The main problem with this work is expectation: it is the novel of an author who, twenty years earlier, published The Magic Mountain. We expect, then, that these two decades will be reflected in maturity and higher altitudes—something that does not happen, Mann seeming instead to have come down from the mountain. Doctor Faustus is a fine example of the authentically German defects: it is a work of almost fifty chapters that would be much better and more powerful if summarized in three. Its climax consists of the invocation of the devil, a character that is always interesting in itself. If the work was reduced to this moment and its consequences, perhaps we would have a different impression; but Mann makes sure to bore us with a few hundred idle pages. What to say? Carpeaux compared this work to Hermann Hesse’s The Glass Bead Game, saying that both authors took refuge in music. But oh, how different! It seems impossible to compare them without leaving Doctor Faustus completely humiliated: this is a work devoid of elevation, boasting a mediocre thoroughness, as written by the bourgeois who entertains himself by displaying useless knowledge and writes as a hobby. What a disappointment! It seems inevitable to imagine Mann, in his luxurious mansions, overcome by a boredom similar to that of the old Indians, unable to perceive himself fading the more he allowed himself to “take refuge.” It hurts to see him in this great writer…
Tag: literature
Technicism, in Literature, Is Only to Be Tolerated…
It is true that, in addressing any topic, the writer can make it interesting by giving it depth or, rather, by showing himself as an expert on the subject. However, there is a limit which, if crossed, makes the text dull to an unbearable level. Technicism, in literature, is only to be tolerated when it reinforces the peculiarity of the expression that is independent of it; more often than not, what it does is to make the lines insipid for those unfamiliar with the area being dealt with. Unfortunately, this is a difficult mistake to avoid for someone who has dedicated himself to a certain subject and then decides to dramatize it. But it is good to keep in mind that great literature is not produced for specialists because, after all, we hardly call a specialist one who is one in the essential.
It Is Strange to Note the Absolute Irrationality…
It is strange to note the absolute irrationality of this duty that is often the inexhaustible and most potent fuel in the trajectory of great writers. When asked about the reason for so much effort and so much affliction, the answer of “I have to do it” does not seem sufficient, and even believable. An entire life, then, justified by something inexplicable… this is, no doubt, something apparently fragile; and yet, so it is.
Dedicating to Shoes
The advantage of the intellectual who, like Boehme, devotes himself to shoes during the day is that he can write what he wants, when he wants and how he wants, also read what he wants for as long as he wants, and publish what he has written only if he wants. In short: freedom. No need to get involved in polemics, to please or submit to editors and other writers, no need to deal with reader-clients, no nothing. There are shoes that will always serve as intellectual deliverance. There is nothing to pay for that self-sufficiency and carefree feeling. Freedom, after all, is always dignity.