“Tonio Kröger is always a favorite in Japan”

The Magic Mountain and Doctor Faustus as apocalyptic works, following in Mann’s footsteps on walks through Munich’s Nordfriedhof cemetery, young Japanese authors who dedicate chapters of their books to him: In recognition of Thomas Mann Year, Yasumasa Oguro, Professor of German Studies at the University of Kyushu and an LMU alumnus, discusses the German writer’s perennial popularity in Japan.

Professor Oguro, you are a Germanist and an expert on Thomas Mann. How did German literature come to your attention?

I was already interested in German philosophy – in Kant, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche – back in my days at high school. That’s why I picked German in my foundational study course. Back then it was very popular as a second foreign language, although Chinese and Korean are the preferred languages today. As I was studying philosophy at the University of Hokkaido in Sapporo, German was initially just a means to an end. But it didn’t take long for the language and literature to fascinate me more than the philosophy. After finishing the foundation course, i.e. at the end of the second semester, I therefore opted to make German studies my main subject. For me, it was like a window on another world – a window I desperately wanted to open wider.

And what drew you to Thomas Mann?

At the end of my sixth semester, I had to find a topic for my thesis. I initially thought about Austrian literature. But then, more or less by chance, I read Tonio Kröger, and shortly afterwards The Magic Mountain. Reading the latter work was a seminal experience. I was fascinated by the characters, by the tension between life and art, between bourgeois culture and the life of an artist. My supervisor, Professor Aoyagi, was himself a proven connoisseur of Thomas Mann and had translated the correspondence between Mann and Hermann Hesse into Japanese. So, Thomas Mann became my topic – and has gripped me ever since.

What aspects of his work appeal to you?

Primarily the themes he addresses. I wrote my doctoral thesis on the subject of the “apocalypse” in Thomas Mann. It is unmistakably a central theme of Doctor Faustus, but it is also present in The Magic Mountain. I refer to the suicide of Peeperkorn, who has such a zest for life, as the “minor apocalypse”: an implosion that rocks the characters. In Doctor Faustus, the shocking Echo scene delivers a “major apocalypse” in which the demise of a whole epoch becomes palpable.

I see a structural analogy between the two passages: Crises that effectively portend the end, but that open up a new literary dimension. I am interested in these patterns of collapse, crisis and new beginning not only on the literary level, but also with a view to European history. Later, I published further monographs, most recently on Thomas Mann again, because this subject never loses its fascination for me.

What is your favorite book today?
I never cease to encounter new discoveries in The Magic Mountain. Every time, I unearth something I have never seen before. But I also benefit from reading and re-reading the early works, such as The Road to the Churchyard and Little Herr Friedemann. What was very special was finally being able to finish reading Joseph and His Brothers in Munich. I had been unable to do so in Japan, despite my very best efforts. Maybe I simply had not had the time and the quiet that I needed.

What other memories do you have of your time in Munich?

After four years of study in Sapporo, I continued my studies at the University of Kyushu in Fukuoka in 1989. After completing my master’s degree, I started work on my doctorate in 1991 and, a year later, came to Munich for four years to continue my German studies at LMU. To begin with, I lived at Johannes College, a student hall of residence near Hohenzollernplatz. Here I got to know a lot of fellow students from Asia in particular – from China and Korea – which broadened my perspective to a great extent.

In Japan, I had always seen myself as “Japanese”. But in Munich, I suddenly realized that I was also part of a larger Asian, indeed international community. I later lived in shared accommodation near Goethestrasse and taught at the Japan Center – eight courses a week! It was an intense and very formative time.

Thomas Mann too once lived in Munich. Did you ever follow in his footsteps?

I certainly did. I would often go walking through Schwabing, from Schellingstrasse across Ludwigstrasse down to Odeonsplatz – precisely the route described in Mann’s novella Gladius Dei. The Nordfriedhof cemetery too left a deep impression on me. In Death in Venice, Mann’s character Gustav Aschenbach encounters an uncanny figure here, whereupon he resolves to travel to Venice.

In the cemetery I went searching for two “apocalyptic animals” made of stone, which Mann describes. I even asked the caretaker, but to no avail. When I returned many years later, I did indeed discover two sphinx figures at the entrance. They were not identical to Mann’s description, but they were a nice discovery. In 2018, I also visited “Villino”, Mann’s summer house in Feldafing on Lake Starnberg. I was the last official guest before it was closed as a museum – which, to me, was almost symbolic.

To what extent did Thomas Mann himself have contact with Japan?

He was never there himself. But there was an indirect connection via his wife Katia, whose twin brother Klaus Pringsheim was Professor of Music in Tokyo. It was through him that Mann gained insights into the country and its culture, and he seemed very interested. After the war, he kept a close watch on the political situation in Japan. And he definitely planned to travel to Japan, even though that never happened.

What echo does Thomas Mann elicit in your home country?

A very powerful one to this day. There are seven translations of The Magic Mountain. Tonio Kröger has been a favorite since the 1920s and has been translated into Japanese an astonishing 17 times. I myself produced the 17th translation. And the fact that this was even discussed in the German press was a great honor for me.

What do you see as the reasons for such a positive response to his work?

One reason is that his themes – identity, education, art, sickness, death – are universal. And then there is the fact that educational novels in particular appeal to many Japanese, because education and career are closely interwoven in our country, too. Lastly, many of my compatriots believe that the Japanese and German mentalities are very similar. Both peoples are industrious, conscientious and serious. This proximity to how the Japanese see themselves is undoubtedly part of why Mann is so well received – even if I have found that the Germans are also very fond of going on vacation (laughs).

Are there Japanese authors whom you would compare with Thomas Mann, or who are inspired by him?

Yes, indeed. Yukio Mishima, for example, one of the best-known writers in Japan, was an avid reader of German literature back in his schooldays. His works reveal the same tension between tradition and modernism, between life and art. Younger authors likewise pick up these links: In his artist novel, Keiichiro Hirano even calls one of his chapters “Venice Syndrome” – in direct homage to Mann. And even the very youngest generation exhibits a keen interest: Yui Suzuki, who was born in 2001 and has won the prestigious Akutagawa Prize, concerns himself intensely with Goethe and Thomas Mann. Incidentally, even the world-famous author Haruki Murakami was influenced by Mann’s The Magic Mountain when he published his novel Norwegian Wood, whose German title is Naoko’s Smile. So, in Japan, Mann’s works are clearly more than just a traditional educational legacy: They continue to provide creative impetus to this day.

How is Thomas Mann’s 150th anniversary being celebrated in Japan?

In a very lively manner. I have been invited to numerous events since 2024, and there seems to be no end to them. Last year saw the 100th anniversary of his publication of The Magic Mountain. In summer 2024, a large conference of Asian Germanists in the Chinese coastal city of Qingdao was particularly impressive. The city almost had the feel of a scene from Mann’s landscape metaphors. For Mann, beaches – witness Death in Venice – are just as much key locations as mountains: One need only think of the Davos sanatorium in The Magic Mountain.

This year, together with Hirano and Suzuki, whom I mentioned earlier, I hosted a celebration of Thomas Mann’s 150th birthday in Fukuoka. The occasion was not held on Mann’s birthday, however, but on 26 April, because in Jun I had been invited by the German Thomas Mann Society to take part in a panel discussion entitled Thomas Mann on every continent.

In May 2024, I also had the opportunity to present The Magic Mountain in the TV show “Masterpiece in 100 Minutes”, produced by Japan’s public broadcaster. And in the middle of the closing war scene, of all moments, the broadcast was interrupted by a nationwide missile alarm – triggered by the testing of a North Korean missile. An almost uncanny coincidence that once again made clear to me how topical Thomas Mann’s literature remains to this day.

Yasumasa Oguro, Professor of German Studies at the University of Kyushu in Fukuoka, has studied the works of Thomas Mann in great depth. He is a former President of the Japanese Society of German Studies and has published monographs such as “Apocalyptic Dreams. Thomas Mann and the Allegory”. Alongside Thomas Mann, Oguro also conducts research into romanticism, Rudolf Kassner and Herta Müller.