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Germanic Collections

Resources on Thomas Mann

Topics:

1. General Bibliographical Resources

2. Sources of Information about Thomas Mann

3. Collections and Special Collections at Stanford

A few terms

1. Catalog vs. Bibliography

2. Format (on-line vs. paper)

3. Primary vs. Secondary Sources

Different levels of bibliography, each with specific goals and scope of coverage:

National bibliography—not relevant

Disciplinary bibliography—coverage of the literature in a field like German Studies or German literature

Personal or topical bibliography—narrowed to specific, in-depth coverage of a subject or person.Personal bibliography is sometimes restricted to publications by a person, sometimes covers only the literature about a person, and sometimes covers both.

On-line Resources:

* MLA Bibliography

Coverage of Thomas Mann: Try basic search (keyword: Mann) or Advanced Search (author's name: Mann, Thomas & keyword: Zauberberg)

* Biography Index

* Britannica Online

* Bibliographie der deutschen Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft - BDSL. (Humanities and Area Studies Resource Center, also available online through Stanford) is the largest annual bibliography of German Studies focusing on language and literature.  It is also known as "Eppelsheimer" or "Eppelsheimer-Köttelwelsch."  

It is a classified bibliography, meaning that the bibliographic entries are divided chronologically and by subject category.  Typically for an annual, classified bibliography, it is organized by large general and chronological rubrics, with subtopics (often repeated in several rubrics as sub-categories). 

The author entries provide access to bibliography; abbreviated periodical titles refer forward to the extensive lists of journals and Sammelbände. The author index also catches references to authors spread throughout the bibliography in various rubrics or categories.   Eppelsheimer provides access to virtually all formats of publication and includes foreign (i.e., English-language), as well as German publications.

Publication began in 1945.

Coverage of Thomas Mann: 1. Look in the name index to find all the entries, whatever the chronological or subject classification. The 1997 compilation alone offers roughly 200 entries.

OR, with a prominent author like Mann, look if there is a rubric devoted to the author. In Mann’s case, there is such a rubric in section XIV, “Jahrhundertwende,” with 150 or so references. Subsections covering journals, bibliography, editions of his works, research, documents, biography, etc. Some 20 entries just in this year are devoted specifically to the Zauberberg. Some English and other languages, though mostly German.

Germanistik (Humanities and Area Studies Resource Center, also online htrough Stanford) is an annual, classified bibliography, typical for disciplinary bibliography.  The classification schemes is a mix of general subject and chronological rubrics, with sections for major authors in every chronological period. As the title (Referatenorgan) indicates, it includes short book reviews.

Publication began in 1960.

Coverage of Thomas Mann: Also a classified bibliography and access to material on Thomas Mann is the same as for the Bibliographie: name index or going directly to the rubric devoted to Mann (in the classification covering “Naturalism to 1945.”)

More selective than the Bibliographie, but includes short annotations (almost mini-reviews) for many entries, esp. monographs.

Thomas Mann: Roughly 75 entries in the name index, only 30 in his own section, for 1998. Less than half that in the Bibliographie.

2. Sources of Information about Thomas Mann

Georg Potempa. Thomas Mann—Bibliographie. Cicero Presse, 1997. [Z8547.41 P67 1992 Green Stacks]

Like most personal bibliographies, in the Stacks in the Z-classification.

Massive, exhaustive bibliography of the works of Thomas Mann. Over 1600 pages. Possibly the most complete modern author bibliography in German Studies.

Includes sections for translations into 50 or more languages and interviews in an international array of newspapers and magazines, with numerous indexes.

Publications are arranged by broad categories (novels, short stories, collected works, etc.) then by date of first appearance.

Thus, Der Zauberberg is listed under novels as his third novel. A short note tells us when the book was written (July 1913 to Sept. 1924) and then 38 publications of the novel are listed.

The first 10 are single German editions (Ausgaben, not Auflagen—these 10 editions alone cover approximately 200 printings of the novel.)

11 through 21 are Lizenzausgaben.   These are largely paperback or book club editions, but they also include the East German edition, first published by Aufbau in 1953 and reprinted five times through 1987.

22 through 32 are various partial editions published before the first edition of the novel, mostly excerpts published in magazines and including one five-day serialization in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung in 1920.

33 through 38 are partial editions published after the first edition of the novel.

The second volume then lists translations of Zauberberg into some 32 languages, incl. Bulgarian, Georgian, Hebrew, etc. It also lists dozens of interviews concerned with the novel, including many carried out while he was writing.

Bibliographies of studies and criticism of Thomas Mann & his work.

Klaus Jonas. Die Thomas-Mann-Literatur. [Z8547.41 J6 Green Stacks]

Project in cooperation with the Thomas-Mann-Archiv in ZŸrich.

Three volume set: 1896-1955, 1956-1975, 1976-1994.

First vol. begins with a survey of manuscript collections in the United States and Europe, incl. private collections. (Jonas was a Germanist in the United States and the orig. publication of Jonas’ survey was published in English as Fifty Years of Thomas Mann Studies.)

The “Bibliographie der Kritik” then follows. It is not classified. The publications are organized by year of publication, then by author. Access to topics is by indices: author, work, subject (people, themes, honors), Zeitschriften. There are roughly 300 entries under Zauberberg, 14 entries under Georg Lukacs, a dozen or so entries under Goethe, etc.

1955, the last year of vol. 1: 600 entries. 1975, last year of vol. 2: 978 entries. 1994, last year of vol. 3: 266 entries. Compare to the 200 or so entries in the disciplinary bibliographies for recent years. Obviously, coverage is more focused and extensive, but the disciplinary bibliographies do pretty well. Interesting trend in number of publications.

Klaus Jonas. Fifty Years of Thomas Mann Studies and Thomas Mann Studies, Vol. II. [Z8547.41 J62 Green Stacks]

Bibliography of criticism (with an introduction by Thomas Mann). Good review of criticism classified by theme and topic, such as biography, autobiography, political writings, style & technique, etc. (This refers to the first vol., the second is less well organized.)

There is a note on manuscripts in the second volume—basis for the longer section in the German version.

There is a section for novels, with a sub-section on the Zauberberg—roughly 150 or so entries in the first vol. and 200 or so in the index (no section) of the 2ed

Die Literatur über Thomas Mann: Eine Bibliographie 1898-1969. Exhaustive and well-organized bibliography published in East Germany by Aufbau in 1972. [Z8547.41 J618 Green Stacks]

Over 14,000 entries organized by topic and with numerous indexes.

Best bibliography and guide in English, selective, with quite a few English-language citations.

Drawback: Vol. II published in 1967.

A companion to Thomas Mann's Magic mountain / edited by Stephen D. Dowden [PT2625.Z38 C66 1999 Green Stacks]

Thomas-Mann-Handbuch / herausgegeben von Helmut Koopmann [PT2625 .A44 Z8972 1990 Green Stacks]

The Nobel Prize Internet Archive

-- Thomas Mann

Thomas-Mann-Archiv (ETH)

3. Collections and Special Collections

Publishing History:

The first ed. of Der Zauberberg was published in two volumes in 1924 by Fischer. Stanford has several copies of the 1925 ed. in SAL, which like the earlier ed. was published as part of his Gesammelte Werke

English Translation by Helen Lowe-Porter first published in 1927 by A. A. Knopf. We have many editions, the earliest being the 1938 re-issue of the 1927 edition, in Green . Other eds. are in Green or SAL.

Editions can be found in the Green Stacks and SAL. Includes eds. of collected works, individual works, correspondence, and writings about Thomas Mann, including journals devoted to Mann Studies.

Thomas Mann in the Stack Collections:

Stacks: PT2625 (LC Classification)

SAL (and STK): 833.8.M28

Journals and monograph series

Special Collections

Holdings: Includes some editions of Zauberberg and other works.  Also Kino, one of the separately published excerpts.

Letters by Thomas Mann:

Papers of Albert Guerard, Stanford professor until 1946 and father of Stanford professor. Half dozen or so warm letters exchanged with Thomas Mann between 1940 and 1954, all in English. Interesting that one letter is both handwritten and typed in a clean copy—demonstrates Mann’s command of English.

Papers of Norman Foerster. A miscellaneous author’s collection. Foerster was a writer (creative writing program at Univ. Iowa) who edited anthologies of literary and scientific writers, and his correspondence includes the numerous authors with whom he worked, including Mann. Letters with Mann are from the late 1940s.

Two small collections relating to Ernst Bertram.

Correspondence with Josef Pichler and papers from Donald Morgan.

Aufbau-Verlag collection: Catalog and brochure collection. Portraits of authors includes one of Thomas Mann. East German perspective.

Janos Frecot Collection.   [Hint: Browse in Socrates under "Frecot" as a subject.]

- Henry Lowood

Prepared for Sophomore Seminar (Russell Berman), Sept. 2000

Last modified: June 19, 2009