Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family

By Thomas Mann

Categories: Literature & Fiction

Thomas Mann's first novel, published in 1901, follows four generations of the Buddenbrooks, a wealthy merchant family in the north German port of Lübeck, from 1835 to 1877. Mann drew on his own family's history for the story. As the firm's fortunes slip, later generations grow more sensitive, more drawn to art and less fit for business, and the family's standing in the town declines. This edition uses John E. Woods's 1993 English translation.

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• Fareed Zakaria: “In fiction, I prefer emotional insight. I have often found that even at its best, a “novel of ideas” is not that good at providing deep intellectual insight. I preferred Thomas Mann’s “Buddenbrooks” to “The Magic Mountain.””