Thomas Mann Biography

Thomas Mann was a Nobel Prize winning German novelist, short story writer, and philanthropist. He had to flee his country, never to return, due to the impositions on free press by Hitler. His ironic epic novels and novellas are known for their insight into the psychology of the artist and the intellectuals. He used modernised German and Biblical stories along with the ideas of Goethe, Nietzsche and Schopenhauer. With the outbreak of World War II, Mann escaped to Switzerland and from there, he immigrated to the United States. He hated school and could not meet up to its requirements till the end of his schooling. According to him, education should be acquired in a free and autodidactic manner, and not under the pressures of official instruction. From the beginning of nineteenth century, his writings were translated by H T Lowe Porter. He was a member of the Hanseatic Mann family and portrayed his family and class in the novel Buddenbrooks. He wrote diaries during his lifetime, and these were kept sealed even after his death. They were unsealed almost twenty years after his death. They revealed his struggles with bisexuality, the reflections of which could be found in his writings. His older brother, Heinrich Mann, was also a radical writer.