13 - The Story of Marie

Summary

THE SITUATION IN THE NOVEL has now completely changed. The historical period of the rest of the novel is the 1920s in Munich, a time and place where the rapid increase in fascist support and political polarization and intolerance was particularly pronounced. Fascist intolerance of dissent was leading to a complete breakdown of social order and justice, and violence on the streets was routine. Adrian's Apocalipsis cum figuris has been preempted as an argument for fascism by the Catholic intellectual community in Munich, and Adrian, who understands the demonic implications of this distortion of his ideas, is now working, as did Mann, to support the Weimar Republic and to dissociate himself from this fascist movement. The events of the rest of the novel must be read in the light of this new situation. Otherwise they make no sense at all.

Adrian's anti-fascist activities lead eventually to his absolute rejection by the Munich intellectual community:

… denn der Grund für das Verhalten der Leute war ja die Atmosphäre unbeschreiblicher Fremdheit und Einsamkeit, die ihn in wachsendem Maß — in diesen Jahren immer fühlbarer und distanzierender — umgab, und die einem wohl das Gefühl geben konnte, als käme er aus einem Lande, wo sonst niemand lebt. (DF, 545)

As Mann's son Michael says:

Thomas Mann sah sich in den dreißiger und vierziger Jahren bei aller redlichen Bemühung um Kontaktaufnahme mit den westlichen Demokratien zurückgeworfen auf das Einsamkeitspathos seines Künstlertums — es ist das Einsamkeitspathos Adrian Leverkühns.