The magic mountain

A few words about the Great Narratives series
The Great Narratives series includes landmark works of world prose; works by authors who have broken the barrier of time and deserve to be read by everyone as part of a fascinating current event that concerns us.

The Magic Mountain is a masterpiece of European literature by a Nobel Prize-winning author who explores the allure and degeneration of ideas in an introverted community on the eve of the Great War. The plot is seemingly simple. The young engineer from Hamburg, Hans Castorp, visits the Berghof sanatorium in Switzerland to see his cousin. A slight malaise and a lingering fever lead the sanatorium's doctor, court councilor Behrens, to suggest that he extend his stay. Eventually, Hans Castorp decides to stay at the sanatorium for three weeks. Only, the three weeks, without realizing it, turn into seven years, as Hans falls in love and becomes intoxicated by the ideas he hears being discussed there.

THE PRESS WROTE
Famous for his irony, Thomas Mann, along with Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Freud, offers the unifying essence, the love of art and imagination, that the modern world needs in order not to disintegrate after the collapse of social forces and religions.
Independent

It lends itself to multiple readings. A novel for a lifetime and not just for a rainy afternoon.
Guardian

The most important novelist of the 20th century.
Spectator

A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE SERIES
The Great Narratives series includes landmark works of world prose; works by authors who broke the barrier of time and deserve to be read by everyone as part of a fascinating current event that concerns us.