Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Magic Mountain, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Time
Coming of Age
Death and Illness
East vs. West
Abstract Ideals vs. Lived Experience
Summary
Analysis
One summer, the “ordinary” Hans Castorp leaves his hometown of Hamburg and heads to the mountains, to a sanatorium in Davos Platz. He plans to stay there for three weeks. Getting there requires a long and arduous journey through the Alps. It requires boarding a train at Rorschach, then boarding another train to Landquart. Up to that point the journey is dull, and the passing scenery is unremarkable. But upon boarding another train at Landquart, the wild and treacherous ascent up the mountains begins.
The story begins with Hans leaving his home behind to journey into the mountains. The shift from boring, mundane scenery to vivid, wild, and treacherous mountains suggests that Hans is venturing into a new and unfamiliar world. This passage thus lays the groundwork for the mountains as a separate realm, one where the norms or rules of conventional society—norms that the ordinary Hans likely has grown up with—might not apply.
Themes
Hans Castorp is alone in a small compartment on the train. The only things he has with him are an alligator suitcase—which was a gift from his uncle (Consul Tienappel, who is Hans’s guardian)—a blanket, and his winter coat. The window is open, and the air grows colder as the train makes its ascent. Hans, who is rather delicate and pampered, rolls up the delicate silk collar of his overcoat. He has been traveling for two days now.
The Magic Mountain is a Bildungsroman, or a coming-of-age story that follows a protagonist’s educational journey from youth to adulthood. This passage, with its mention of Hans’s delicate disposition and little silk collar, emphasizes his youth and inexperience. At this early point in the story, he’s not seen much of the world and still has considerable learning to do.
Themes
People describe time as “water from the river Lethe,” but being in a strange place—breathing “alien air”—is not so different. Though less “profound, it works all the more quickly.” Hans has experienced this sensation already, though he went into the trip trying not to take it too seriously and not expecting to emerge from it changed. Yesterday, he was still preoccupied with thoughts of his everyday life: of his exams, and of Tunder and Wilms, the firm he was about to join. He just wanted to get the next three weeks over with. But now, as he is transported into a new and strange place, he can’t help but be fully invested in his journey. He’s excited, despite himself, and he wonders what it’ll be like “up there.” Being born just above sea level, he wonders if it’s even healthy for him to be up this high.
Once more, the narration explicitly draws attention to the strange and unsettling nature of time—in Greek mythology, the river Lethe, also known as the river of forgetfulness, is one of the passages to the underworld. In describing time as “water from the river Lethe,” the narration foregrounds the theme of time’s subjective nature, pointing to time’s ability to skew memory. Finally, in comparing the sensation of breathing the “alien air” of a strange, new place to “water from the river Lethe,” the narration suggests that being in a new place can, like time, skew a person’s perception and perhaps even cause them to lose sight of the person they were before they got there. This heavily indicates that Hans will undergo such a transformation during his stay at the Berghof.
Themes
Eventually the train reaches the end of its ascent and pulls into the small station of Davos-Dorf. Hans Castorp hears someone at the station call his name. Suddenly, his cousin Joachim Ziemssen is beside him. Joachim looks healthier than Hans has ever seen him. In a friendly, easygoing voice, he tells Hans that they’re near the sanitorium—it’s time for Hans to disembark. Hans gathers his belongings and gets off the train. The concierge of the International Sanatorium Berghof takes Hans’s trunk to store it while Joachim and Hans get dinner.
Thus far, the narration has hinted that Hans’s journey into the mountains will be transformative in some way. That Joachim looks healthier than Hans has ever seen him suggests, then, that whatever transformation Hans undergoes during his time here may be for the better. Indeed, sanatoriums were generally located in areas with climates thought to be beneficial to people with conditions like tuberculosis and other chronic illnesses.
Themes
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Once inside their carriage, Hans asks Joachim how his own health is—Joachim looks well enough to return to the military—and if Joachim will be “coming back down” when Hans leaves in three weeks. This puzzles Joachim—he can’t fathom that Hans is already thinking about leaving when he’s just arrived. And “up here,” three weeks is practically nothing—time, Joachim explains, is totally different “up here” than it is “down below.” In fact, Joachim’s next appointment isn’t even for another six months. This shocks Hans, who can’t imagine wasting so much of one’s life. Joachim says that Hans will start seeing things differently once he’s been here a while. Then, to answer Hans’s initial question, Joachim says that he’s feeling better, though the lower lobe is still rattling around quite a bit.
This passage provides background information about Joachim: Hans’s observation indicates that Joachim is in the military. Joachim’s remark about three weeks not seeming so long “up here” reinforces the notion that time is malleable and subjective—it can pass quickly or slowly depending on one’s circumstances and one’s environment. Here, Joachim suggests that something about the atmosphere of the sanatorium makes the days and weeks fly by. Hans’s shock at how long and drawn-out Joachim’s treatment at the sanatorium is shows that time is much more regimented and organized where he’s from, in the world “back down” the mountain.
Themes
The carriage heads up a hilly road, and Hans sees the sanatorium in the distance. It’s a long building with so many balconies along its walls that from afar it almost looks like a sponge. As the sun sets, Hans considers the magnificent scenery that surrounds him. He notes how glorious the air is up here. Joachim, looking extremely disgusted, says that Hans will soon tire of it. Inwardly, Hans thinks it’s really strange how frequently Joachim is using the phrase “us up here.”
Joachim’s frequent use of the phrase “us up here” establishes the Berghof and its residents as somehow distinct from ordinary society and the people who inhabit it—perhaps residents’ shared experience of illness sets them apart from healthy people.
Themes
Joachim casually mentions that because of the high altitude here, sanatoriums must use bobsleds to cart the bodies down the mountains. The absurdity of how calmly Joachim has just spoken about dead bodies causes Hans to laugh, and he jokes that Joachim has become cynical since coming here. Joachim merely shrugs and explains that Behrens, the surgeon, is a cynic. Joachim thinks Hans will like him. He also mentions Krokowski, Behrens’s assistant, who “dissects the patients’ psyches.”
The image of a bobsled (which suggests fun and recreation) carting dead bodies (about which there is conceivably nothing fun) down the mountain juxtaposes lightheartedness with the horror of death in a way that strikes Hans as absurd. One of the aspects of life at the Berghof that Hans will have to adjust to is the unavoidable presence of death. At this early point in the novel, Joachim, an acclimated resident of the Berghof, has acquired a casual acceptance of death that Hans lacks.
Themes
