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
The lousy weather continues, making it difficult for Joachim and Hans to take another outing. Hans doesn’t mind the monotony though, since he’s only going to be here three weeks total. Curiously, though, Hans can’t help but feel regret that his stay at the Berghof seems to be flying by as his infatuation with Madame Chauchat grows. He stares at her in the dining hall but pretends not to, a bad performance meant for her to see right through—as she clearly does. One day she stares back at him, and their mutual shock at this causes her to drop her napkin. After this incident, however, she doesn’t look at him for another two days.
This passage reinforces the notion that time is malleable and subjective. Before Hans developed feelings for Clavdia, his days were rather monotonous and so passed slowly. But now that Hans has a tempting reason to want to stay at the Berghof, time flies. Clavdia’s choice to stare back at Hans indicates that she knows he’s attracted to her and perhaps even reciprocates his feelings. Their unspoken, mostly unacted-upon romance is rather immature, underscoring Hans’s youth and inexperience at the start of his coming-of-age journey.
Themes
Hans longs to be in Madame Chauchat’s company, even though he also admits that she is beneath him, with her poor posture, bad manners, and bitten fingernails. One day, when he overhears her in the lobby struggling to speak German, he feels a sudden pride in his native language and feels superior to Madame Chauchat. In a sense, he regards his “relationship” with the odd woman as little more than a vacation fling and therefore not quite real, however much he continues to daydream about her.
Hans continues to deny his obvious feelings for Madame Chauchat, desperately turning to “logic” (she is beneath him, it doesn’t make sense for him to be attracted to someone with such poor manners, etc.) to undermine his instinctive attraction to her. All the same, he continues to pine after her. Once more, Hans is torn between his rational, bourgeois sensibilities and the irrational passion that Clavdia and her Eastern influence evokes in him.
Themes
Nevertheless, Hans does make some effort to meet Madame Chauchat properly. Knowing that she arrives late to meals, he starts arriving late, too, and discreetly making sure to pass by her door around the time she usually leaves for the dining hall. On the days she emerges from her room just after Hans has passed by her door, Hans can feel her eyes on his back, and it makes the nerves in his legs twitch. On days he arrives at the dining hall before Madame Chauchat, he sometimes makes up an excuse to go back to his room, allowing himself and Madame Chauchat to encounter each other head-on in the hallway.
Slowly but surely, Hans takes his pursuit of Clavdia to the next level. Though he still hasn’t spoken to her, he strategically places himself in situations that put him in close physical proximity to her. It's also notable that he starts arriving late to meals, a display of poor manners he would have frowned upon (and, indeed, did frown upon) just days before. This shows that Clavdia’s dangerous and irrational influence is rubbing off on Hans and leading him astray.
Themes
The second time this happens, Madame Chauchat stares directly at Hans, causing his blood to run cold. He stares at her face, which he finds “foreign,” strange, and distinct. Her face is both sharp and soft. Her “Kirghizshaped eyes,” which are so stern and dark from afar, look so much like Pribislav Hippe’s. The encounter simultaneously thrills and terrifies Hans.
Hans’s response to Clavdia’s stare reinforces the link between physical symptoms and repressed emotions. Meanwhile, his focus on her “foreign” face and his comparison of her face to Hippe’s underscores the irrational temptation that Eastern ideals pose to Hans.
Themes
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Meanwhile, Joachim’s mood becomes increasingly gloomy and dejected as he continues to plead with Behrens to let him return to the “flatlands” below and resume his military duties. Joachim insists each night near the start of the social hour that he and Hans return to their rooms for their rest cure. Hans knows why—it’s because Marusya is there, laughing, and Joachim cannot bear his attraction to her. Hans wonders if Joachim feels as trapped here as he does.
As time progresses, Joachim’s and Hans’s feelings about the Berghof shift in opposite ways. Joachim, who has never felt at home there, becomes more restless and frustrated. Hans, meanwhile, feels more at ease at the Berghof the longer he’s there. The cousins’ opposite feelings toward the Berghof mirror their opposite feelings about their respective irrational passions. Joachim hates the way his attraction to Marusya undercuts his duty and his bourgeois sensibilities. Hans, meanwhile, seems increasingly willing to set aside his bourgeois sensibilities to act on his passion for Clavdia
Themes
In time, Hans becomes totally acclimated to life at the Berghof, even learning to swaddle himself in his two blankets as well as any other resident. He starts to think it odd that nobody “down there” knew anything about this “art” form, and his fixation on this thought bothers him. He longs to confide in someone who can help him make sense of these unusual and troubling thoughts. He thinks back to the advice Behrens gave him when he first arrived about living as a resident. Hans thinks of Behrens as something of a father figure, he realizes, and he also realizes that he wants some paternal advice. Despite this, he finds it hard to trust Behrens, uncertain that the doctor is truly cured of his long-ago illness.
Hans’s adeptness at swaddling himself in the camel-hair blankets symbolizes his growing acclimation to life at the Berghof. Where once he thought the residents’ customs were strange and nonsensical, now he considers them “art” forms and thinks that the people “down there” (a community of which he seems to no longer consider himself a part) are strange for not knowing about or appreciating these art forms. Hans’s transformed relationship to Behrens, too, signals his acceptance of the Berghof as his new home. Behrens, in becoming something of a father figure to Hans, symbolically replaces the family Hans left behind “down there.”
Themes
Hans considers whether Settembrini could be a mentor to him. Though Settembrini had criticized Hans’s idea that sickness and stupidity are opposites, he had also called himself a “pedagogue” and seems clearly interested in molding young minds.
Hans has previously rejected Settembrini’s efforts to teach him, so it’s curious that he seems to take an interest in Settembrini as a mentor now. Perhaps he recognizes, if only subconsciously, the danger that Clavdia (and the ideals she stands for, like irrationality, passion, and idleness) poses to him, and perhaps he wants somebody to guide him back to the right path.
Themes
One day, Settembrini stops by Hans’s table in the dining hall and asks Frau Stöhr about her present condition. When she complains about being in poor health, Settembrini jokes that she must have a doppelganger—last night, he saw Frau Stöhr’s light on her balcony and thought she must be dutifully taking her rest cure. But just moments later, he saw her eating desserts, drinking wine, and seeing a film at the cinema. The accusation makes Frau Stöhr squirm in her seat, and her discomfort only grows when Settembrini reveals that she was doing these things in the company of Captain Miklosich from Bucharest. The other tablemates make eyes at each other—it’s common knowledge that Frau Stöhr sneaks off to have fun in the English quarter of town (while her unknowing husband waits for her back home). Settembrini also implies that Frau Stöhr is having sex with Miklosich.
Settembrini’s commitment to truth, knowledge, and social decorum make him unique among the Berghof’s residents. Frau Stöhr, as he reveals here, is a hypocrite, claiming to be ill and helpless and yet engaging in antics and romantic trysts in town when she thinks nobody is watching. Settembrini, like Joachim, seems unsatisfied with the dishonorable and tedious lives that most patients at the Berghof lead. This scene, then, establishes that Settembrini could be a positive and worthy mentor to Hans, should Hans choose to listen to the older man’s advice.
Themes
Of course, Frau Stöhr isn’t the only resident to engage in such illicit behavior, Settembrini admits, noting Anton Schneermann’s empty chair—apparently, the teenager’s mother somehow found out that he’d been engaging in immoral (sexual) behavior and removed him from the facility immediately. Settembrini knows all the gossip, and everyone laughs at the insider details he shares.
Settembrini’s love of gossip reveals that he’s not quite as principled as he makes himself out to be—he can be just as frivolous about how he spends his time as any of the other residents. This complicates his character, somewhat: while Settembrini’s ideals are generally noble, he doesn’t always translate these ideals into action.
Themes
Settembrini also talks about his family in Italy. He regretfully compares the life he wastes away at the Berghof to his grandfather’s revolutionary past—he conspired against Austria and the Holy Roman Empire and was a political revolutionary, a Carbanaro. He was a courageous man full of national pride who wished to see his country free. He supported freedom not only in his own country but in all places. After 10 years of exile, he was able to return to Italy and find work as a lawyer in Milan. He continued to call and write for freedom in his own country and in all lands.
This section contextualizes Settembrini’s humanistic ideals of liberty and democracy within his rich family history.
Themes
One detail from Settembrini’s story about his grandfather sticks out to Hans: he always wore black in public, out of “mourning” for his country. This reminds Hans of his own grandfather, who also wore black, though young Hans never knew why. Nevertheless, Hans ruminates now, both grandfathers built a wall between themselves and the “evil present” that surrounded them. But while his grandfather did so to honor the past, Settembrini’s did so for the future—for progress.
As Hans contemplates the similarities and differences between the two grandfathers, he’s once more caught between two opposing ideals: honoring the past or working toward the future. As usual, he remains ambivalent about which side to take. He is still early in his self-education and lacks the conviction to commit to his ideals.
Themes
Settembrini praises Hans’s homeland of Germany for contributing two key inventions, both of which he believes contributed to progress and democracy: gunpowder and the printing press. Meanwhile, he praises Italy for its major role in pushing forward enlightenment ideals and culture. Settembrini preaches that technology and morality go hand in hand: he believes the world was born in immoral darkness but, through advancement and progress, has become more moral. Though Hans consistently takes issue with some ideas Settembrini puts forth in his many lectures, he tries to at least listen to the man with an open mind, much like a traveler who takes care to learn about a new culture.
This scene emphasizes Settembrini’s humanist beliefs: he values rationality, human progress, and personal liberty most of all. Settembrini, having previously implied the responsibility that mentors have to mold the minds of the younger generation, is clearly trying to instill his own values in Hans. Hans remains characteristically ambivalent, though he tries to recast this ambivalence in a positive light, portraying his passive inability to take a side as having an open mind.
Themes
Another of Settembrini’s big ideas is that the world is governed by two opposing principles: “might and right, tyranny and freedom, superstition and knowledge,” and so forth. Settembrini claims the former may be thought of as the “Asiatic principle,” and the latter the “European principle.” He has no doubt that enlightenment and progress—the European ideals—will always win out, though there’s still much work to be done. To achieve complete enlightenment, however, Settembrini argues, it will be necessary to destroy the center of the Asiatic principle of tyranny: Vienna. Hans takes issue with this theory, and Joachim—the military man—does too.
Settembrini’s idea that the world is governed by two opposing principles is an important concept that will reverberate throughout the rest of the novel, especially as Hans has more firsthand experience with characters whom Settembrini would classify as proponents of his so-called “Asiatic principle”—characters such as Clavdia, whose sensuality and rationality, Settembrini might argue, inhibit human progress.
Themes
Settembrini also lectures about his reverence for humanism (meaning, at its core, a love of humankind). He inherited this reverence from his father (the humanist philosopher) and grandfather (the freedom-driven political agitator). Settembrini, as a writer, believes that words and language are vessels for humanity’s “dignity and self-respect.” And he believes that politics play into this, too, since politicians are people putting dignified word into action.
Settembrini’s belief in the power of words and language to ensure “dignity and self-respect” is a good principle in the abstract, but it’s notable that he, unlike his grandfather the political agitator, doesn’t translate his humanist beliefs into concrete actions. While the book generally sides with Settembrini’s politics and intellectual views, it is critical of his inability to act on his ideals.
Themes
The narrator observes that at first it might seem that the waking Hans is very different from the sleeping Hans. While the former listens to Settembrini with an open mind (even if he doesn’t agree with everything he says), the sleeping Hans, in his dreams, dismisses the man as an “organ-grinder” preaching lofty, meaningless ideals. Yet as soon as Hans considers Settembrini’s lectures alone, he finds himself drawn only toward views that oppose Settembrini’s love of patriotism, literature, and human dignity. And what’s more, Hans probably only listened to Settembrini in the first place to grant his troubled conscience permission to gravitate toward the opposite: toward “listless, worm-eaten, Kirghiz-eyed” Clavdia Chauchat.
Settembrini’s lectures fail to secure Hans’s full attention, perhaps because they are just that: lectures. The abstract ideals Settembrini preaches to Hans can hardly compete with the physical, sensuous presence of Clavdia Chauchat. And so, Hans increasingly finds himself drawn toward a harbinger of the “Asiatic principle” Settembrini has warned Hans against: the “listless, worm-eaten, Kirghiz-eyed” Clavdia Chauchat.
Themes
