanthus"; he lashes out most cynically at Behrens' greediness (underlined by his standard expressionsine pecuniaand his invention of a separate summer season for the Berghof); and he condemns the director's conniving generosity toward a debauched prince who showed his gratitude by conferring the title of "Hofrat" on him. The Hofrat's sensuality will become obvious later on, especially in connection with his hobby, oil painting. Spotting Dr. Krokowski, Settembrini mentions the appropriateness of his black attire to Hans and is shocked that the latter has not yet sized him up. Exhorting him to use his eyes and reasoning power to arrive at lucid conclusions, the Italian lapses into another praise of humanism and the related art of pedagogy.Settembrini represents that force which never hesitates to express direct honesty. He answers Castorp's charge that he is too sarcastic in his efforts to eradicate wrong by telling him that malice is the "animating spirit of criticism; and criticism is the beginning of progress and enlightenment." In this context, it is interesting to note that the Italian liberal very much resembles Mann's brother Heinrich, with whose highly didactic notions about art (especially political literature) he never agreed. Settembrini was the name of a historical figure in Italy's fight for unification, though the author never said he used it in his novel for this reason.Whether Mann chose Settembrini's name deliberately or not, the long battle between the Austrian empire and the individual Italian states over unification and independence (of which World War I was merely the final, most violent outbreak) is a major theme on the novel's political level. Settembrini's aggressive exposure of the relationship of Behrens (whose spurious title Hofrat means "Imperial Counselor" and was once a meaningful award for distinguished services rendered, but is used here as a symbol of the declining monarchy's title-consciousness) with a debauched member of nobility certainly fits this pattern of his passionate anti-monarchistic feelings.When Castorp finds the patient who keeps irritating him by slamming doors in the dining hall, he is surprised at her attractiveness and, above all, by her slanted eyes, protruding cheek bones, and the delicate, girlish hand that pats her hair: "A vague memory of something, of somebody, stirred him slightly and fleetingly as he looked." Clavdia Chauchat's Asiatic features captivate him. Little does Hans know that from now on his life is going to be increasingly influenced by her presence. The fact that she is Russian and returns to the Caucasus every once in a while to visit her husband accounts for her sloppy behavior, an indication of her pronounced passivity, sensuality, and irrationality in Mann's "system" of ethnic characteristics.The strange fascination Clavdia Chauchat exerts on Castorp leads to the latter's mounting confusion. Her effect on him is such that at one point he cannot even muster up enough strength to look at the blood he coughed up a clear symbol of the decay she spreads. Clavdia is like a scintillating and pungent carnivorous plant, enticing her prey by dulling its senses rather than by striking out herself. She is not even aware of her devastating influence on Castorp, this fact underlines her passivity. The implications of her sensual and irrational character are eminently political, as are the Russian couple who keeps offending Castorp by promiscuously giggling and panting in the room next to his. Feeling and irrationality (in the form of passivity and tyranny) are "Eastern" characteristics; submissiveness and hierarchial order their political expression.Mann simplifies, of course, but he nevertheless has a point, as the political history of eastern and central Europe has shown for hundreds of years. Whether ruled by tsarist or communistic tyranny, whether ruled by Prussian power politics or Nazi imperialism, eastern and central European (Slavic) peoples have never had a democratic tradition to speak of, at least not before the end of the twentieth century. (Hungarians have, but they are not Slavs). It is not by accident that the obscene sounds of the Russian couple are accompanied by the hackneyed tunes of operetta music symbols of imperial Austria. This theme of "Eastern" and "Western" traits will crop up again in connection with the far touchier discussion of whether "intellectual literature" may be pitted against "emotional music."Immediately after Castorp meets Settembrini and Clavdia Chauchat, the two become embattled over him. Asked about his age by Settembrini, Castorp has to think twice before answering him correctly. Then, when he talks gibberish (his temperature is consistently rising), the Italian advises him to return to the "world below." This marks Settembrini's first intervention in Hans' support. His second one comes that night in Hans' dream when Hofrat Behrens advises him to while away his time in pursuit of pleasure. Settembrini, in this dream, admonishes Hans to resist the diabolic forces of Behrens, but Hans refuses to pay any attention to his clear-headed advice. Yet the Italian realizes Hans' condition and keeps up his warnings. In this same dream, Castorp finds himself back in the school court of his high school, where he borrows a pencil from Clavdia Chauchat. Toward dawn, he dreams of her again, this time of the open, delicate hand, which she offers him to kiss. This hand was the very first thing he noticed about her, and now it triggers the same "wild wave of sweetness" in him he experienced when he put himself in Herr Albin's position earlier that day. The connection is evident: Herr Albin was bound to die and played with the idea of committing suicide; Castorp is moving toward his own death through Clavdia.The emergence of Clavdia Chauchat in the school court is the most thoroughly developed leitmotif in the novel, pulling together episodes both real and imagined over long spans of time. The leitmotif strongly suggests Mann's familiarity with Sigmund Freud's theory of dreams. In fact, Mann studied them while writingThe Magic Mountain.He was also familiar with Freud's psychoanalytical experiments. Therefore it may not be too farfetched to see in Settembrini, the great admonisher toward self-control and responsibility, an embodiment of the hero's superego; Clavdia Chauchat, the temptress toward sensuality, may then be seen as Hans' id.We have made the point that Mann conceived of virtually all of the novel's characters in terms of opposites; in fact, most of them are defined in terms of their opposites. Settembrini and Clavdia Chauchat form such a set of opposites, Settembrini and Naphta later on; and Castorp with Joachim also. If the relationship between the cousins was well characterized in Chapter 1, there are new insights here with regard to Behrens. He prefers the more pliable and susceptible character of Hans to that of Joachim, which makes him think Hans would be a better patient than his cousin. Joachim's overly reserved treatment of his girlfriend Marusja, on the other hand, is an interesting parallel to Hans' budding love for Clavdia Chauchat.As stated at the outset of this chapter,The Magic Mountainis also a novel about the mystery of time. Chapter 3 introduces the subject explicitly in the form of a conversation between the cousins. It develops out of Castorp's annoyance over the tedious procedure of having to take his temperature four times a day. Yet his annoyance is only seemingly insignificant, for it soon turns out that boredom plays a very real role in any discussion about time. Time, after all, is the correlative of experience.As is to be expected from Joachim's uncomplicated nature, he is quite willing to let the various time-measuring devices determine what time is. Castorp, however, is more sophisticated and argues that time is as long or as short as oneexperiencesit. When Joachim, getting tired of "mental gymnastics," contends that "a minute lasts as long as it takes the second hand of my watch to complete a circuit," Hans is still not satisfied. Considering Joachim's words, he concludes that we measure time by space. It does not mean much to say it takes twenty hours from Hamburg to Davos, for on foot it takes infinitely longer, and in the mind not even a second. This notion of time as a function of space will be developed further when Hans tries to find some relationship between time and the circles he makes wandering around in the snowstorm.Time is not merely a major theme of the novel; it is also its medium. All of Chapter 3 deals only with events during Castorp's first day at the Berghof. It begins exactly where Chapter 1 ended with Hans getting up in the morning. The point is clear: Once a newcomer has lived through one day at the sanatorium, the best he can hope for as far as novelty is concerned are new ways of fighting boredom and confusion. A day is like a month is like a year at the Berghof, and all of it is like a spell of uncertain duration. The static quality of time stands out. As Castorp puts it on his first afternoon up there: "Good Lord, is it still only the first day? It seems to me I've been up here a long time ages."From now on, single chapters of the book will not treat a day, but weeks, months, and even years of Hans Castorp's life. No wonder, for as Hans reflects at one point, "A path is always longer the first time we traverse it."C4Settembrini reproaches Hans Castorp for accepting the old-fashioned view that disease is always something noble even when it affects stupid people. But Castorp claims that whenever disease or death is present in any form, he develops his faculties to the utmost. Even coffins and funerals have a peculiar appeal to him. "Cultural backsliding" is the term that Settembrini uses to describe Castorp's notions. Settembrini respects the body only as long as it presents no obstacle against the attainment of freedom; as a consequence, he regards the sick body with contempt.Important to note is the surprise Settembrini expresses upon hearing that Hans Castorp has bought a blanket. The blanket is the symbol of the rest-cure at the sanatorium, and the rest-cure the symbol of temptation toward the dangerous spells of timelessness. The Italian chooses the wordsplacet experiri(Latin forhe likes to experiment) to express his surprise over Castorp's decision to resign himself to life at the Berghof. The point is obvious: Settembrini's keen mind sees the temptations of illness, whereas our hero, pursuing a system of trial and error, is still largely unaware of them. He is the seeker, the hero of thebildungsroman, forever venturing on new paths and vacillating back and forth between what he is and what he is led to believe he should be.With the rest-cures comes plenty of leisure time, and with the leisure time come all those countless dreams, visions, and states of semi-consciousness which lend a mystical quality to this basically highly intellectual story. No wonder that Castorp lapses into another reflection on the nature of time.When Settembrini joins the cousins on the occasion of a Sunday morning terrace concert, they all become involved in a lengthy discussion on music. Joachim stresses its relationship to time, and the Italian adds a new dimension to the conversation by tying music up with politics. Confessing his preference for intellectual pursuits, especially literature, over music, Settembrini even declares music to be politically suspect because it invites the mind to remain passive and to lose itself in reverie. Joachim's reply affords us a rare glimpse into his uncomplicated mind. He defends what he calls the "moral value" of music by arguing that it has a way of dividing time into measures and other units. This alone makes it possible for him to enjoy time, which would otherwise remain one dull continuum. Settembrini agrees with him insofar as music may defeat boredom. Joachim is of course simpler than Settembrini, and this is why he longs for the conveniently arranged daily routine of the "world below."Settembrini then brings up the essentially emotional quality of music. His view reflects Mann's lifelong notion of the self-destructive element in the esthetic soul. This soul has a tendency to affirm life only to the degree it can provide the individual with purely subjective, esthetic experience. Opposed to any moral view of life (Settembrini is, of course, a moralist), the esthetic soul conceives of the total immersion of the individual in contemplation as life's sole justification. It denies an individual's responsibility to society and therefore tends to be politically reactionary.That it can under certain circumstances be dangerous for segments of a whole nation to be transported into musical-emotional passion was proven, for instance, in Nazi Germany. The Nazis enthusiastically extolled the operas of Richard Wagner with their ancient Germanic sagas and highly emotional music. The enormous appeal of this combination, unfortunately, distorted Wagner's intention.We have seen Settembrini's enthusiasm for literature, preferably that of classical and Renaissance poets, and Hans Castorp's reluctance to share this enthusiasm. But, toward the end of his stay in the mountains, Hans will sing and listen to music, highly romantic music. This corresponds to Mann's belief that the preference of music over literature is a German characteristic (and a Slavic one), while "Western" civilization is essentially founded on literary (intellectual) values. Even if he is grossly oversimplifying (Italians, after all, have created opera, though one can argue opera is not a purely musical genre), Mann has a point: The musical tradition in central and eastern Europe is a long one, and there simply is nobody of the stature of a Bach, Beethoven, or Mozart outside the German world. By the same token, it is easy to show that German literature never produced a Dante or Shakespeare and cannot compare, either in terms of tradition or quality, with that of the French barring, perhaps, Goethe.The real problems, however, come in when Mann (or Settembrini, Mann's rational aspect) tries to explain these differences by assigning a basically emotional (irrational) quality to music and an intellectual one to literature. Where does this leave Milton, much of the seventeenth century, most of the nineteenth century, or writers like D. H. Lawrence, to name but a few? And where shall we put Bach's fugues, Mozart, and the highly mathematical music based on Schnberg's twelve-tone scale? Mann was treading on thin ice here, and he must have known it. More than once did he stress the complex, musical structure ofThe Magic Mountain,and the hero of his last novel,Dr. Faustus,is the composer Adrian Leverkhn, an intellectualpar excellence.One could more easily dismiss these interesting but deficient attempts at classifying people and peoples by national traits if Mann had not attached implicit value judgments to them. And this he clearly did. Hans Castorp rejects many of Settembrini's ideas in an effort to find his own way to a "humane" life, but he ismoreinclined to side with the Italian's views than with those of Clavdia Chauchat or, later on, Naphta. The autobiographical element and political import are significant: Mann was farsighted enough to question the merit of Western democracy when transplanted to Germany, yet there can be no doubt that the older he became, the more he agreed with its ideals. He despised tyranny, whether in Germany or the former Soviet Union.Though these political implications of Mann's belief in national-ethnic characterization are not the essence of the dream Castorp has on a bench not far from the Berghof, they dramatize it considerably. In this dream, our hero finds himself back in high school, where his thoughts center around Pribislav Hippe, his one-time schoolmate. Pribislav is of Slavic descent, has greenish eyes and protruding cheek bones. Hans Castorp used to be fascinated by his appearance though they had met only once when he borrowed a pencil from Hippe. The parallel to Clavdia Chauchat is obvious. Snapping out of his dream, Castorp realizes the long span of time his mind has traveled and, still fighting spells of dizziness, runs to attend a lecture by another Slav, Dr. Krokowski. Our hero's stubborn nosebleed is a symptom of his deteriorating condition, as is his spinning head. Yet Hans deliberately rushes to suck in the poisonous analyses of love presented by the Polish doctor. Each in a different way and each to a different degree, these three "Eastern" people play a vital role in Castorp's worsening condition.As indicated above, Hans' dream is remarkable for another reason, namely the complex world of dreams with its total suspension of the sequence of time. In a previous dream, Hans Castorp found himself borrowing a pencil; he will do so in reality in the carnival scene. Now that Hippe has been recalled, Hans is aware of the connection between the school friend and Clavdia Chauchat. In no other leitmotif does the inseparability of man's conscious and unconscious levels of experience appear so strikingly. Mann employs the leitmotif to enhance the vividness of his characterizations and also to emphasize the similarities of recurring situations.Does this blending of dreams and conscious experiences mean that had it not been for his fascination with Hippe long ago, he would never have felt attracted to Clavdia Chauchat? Or the other way round, perhaps, that she, in some inexplicable way, has existed in his mind even before he met Hippe? Expressed in terms of psychoanalysis, has his repressed homoerotic attraction to Hippe emerged as his desire for Clavdia? The answers remain ambiguous.At any rate, Hans Castorp attentively listens to Dr. Krokowski's analyses in an effort to get rid of his mounting sense of confusion. The subject of the lecture is the inevitability of conflicts between love and chastity. He contends that, although in the minds of most people the ideal of chastity defeats the sex drive, this drive is too strong to let itself be repressed. Repressed physical love is the basis of disease. Dr. Krokowski's arguments and his "ruthlessly scientific" ways make him the irresponsible representative of the type of psychoanalyst who naively believes in the possibility of solving people's innermost problems throughrationalinvestigation. He speaks of the "redeeming power of the analytic," and he looks "like Christ with his arms outstretched and his head on one side." Nevertheless, his ambiguous treatment of love and his mounting interest in magic make him the apostle, not of love, but of sterility. Appropriately enough, his office is located in the basement and is shadowed by "profound twilight." In this atmosphere of pseudo-scientific sensuality, Clavdia Chauchat's presence triggers another dream within Castorp, one full of longing for her. Indeed, Hans' love for herisdisease-forming, but his dreams are but symbols of his physical and moral condition.Whenever his mind is not clouded by Clavdia Chauchat's image, Castorp tends to doubt Hofrat Behrens' ability and interest in the cure of his patients. Behrens was seriously ill himself; therefore, can a former patient, one who has perhaps not wholly recovered, really do anything for him and for everybody else up here? Castorp is aware his own health is dwindling, but he is already too sick, both physically and morally, to want to do anything about it. More and more, Madame Chauchat becomes the center of his life. When she is around, they find ever-new ways of flirting and arousing each other's sensuality, and when she is away on her occasional visits to her husband, he daydreams about her. Hans Castorp is quickly becoming part and parcel of the horrible ennui of this sanatorium existence.At the same time, his ties to Joachim are growing weaker. The slight trembling of his head at the very sight of Madame Chauchat is another outward sign of his violent emotional involvement. One of numerous leitmotifs of the novel, Castorp's trembling also serves to point to the significance of inherited tradition: Hans' father and grandfather suffered from inflammation of the lungs. Thus being by nature "life's delicate child," Hans' disease affords him an ever more lucid understanding of himself. It teaches him that the body and the soul cannot be two separate realms, each following its own laws. This is important to remember, for the ultimate transcendence of this dualism is the professed goal of our hero's painful journey toward self-awareness and humanism.The idea that man is to an astounding degree molded by tradition is one of Mann's favorite themes, and it is dealt with once more in this chapter. Settembrini tells Castorp about his (Settembrini's) grandfather, who devoted his life to the noble cause of the Italian revolution. Hans replies by mentioning that his own grandfather was dedicated to the cause of the traditionalists of that time, who ruled over the very areas where Settembrini's ancestors had lived. Together they discover the uniqueness of their grandfathers, who practically fought each other, each convinced of the justice of his cause.The trance Hans Castorp experiences while listening to the story of opposing causes has political relevance. He remembers himself on a lake in his native Germany, crossing over in a boat: The pale moon rising in the east and the glowing sun setting in the west leave him in a strange mood of twilight. The colorful and confusing twilight stands for the impending political holocaust threatening Germany. As we have said previously, this picture may also be interpreted to illustrate Mann's favorite political idea that of Germany as a saving mediating force between East and West. In any case, once again a dream points into the future by means of an image of the past.Settembrini continues to present himself in the light of the rationalist who believes in the final victory of democracy; he agrees with his grandfather's comparison of the French revolutionary days with the six days of creation. He explains that he became a man of letters because there is a close relationship between humanistic thought and action on the one hand and speech and writing on the other. The idea of the intellectual superiority of literature is advanced again. Yet Hans Castorp is not impressed, and he even pounds his fist on the table at so much arrogance from the Italian. After all, Settembrini, as much as anyone else, is what he is largely because of his ancestors. This is Thomas Mann speaking, the apostle of tradition at his best.C5If we stop to take a look at the course Hans Castorp's life has taken so far, we will see that it has zigzagged between the two poles of Settembrini and Clavdia Chauchat. Torn between their extreme positions, Castorp has either reverted to the values he cherished at the outset or has resorted to Joachim's simpler views which amounts to almost the same thing. Yet our hero has also shown more and more unmistakable signs of a tendency to eschew Settembrini's cautioning influence and to succumb to the spell of Madame Chauchat. Hans has now reached the point where he is drawn to her ever more violently, the violence reinforcing the pace at which this happens and vice versa. The Italian's warning that "Lilith" the name he gives Clavdia Chauchat during the carnival night was a Hebrew night demon devouring men does not help, nor does his attempt to keep Castorp from Clavdia's lures by switching on the light. On the contrary, Hans tells his mentor to leave him alone and confides to her that words, thought, and light are pitifully "republican" notions. Eventually, Hans Castorp's sensuality reaches a point where it turns into self-debasement. Thus, Chapter 5 contains the juncture at which Castorp's course of life merges with that of Madame Chauchat. From here on, the two will move apart again, he to new intellectual and moral insights and she to another sensual adventure. It is not by accident that in the two-volume edition, Mann let the first volume end here.Mann has been criticized for having created relatively lifeless, almost stylized characters, and this objection has its point. With the exception of Castorp, the seeker of his identity and ideal, most central figures tend to reiterate certain ready-made ideas on how to master life. There is no character development or change in outlook in any of them. While this static quality may become rather boring to the reader when it dominates a scene (such as the major dialogues between Settembrini and Naphta, whose dialectic technique and content one could almost copy from an encyclopedia), it is also true that this quality emphasizes the aspect of time which Castorp keeps calling the "dimensionless present." Besides, carriers of fixed ideas facilitate the success of their respective educational function. This, needless to add, is extremely important in abildungsroman.This static quality is most obvious in Settembrini, whom Hans calls "a mere representative without name." Innumerable times Settembrini assures Hans that anybody living "up here" is doomed and that he should leave. His intricate monologue on the unity of life and death is the clearest manifestation of his monism yet. There is no new or even different angle to his arguments, and if anything at all strikes Castorp or the reader as different, it is his growing haughtiness.Our "delicate child of life," on the other hand, is susceptible to the diverse influences and assaults upon him. Joachim, Settembrini, Clavdia, and Naphta are not only outside forces acting on him; they are also components of his own personality, pulling him in several directions and thereby enabling him to learn. He is Castor and a bit of Pollux, the twin stars of Gemini, as his name suggests. (If nothing proves that Mann consciously derived Castorp's name this way, the twin-star image is nevertheless highly appropriate.) Hans continuously undergoes changes, and he always moves. His new, defiant reaction has never been so evident as when Settembrini condemns the perversely lavish concept of time of "those Parthians and Scythians" (Slavs). To convince Hans of his view, Settembrini divulges his membership in an organization propagating the self-perfection of man on the basis of "objective" data. He continues that the organization has asked him to compile a volume on the therapeutic values of world literature to be printed in an encyclopedia entitledThe Sociology of Suffering.He even invites Hans to join, but Hans declines.And, indeed, how can the fanatical Settembrini, risking anything as long as his cause is advanced, be so dedicated to "international" organizations and "world" literature? How can he refuse to acknowledge the reality of disease when his own disease keeps him from traveling to a professional meeting? Mann picks sociology as his target here, pointing to its unfortunately widespread mania of treating social phenomena as though they obeyed the laws of the natural sciences. The mere title of Settembrini's encyclopedia is symptomatic of the cast of mind which confuses quantity with quality. In short, Castorp is infuriated, and he means to let his teacher know. He points up the grave inconsistencies in Settembrini's philosophy-which would not be so bad if Settembrini did not always pride himself on his "rational" and "intellectual" powers. Above all, Hans begins to supply his own correctives to Settembrini's thoughts, which he has accepted or at least listened to without contradicting so far. The upshot is that Hans is undergoing a decisive phase in his education. It is important to remember, though, that our hero's refusal to go on swallowing his educator's suggestions hook, line, and sinker is not merely the result of his rapidly growing infatuation with Clavdia Chauchat: His conviction that all these arrogant claims advanced by Settembrini are false is real and justified. It is for the first explicit indication we have that Castorp has come to see his road as leading somewhere between these extreme positions he encounters.Very much the same static quality marks Behrens' behavior. His leading role on the magic mountain is becoming more apparent now, thus justifying everything that Settembrini has observed and that Castorp has surmised about him. Especially Behrens' sensuality is disclosed, both through his hobby, oil painting, and his addiction to the body, which has nothing to do with medical concerns. Interestingly enough, it is again Castorp who begins to react differently. His desire for Clavdia Chauchat makes it extremely hard for him to bear the mere thought that Behrens should have enjoyed her nearness to this degree while he painted her. Waiting in line to have his X-ray taken, he meets her as she comes swirling into Behrens' waiting room, and the thought that the doctor should be able to lookintoher, as well asather, sets Hans wild. Taking advantage of an accidental encounter with the doctor, Castorp invites himself to Behrens' house because he wants to see the painting. Appropriately, the desires of both men are naked to each other and they meet in front of the nude painting of Clavdia. Castorp tells his host that he (Hans) should have become a doctor because he loves the human body. Asking Behrens to tell him something about the functions of the skin and the glands, he eagerly listens to the doctor explaining the intricate processes to him during which physical or psychological stimuli arouse certain external changes. Behrens winds up his lecture stating that both life and death are but two forms of oxidation. "Living consists in dying," he says, revealing his utter disinterest in life by denying its uniqueness. This exaggerated delight in particularly the skin and glands is symptomatic of a pathological condition which craves the body, especially the sick body. This is what Behrens and Castorp have in common. In the latter, this desire is so strong that it drives him to rave about it to Clavdia, which gives him some sort of surrogate satisfaction.Eventually Castorp responds to Behrens as he does to Settembrini. Just as he now contradicts his Italian mentor, he also uncovers Behrens' vices. He takes the initiative: He has convinced himself of Behrens' carnality, so he pries at the doctor to hear more about the science of the body. In terms of the educational process Hans is undergoing, this scene is significant because it shows his growing self-awareness. The particular stretch of road he is traveling now leads him straight to his downfall, but it is only by crossing through darkness that he can emerge wiser. There can be no cure without the danger of death, no purification without fire, and no mercy without previous sin. This is Mann speaking, the great admirer and expert on medieval philosophy.Behrens presides during Walpurgis Night, pouring punch and conducting diabolic games in reddish semidarkness. According to legend, witches met the devil during Walpurgis Night (April 30-May 1) for a night of revelry on the Brocken Mountain. (Mann took much of this scene from Goethe'sFaust). The symbolism of Behrens' drooping posture dominating the magic mountain revelry is obvious. Mann resorts to an old literary tradition, namely that of seeing the world of clowns and jesters as the only real one. Castorp experiences this night as he might experience a dream. Dreams, too, have stood for windows into a higher reality throughout literature not only here but in other Mann stories (Death in Venice). Thus Mann uses two specific means here of stressing the scene's character of revelation. That disease is the catalyst of any comprehension of reality goes without special mention; it is one of the major themes of the novel.The Walpurgis Night scene is central not only because it contains the climax of Castorp's irrationality but also because it elevates the novel's main leitmotif of the borrowed pencil from the world of vague reminiscences into that of the very real party game conducted by Behrens for his guests. Castorp experiences the entire evening "like a dream," but he wants to participate in the pig-drawing contest, so he approaches Clavdia Chauchat for a pencil. Confronted with her, he turns pale, realizing the parallel between this situation and the others he has lived through in dreams (and, in reality, during his school days). Clavdia lends him the pencil, using the very words Pribislav Hippe once used when he lent Hans a pencil for a drawing lesson at school. Essential questions are posed: Is Castorp experiencing the same thing over and over again, though under slightly different circumstances and in varying degrees of consciousness? Has he known Clavdia before, and if so, in this world or in another? Where do dreams end and where does reality begin if, indeed, they may be pitted against each other as though they were mutually exclusive?Psychologically speaking, this scene is a masterpiece, as is also proven by Mann's insistence on having his hero address Clavdia in French. He carries on a rather intimate conversation with her and eventually confesses his love to her, allen franais.The reason is that he, like all of us, finds it easier to express something delicate or embarrassing in a language whose subtle nuances he cannot tell apart and for which he is therefore not responsible. The author picked French simply because at that time, French was the important language of international communication; in this connection, we remember that Castorp practiced it with Tous-les-Deux, the Mexican lady, long ago.We have made the point that while Settembrini and Clavdia Chauchat (later on Naphta and Mynheer Peeperkorn) are relatively static characters because they are vehicles of different ideas, Castorp is the one character who, being confronted with opposing views, keeps moving by steering an in-between course. The thin mountain air merely brings out his disease, which in sensitive people like him becomes a yardstick of his growing self-awareness and, thus, his education. This is what Castorp means when he confides to his cousin that "down below," all the intriguing discussions with Settembrini, for instance, would not have meant anything to him.Now one must consider some of the indications that Hans' condition has grown worse. First, Hans' fever curve has steadily gone up, typically enough and most conspicuously, whenever he either dreams of Clavdia or when he sees her. In fact, Hans has reached the point where hewantsto be sick and triumphantly writes home that his rising temperature necessitates his prolonged stay at the sanatorium. If so far he has been largely unaware of the perils endangering him, he is now defending himself against Settembrini's warnings in spite of the fact that he understands the Italian's concerns. Nothing does he dread more than the removal of the protective veil of his clouded senses, which affords him the destructive nearness of Clavdia Chauchat. As a result, Hans not only foregoes his own judgment but also begins to let himself go. Neglecting his posture at the table (where much of life at the Berghof goes on) and slamming doors behind him, he takes on the contempt of form and composure so characteristic of Clavdia. Illustrating moral deterioration through the dissolution of form, Mann makes the point that content and form are but two aspects of one and the same thing. This issue, already dealt with on an intellectual level in the discussion between Castorp and Behrens, is of course only a variation on the underlying theme of the dualistic view of life which Castorp seeks to overcome.The quickly changing weather, which is employed throughout the novel as an indication of the different values governing the Berghof world, upsets our hero less and less. His response to the surface heat of an Indian summer concealing the coming winter frost sheds light on his diseased condition one of "mingled frost and fire." Oblivious to the fact that it is October, he overcomes his confusion about the strong sun rather quickly and, more and more susceptible to sensual stimulation, thoroughly enjoys the heat. Now Hans is sick enough to accept the suspension of the natural sequence of time as "normal." Few things indicate the true condition of life on the magic mountain (in prewar Europe) thus, why should the weather follow the calendar?The scene in which Castorp and his cousin look at each other's skeletons in front of the X-ray screen also points to our hero's mounting confusion and awareness of his disease. Looking at his bones, he is startled by the memory of an old aunt of his who had the strange talent of seeing people who were about to die as skeletons.Hans' growing self-awareness leads him to take up serious reading, which is the prerequisite for any new insights. He concentrates on books dealing with the origin and composition of life, which is described as neither exclusively matter nor spirit but as something resulting from an interaction between the two. The more Castorp reads about the human body, the more he appreciates life. He realizes that his old notions about death as an independent force are wrong; they would keep him from enjoying life to the fullest. Nevertheless, he still clings to the idea of death and disease as something noble and so sends flowers and messages of hope to patients about to die. Yet Hans' well-meaning consolations lead to offenses and unintended cruelties in several instances, proving Settembrini right in urging him "to let the dead bury their dead." Taking the balance between intellectual and physical life as the goal of his reading, Hans moves further ahead on the road whose end brings the transcendence of all the dichotomies invented by man (and Mann).Yet our hero, "life's delicate child," also travels another path toward self-realization and self-awareness, which is the reason why in his reading he dwells on pathology. As has been indicated, CastorandPollux make up Hans' soul. Nothing is really "simple" about him, and just as the several characters shaping his mind may be interpreted to be something akin to the different aspects of his (the average man's) consciousness, Castorp's own actions and reactions often seem to belong to different patterns of behavior. Indeed, the monolithic Castorp, cast out of one mold and consistent within himself, does not exist. He cannot exist because he is man depicted in the agonies of his lifelong battle toward self-realization. Hans' avid reading of books on pathology only seems to contradict his other reading. Castorp, the representative of us all, is fighting within himself, as when he says to Clavdia that "There are two paths to life: one is the regular one. . . . The other leads through death that is the spiritual way." There are different approaches to life for different people, but there are also different souls within one and the same person.In terms of the reading Castorp does, this means that his delving into problems of pathology corresponds to that part within him which emphasizes disease as something positive. In his sick state, our hero's principle is pure feeling, which he readily admits. And since there is nothing like disease to provide undiluted feeling, he craves disease as a form of lust. The cause and symptom of his disease is Clavdia Chauchat, and what he experiences when he sees her is an intense and undecided battle between pain and lust. As a direct result of all his abstract reading, Castorp falls asleep and lapses into a rather sensual dream of Clavdia's embrace and lingering kiss. As the undisputed painter of human psychology that he is, Mann admirably succeeds here in depicting man's different levels of consciousness as one large reservoir.The treatment of human experience as essentially one reservoir, of which the various dreams and visions are but the most paramount expression, is closely tied up with the treatment of time. And time, as we have seen in connection with the carnival scene already, figures prominently in this chapter.At the beginning of Chapter 5, the narrator reveals that the description of Castorp's life at the Berghof will not take up nearly as much time as it has so far. This does not contradict what was said above, for it means that, unlike Chapter 1, which dealt solely with the newcomer's experiences during his first day, all subsequent chapters are not commensurate with the span of time they describe. This is consistent with Castorp's often-expressed belief that time passes quickest whenever a change of place is involved, and that after a while longer, periods can easily be condensed into relatively little space because they are not experienced as the same long periods any more. The novel, let us not forget, attempts to convey the sense of time as Castorp experiences it.The discussion of time now moves in the direction of what the author symbolically calls "soup everlasting." It appropriately describes the condition in which the sanatorium patients experience the fading away of past and future, their gradual blending into one indiscernible present. The soup they always get for lunch is the only reality for them because it comes regularly and divides up this uncertain something called "day." But nobody really knows whether it comes once a day, twice a day, or only every other day. Since this "eternal now" is increasingly hard for them to bear, they try to counteract it by various hobbies: Settembrini sticks to his reading and writing, Joachim has taken to studying Russian to survive, and Castorp reads copiously or keeps track of the days by arranging dates with Clavdia.Then, during the night of the carnival, Castorp's enchantment widens his experience of time to include magic touches of fulfillment. They are fleeting touches, to be sure, which do not bring the fulfillment of his longing as such. Fulfillment would be the end of all longing and would hardly justify Castorp's further adventures toward self-awareness and his own way of life. Yet, stammering his confessions of love to Clavdia, he raves that sitting with her is like a dream. The present and eternity have ceased to be two opposite aspects of time. From now on, Hans Castorp experiences them as one long, vague mystery.C6Now that Walpurgis Night is over and Clavdia Chauchat has departed, Castorp takes off the fool's cap she put on his head and returns to studying botany. Left with nothing but Clavdia's farewell present and the framed X-ray portrait of her upper body, he slowly moves away from her and further up the path toward self-awareness. Now the path will lead steeply upward and Castorp will reach its high point during the snow adventure. Settembrini, of course, is unable to see that it is not only in spite of, but because of, his involvement with Clavdia that Hans resumes his search for knowledge and insight. Settembrini's understanding of Castorp's education does not go beyond the cynical inquiry of how Hans enjoyed the "pomegranate" of sensuality, suggesting that one who has tasted of the fruit of perdition is irretrievably lost. More than ever, Settembrini now appears as the moralist and rationalistpar excellence,one who dismisses disease as mere illusion, the result of a lack of reason. In this context, it is interesting to note that Settembrini never actually meets Clavdia, the embodiment of what he battles against. Just how obstinate Settembrini is becomes clear when he, convinced of his hopeless condition, says that he will move into the town of Davos to complete his work for the encyclopedia. The subject of his contribution, it will be remembered, amounts to an attempt to conquer disease and death by denying its essence.If Settembrini represents the purely ethical approach to life, the equally intellectual Naphta, whom he introduces to the cousins, represents the purely esthetic one. Extremely intense and lost in their respective positions, these two adversaries charge the sanatorium atmosphere with sheer mental brilliance. There is one trait in Naphta that makes him radically different from Settembrini: As an intellectual, Naphta is doomed by his irrational mentality to fight his rationality. This renders him a living paradox which he will be driven to solve eventually by committing suicide.Naphta exerts a greater influence on Hans Castorp than Settembrini because our hero, in a way the embodiment of both his educators, is sensitive enough to respond to this tension in the newcomer. It is that part of Naphta he cannot grasp which fascinates him most, thus proving Naphtha's point that humanity always tends to be drawn to the irrational elements rather than those that lend themselves to rational analysis.All the endless discussions between Settembrini and Naphta deal with the question of whether or not a monistic principle prevails in the cosmos (as the Italian contends) or whether spirit and matter are engaged in eternal conflict as two autonomous forces (as the Spaniard claims). It is important to understand that estheticism is related, in Mann's view, with disease and, ultimately, death. This is also a part of Schopenhauer's ultra-romantic philosophy in a nutshell: the purely esthetic, sensual, and mystical mode of life as the great temptation toward death, the final consoler.The discussions of Naphta and Settembrini cover a wide variety of subjects, beginning with politics and soon involving theology. Settembrini argues that natural law alone is the basis of democracy, whereupon Naphta replies that the concept of natural law is but a mutilation of divine law and that the so-called democratic ideal is merely the last attempt of the West to fend off the new order already building up in the East. When the Spaniard learns that Settembrini is a Freemason, he does not hesitate to call this organization a surrogate for the church and claims its success is not the result of the principles of enlightenment it cherishes but of its mystical rituals. At one point, when Castorp is overwhelmed by a beautiful fourteenth-centurypieta,Naphta, to whom it belongs, says it is natural for Hans to be overwhelmed because only spiritual beauty reaches real intensity. Settembrini counters that he prefers Greco-Roman art with its balanced proportions to Gothic art with its emphasis on physical distortion in the interest of the spiritual. In reality, the Italian continues, Naphtha's exaggerated enjoyment of thepieta'sexpression of pain illustrates his desire for the experience of the purely physical; suffering always intensifies this experience, often to the point of a perverted sensuality. Naphtha's sympathy with disease even makes him argue that the sick people of the world would lose their status of priority in life and the healthy ones their best chance to gain salvation (through practicing charity) if there were no misery. Settembrini defends rationality to an absurd point, claiming to have healed insane people merely by looking at them "rationally." The relationship between esthetic appreciation, sensuality, and death is an integral part of Castorp's gradual spiritual growth, as was demonstrated most explicitly in his study of pathology and Behrens' sinister role in it.From thepieta,the discussion of the two men switches to the Inquisition, whose cruelties Settembrini cites to make Castorp think twice about Naphtha's ideas on suffering. The Spaniard retorts, however, that even the worst tortures of the Inquisition were committed to save souls, something that cannot be said of the butchering of the French Aconites, who were convinced that when they killed a man they killed all of him body and soul for good. Naphta corners Settembrini by telling him that if he understood the essence of the Inquisition, he would know that rationalists of his (Settembrini's) kind instituted it.More than ever before, Mann demonstrates his thorough familiarity with medieval philosophy and that of its forerunner, St. Augustine. The heading "Of the City of God" is a direct translation of St. Augustine's masterpiece, and "Deliverance by Evil" reflects his concept ofFelix culpa(literally, "happy guilt"), whose essence is that deliverance can come only through sin and subsequent repentance. These ideas run through the entire novel, and although they are never wrapped in religious terminology, Mann justifies Castorp's disease as the prerequisite for his growing maturity. When Settembrini carries on about the merits of the rationalistic work ethic of the "West," Naphta comes back at him by explaining the teachings of Bernard of Clairvaux, the twelfth-century theologian. His symbology of humanity's progress toward perfection, which was a progression toward pure contemplation, was "Western" too; this is of course the main point Naphta wants to make.The trouble is that neither Settembrini nor Naphta really understands Clairvaux. For Settembrini, the dawn of humanity begins with the Renaissance at best (really with the French Revolution). His mind is therefore incapable of comprehending the full meaning of a symbol: Negating any non-rational component within him, a symbol remains inaccessible to him. All he gets out of Clairvaux is a cheap distortion of the symbol of the "bed of repose," standing for communication with God. Here we have an aspect of Settembrini which is too easily overlooked: He, too, has strong touches of sensuality about him, but he does not grant them room. Like disease, he simply suppresses the urge for sex, and when its pressures become too strong, he transfers his reaction to the level of jokes. In this connection, the reader may recall some of his crude approaches to female patients at the very beginning, which caused Castorp to call him a windbag. Denying humanity's sensual level of existence, he is bound to be a prude. Naphta, on the other hand, reacts in the other extreme. Although well-versed in theology, he, too, is a victim of his extreme and therefore wrong position. He cannot derive anything but voluptuousness from the spirit dwelling in the body.Naphta's voluptuousness again becomes apparent when he questions Settembrini as to whether monism does not bore him. Humanity, according to Naphta (whose name, incidentally, is also that of a flammable, volatile liquid) does not long for liberty, but for terror. Communism, of which early Christianity availed itself, may therefore get along very well with Catholicism, he argues, although the two are opposites in terms of their beliefs. His views, always preferring some form of error to compromise, are rooted in his conviction that death is an independent force. At Joachim's deathbed, he goes so far as to assert that virtue cannot be where there is reason, nor has religion anything to do with reason and morals because it has nothing to do with life.What keeps drawing the two adversaries toward each other may also be expressed in terms of what they lack. Settembrini's deficiency is that he lacks an entire sphere of human existence the intuitive or spiritual one; Naphta's flaw is that he lives only in this sphere. By carrying their deficiencies to absurd extremes, each of these men forfeits his own standpoint which, up to a point, makes sense. Mann stresses the futility of their intellectualism in the face of ultimate reality a reality which kills both Settembrini and Naphta. Castorp is fascinated by their brilliance, but he has matured enough to realize the countless contradictions within each "system," much less between the "systems" and the men advocating them. He gradually arrives at a more harmonious view of the world. When Joachim insists they did not come to Davos to get wiser, but healthier, Hans reminds him that these inconsistencies are only superficial ones and that they ought to be reconciled. "Dividing the world up into two hostile camps," Castorp chides his cousin, "is a grievous error, most reprehensible."As implied above, Naphta's views are not all wrong, as, indeed, Settembrini's are not all wrong. What the Spaniard propagates is wrong only in that it is carried to self-defeating extremes. Suffering and disease may indeed intensify experience beyond that which is accessible to the "healthy" and "normal." The diseased organism, as Castorp's case illustrates, may be more restless and therefore more eager to learn; more sensitive and therefore more capable of learning; closer to physical dissolution and therefore more "spiritualized." Almost by necessity, the superior human being is in some way deficient or, expressed differently, diseased. This is why perfectly balanced or "normal" people tend to be average people; it is also the reason they do not come to grief as easily as do sensitive ones. They take, as does Joachim, the "direct" path to life.Naphta's failure does not consist in preaching these basically true aspects of life but in raising them to the position of exclusiveness. There is little doubt, for instance, that the vast majority of people really need some kind of authority more, certainly, than Settembrini thinks, who judges people by his own demand for freedom. Freedom, however, is no absolute good, nor is anything else if elevated to exclusiveness. Although Naphta is right in principle, he fails here because he winds up advocating outright terror. Similarly, the discrepancy between his justified reply to Settembrini that it is naive to judge the Inquisition by a modern-day standpoint and his reactionary defense of medieval practices in today's church is frightening. It is both absurd and dangerous to propagate these practices in a time that has long since given up the theological prerequisites for them. (To understand the Inquisition, we must understand its underlying belief that the soul's salvation presupposes the death of the guilty body.)Thus, Mann takes sides neither with Settembrini nor with Naphta but remains eager to advocate the ideal of aloofness from all extremes. As a result, his approach is essentially ironic. Irony keeps him from the danger of seeing somebody or something only from a certain angle and only at a given moment. Mann is a great believer in the elusive quality of reality, and he prefers to depict its myriad, scintillating moods rather than supply a system of neat little tags.Hereditary and environmental factors, which Mann emphasizes as most instrumental in forming man, enhance this irony. Their discussion is resumed here at precisely the points where Naphta is about to drive home an idea to Settembrini or Castorp. It immediately reduces Naphta to the level of a product of his heritage: his Jewish ancestors, the cruel customs of his native Poland, and the accident that led him to Catholicism. The Spanish and the "Eastern" characteristics of Mann's ethnic "system" are accountable for Naphta's irrationality, cruelty, and sympathy with disease and death.We have seen that each of the novel's characters is described in terms of another one, and often in terms of its opposite. One of these sets of characters is Hans Castorp and his cousin Joachim Ziemssen. Now, more than ever before, we can measure Castorp's growing self-awareness (and confusion) by the increasingly violent reactions of Joachim here. Joachim responds to his cousin's growing interest in botany, for instance, by telling him he understands him less than ever before. If Castorp gets tired of the intellectual fireworks of his discussion partners, he nevertheless derives insights from them. This is not true of Joachim: All he remembers of these discussions is Naphta's Jewish nose. Typical of a mind that judges by "racial" characteristics (essentially different, it must be stressed, from Mann's ideas on ethnically conditioned modes of behavior), Joachim refuses to think because thinking only confuses matters. Again Mann's irony forbids him to side with Castorp against his cousin. The purely intellectual approach to life is quickly shown to be inadequate and, using the farcical suicide later on, even as self-destructive.The situation between the cousins climaxes when Castorp explains to Joachim that the sudden, unusual change in weather is merely the outward sign of the unusual state of affairs on the magic mountain. Joachim's impatience with Hans erupts because the latter has matured enough to accept this change. (Once upon a time, the reader will recall, our hero was utterly confused by the unusual climate.) Joachim makes plans to leave, demanding that Behrens let him return to the army; because he is a military man to the core, he departs. Before Joachim leaves, however, he implores Hans to follow him while there is still time. He even calls Hans by his first name. (Settembrini, too, will call him by his first name at the outbreak of the war.) Hans does get Behrens' permission to leave but then refuses to go.Irony plays an important role in Joachim's life. He, who has literally lived for the day he would be permitted to return to the world of law and order, is forced to give it up again because of his failing health; and, to make things worse, he has to return to the sanatorium just when the maneuvers, a symbol of strict obedience to authority, are about to begin. Not only his serious attacks, but also his behavior his overly reserved treatment of his girlfriend Marusja, for instance indicate his death is near. Nothing can keep him, however, from formally applying for an extension of his leave. Never has he ceased to be a deeply committed man.Eerily and symbolically enough, the beard growing around his dying face gives him the added likeness of an honorable warrior. It is true that Joachim has been sick all along, but he contracted his deathblow while he was with his unit "down below." He is a victim of fanatical call to duty, and "honor was the death of him," as the cynical Behrens sums it up. Appropriately, he is buried in a soldier's grave pierced by roots-the roots which never permitted him to become exposed to any flights of fancy. He is responsible for his own death, but contentment and harmony on his deathbed are the reward for his moral life. Joachim is, as our hero will explain to Clavdia, the prototype of the kind who travels the "regular, direct, and honest" path to life.There are other confrontations besides that between the cousins which exemplify the degree to which Hans Castorp has become part and parcel of the sanatorium world. Uncle Tienappel's arrival and his sudden departure serve no other purpose than to show the futility of his attempt to retrieve our renegade hero. It also illustrates convincingly how James Tienappel, like every other sensitive newcomer, becomes inevitably embroiled in the lures of the magic mountain and would, if he stayed, be privileged (and condemned) to share his nephew's fate. In fact, this new ambassador of the flatlands goes through the same dizzying experiences Hans once went through. And the heavy tongue, the feverish head, and the protruding veins all seem, in Behrens' opinion, to indicate that he is sick enough to stay "up here." Also, the uncle's sexual excitement mounts, and, as was the case with Hans long ago, he shows it not only by approaching a sensually attractive lady patient, but by asking Behrens to describe the process of physical decomposition to him. The thematic leitmotif of the affinity between sensuality and an exaggerated concern for the body's origin and makeup is taken up again. As one more parallel sensation which we remember from Hans' earlier days, Uncle Tienappel's sense of time becomes vague and his self-assurance begins to dwindle. Hans Castorp fully understands his uncle's reactions as those of initial adjustment-even though he is beyond them now. New insights have slowly led him away from the deep sensuality of his days with Clavdia (the fact that she is away has, of course, helped him), and his concept of time has lost its haunting vagueness because he has become used to it. "We don't feel the cold" is the stereotype with which he counters his uncle's complaints, emphasizing the different standards of the mountain world and his loyalty to them.Like "Walpurgis Night," the section entitled "Snow" warrants separate treatment. As far as Hans Castorp's educational process is concerned, the two sections are opposites. "Snow" brings Castorp's temporary attainment of his ideal whereas "Walpurgis Night" brought a temporary abandonment of an ideal. Both scenes are perfect battlefields for the forces of reason and sensuality in Castorp's life. And, as in "Walpurgis Night," Settembrini's warnings (the very words he shouted after Hans at the carnival) and Clavdia Chauchat's enticements (here in the form of the recurring mention of the pencil motif) play a leading role in this battle. That these warnings and enticements are the product of Castorp's overwrought imagination merely heightens their vividness and increases their effect. The present scene, with all its hallucinations and visions, superimposed upon each other, drawn together by leitmotifs, and whirling around in the emerging circular concept of time, reflects as a microcosm the scintillating macrocosm of the whole magic mountain world. Our hero's wanderings among the marvels of this world are condensed here in the hike away from the Berghof and his almost fatal entanglement with nature.Fascinated by the phantasmagorical landscape of an unusually deep winter, Castorp decides to learn how to ski so that he can venture into higher altitudes. This climb exposes our hero to the danger of succumbing to the awesome power of undiluted nature. On several previous occasions, the climate has been called unusual, but here the aspects of extremity and incalculability prevail. Described as "blinding chaos" and "white dark," snow is the paramount symbol (as sand will be in Chapter 7) of confusion, the harbinger of Castorp's sympathy with death.This sub-theme of snow symbolizing death finds its most explicit expression in Castorp's musings about snowflakes as too symmetrical and therefore opposed to the principle of life. He has outgrown his teacher Settembrini's notion of life as something regular, consistent, and purely rational. On the contrary, his studies of nature have shown him that these qualities are represented purest in inorganic nature. At the same time, he loves snow and enjoys it with an eminently defiant attitude. Hans is aware of his growing distance from the sanatorium, but he continues to climb and dismisses his own misgivings as "cowardice." His voracious appetite for primitive nature triggers the association with Clavdia Chauchat in him, thus demonstrating that his craving for the experience of nature is but another form of sensuality. He has never ceased to toy "with forces so great that to approach them nearly is destruction." Nowhere else is the close proximity of supreme insight and death so frighteningly revealed as during this almost fatal, yet indispensable, adventure. The blinding fury of the snowstorm, the vivid presence of Clavdia's greenish eyes touched off by the reflection of blank ice, the effects of a glass of wine all these combine to drive him on. Having lost his bearings, he moves around in circles and loses his sense of time. This is Schopenhauer's philosophy about the inviting, soothing quality of death. Yet it is Schopenhauer about to be overcome by Goethe's life-asserting humanism in the ensuing vision.The vision Hans Castorp has while standing up against a cabin is the most comprehensive and profound of his many intrusions into the mysteries of life and death. More lucidly than any other one, it affords him a glimpse into the dual nature of human existence and quickly leads him on toward his triumph the transcendence of dualism. That it springs directly from his exhaustion is consistent with the idea, dominant throughout the novel, that disease and suffering are, in the last analysis, positive forces serving spiritual growth provided that they arenotgranted independence apart from life.Not white, gray, and black, but green, blue, and gold are the colors of the world of perfect harmony Hans sees. Glimpses of a luxuriant park where he watches the serene "children of the sun," mythical figures symbolizing the life-asserting forces, play among antique buildings and mingle in Castorp's mind with faint memories of happy holidays at the Mediterranean. A boy standing apart from his playmates and alternately smiling at Hans and the vision of harmony he shares with him, suddenly looks past him, his expression reflecting horror. Following the boy's eyes, Hans Castorp now sees a landscape of crumbling temples and a baby being dismembered by two witches, symbols of the dark forces slumbering in humanity. Desperately trying to escape the bloodthirsty vividness of his dream, Hans Castorp wakes up. Checking his watch, he realizes that all these visions of bliss and horror have been crammed into only a few minutes. Time lasts as long as we experience it.Hans Castorp knows he has glimpsed into the future state of social bliss, but also into what Settembrini terms "cultural backsliding," which always lurks behind it. The scene is highly symbolic, the countless allusions to Mediterranean civilization (the Italian tenor, the mention of Naples, Sicily, and Greece) suggesting Mann's belief in the rational and peaceful quality of "Western" life and the "moss-covered" and "weathered" temples, the statue's "empty eye-sockets," and the gray witches suggesting the decayed world of political reaction. The sunny and shady sides of the temples represent the dual aspects of man, his reason and his irrationality.What is new about this dream is the purely negative aspect of death and the disgust with which Castorp treats it. There is not a trace left of the temptation to surrender to it that he displayed only a few minutes ago. Pondering his vision, Castorp realizes that man dreams not only individually, but also communally; that he who knows the body, that is, life, also knows death; that all "interest in disease and death is only an expression of interest in life" in short, that man is the master of opposites just as he is their inventor. He now sees the utter sterility of the intellectual efforts of Settembrini and Naphta, neither of whom will be able to solve anything without the spark of love. It cannot be man's task to fight life in the name of unbridled reason (Settembrini) or to throw humanity back into barbarism by advocating the abandonment of all reason (Naphta). Since abstract systems can only be born of man, he must be superior to them. Thus Castorp now vows to side with man, who alone is worth fighting for, and to let death have no "sovereignty over his thoughts."Castorp, it seems, has accomplished his goal. Yet his supreme insight turns out to be little more than a fleeting moment's caper. We hear that "even that same evening it was no longer so clear as it had been at first." Is our hero's moment of triumph perhaps only the result of wishful thinking, part of his "dream of thoughts" that lingers after the actual vision is over? A number of questions arise here: Can Hans Castorp (Everyman) realistically be expected to develop his insights steadily and consistently without backsliding? Does he fail to live up to the ultimate goal, or his ultimate vision, because the task is superhuman?Even if we exonerate Castorp from the charge of deliberate irresponsibility, the nagging feeling remains that he has failed and that his failure is somehow connected with his impotence in the face of decisions. Confronted with endless alternatives, he never really makes a choice; when he sometimes comes close to making one, he does not stick to it nor act it out. He conspicuously lacks the