Recommendations based on Tonio Krögerby Thomas Mann

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  1. Death in Venice

    by Thomas Mann
    A writer's journey of self-discovery in an Italian city, through a tangled web of art, beauty, and passion.

    The main character is Gustav von Aschenbach , a famous author in his early fifties who has recently been ennobled in honor of his artistic achievement (thus acquiring the aristocratic " von " in his ... (Wikipedia)

  2. The Magic Mountain

    by Thomas Mann
    A young man's journey of self-exploration and personal growth during a long stay at a Swiss sanatorium.

    The narrative opens in the decade before World War I . It introduces the protagonist, Hans Castorp, the only child of a Hamburg merchant family. Following the early death of his parents, Castorp has ... (Wikipedia)

  3. Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family

    by Thomas Mann
    A story of a family's decline, tracing four generations of a wealthy German family.

    In 1835, the wealthy and respected Buddenbrooks, a family of grain merchants, invite their friends and relatives to dinner in their new home in Lübeck , Germany . The family consists of patriarch ... (Wikipedia)

  4. The Kreutzer Sonata

    by Leo Tolstoy
    A man's moral journey of jealousy, envy and betrayal.

    When Marshal of the Nobility Pozdnyshev suspects his wife of having an affair with her music partner, his jealousy consumes him and drives him to murder. Controversial upon publication in 1890, The ... (Goodreads)

  5. Steppenwolf

    by Hermann Hesse
    The inner struggles of a tortured soul as he searches for redemption.

    The book is presented as a manuscript written by its protagonist , a middle-aged man named Harry Haller, who leaves it to a chance acquaintance, the nephew of his landlady. The acquaintance adds a ... (Wikipedia)

  6. Four Quartets

    by T.S. Eliot
    A poetic meditation on the journey of life and its cyclical nature.

    The Four Quartets is a series of four poems by T.S. Eliot, published individually from 1936 to 1942, and in book form in 1943; it was considered by Eliot himself to be his finest work. Each of the ... (Goodreads)

  7. Stoner

    by John Williams
    An academic's life of quiet desperation, finding solace in literature.

    William Stoner is born on a small farm in 1891. After high school, the county agent advises he go to agriculture school. Stoner enrolls in the University of Missouri , where all agriculture students ... (Wikipedia)

  8. The Iliad

    by Homer
    Epic tale of the Trojan War, depicting heroism and tragedy.

    Dating to the ninth century B.C., Homer’s timeless poem still vividly conveys the horror and heroism of men and gods wrestling with towering emotions and battling amidst devastation and destruction, ... (Goodreads)

  9. Seize the Day

    by Saul Bellow
    A man's journey to reclaim his life, confronting the choices of his past.

    Deftly interweaving humor and pathos, Saul Bellow evokes in the climactic events of one day the full drama of one man's search to affirm his own worth and humanity. ... (Goodreads)

  10. The Seagull

    by Anton Chekhov
    A tale of unrequited love and personal frustrations set in a rural Russian town.

    The play takes place on a country estate owned by Pyotr Sorin, a retired senior civil servant in failing health. He is the brother of the actress Irina Arkadin, who has just arrived at the estate for ... (Wikipedia)

  11. A Doll's House

    by Henrik Ibsen
    A woman's struggle to break from societal expectations and find her own identity.

    A Doll's House (1879), is a masterpiece of theatrical craft which, for the first time portrayed the tragic hypocrisy of Victorian middle class marriage on the stage. The play ushered in a new social ... (Goodreads)

  12. Swann's Way

    by Marcel Proust
    Autobiographical novel tracing the narrator's reminiscences of an aristocratic upbringing.

    Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time is one of the most entertaining reading experiences in any language and arguably the finest novel of the twentieth century. But since its original prewar ... (Goodreads)

  13. The Fall

    by Albert Camus
    A man's journey into alienation and despair, driven by a sense of absurdity in life.

    The Fall, ( French :, La Chute, ) is a philosophical novel by Albert Camus . First published in 1956, it is his last complete work of fiction. Set in Amsterdam , The Fall consists of a series of ... (Wikipedia)

  14. The Immoralist

    by André Gide
    A man's journey of self-discovery and liberation from societal norms and morality.

    The Immoralist is a recollection of events that Michel narrates to his three visiting friends. One of those friends solicits job search assistance for Michel by including in a letter to Monsieur D. ... (Wikipedia)

  15. Candide

    by Voltaire
    A young man's satirical journey through life, encountering misfortune and eventual optimism.

    Candide is the story of a gentle man who, though pummeled and slapped in every direction by fate, clings desperately to the belief that he lives in "the best of all possible worlds." On the surface a ... (Goodreads)

  16. Julius Caesar

    by William Shakespeare
    Tragedy of political power and ambition as Rome's leader is betrayed by those closest to him.

    The Oxford School Shakespeare has become the preferred introduction to the literary legacy of the greatest playwright in the English language. This exclusive collection of the Bard's best works has ... (Goodreads)

  17. Sentimental Education

    by Gustave Flaubert
    Romance and personal growth in the midst of a turbulent political climate.

    Frédéric Moreau renews his acquaintance with a childhood friend, Deslauriers, who advises him to meet with Dambreuse, a rich Parisian banker. Frédéric leaves for Paris, armed with a letter of ... (Wikipedia)

  18. The Devil All the Time

    by Donald Ray Pollock
    A dark tale of sin and redemption, set in a rural southern town.

    The Devil All the Time follows the events and fates of various characters who all carry their own secrets from the past. As the novel progresses the lives of these people converge in unexpected ways. ... (Wikipedia)

  19. The Death of Ivan Ilych

    by Leo Tolstoy
    A man's journey of self-reflection in the face of death, confronting mortality and the meaning of life.

    Ivan Ilyich lives a carefree life that is "most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible". Like everyone he knows, he spends his life climbing the social ladder. Enduring marriage to a ... (Wikipedia)

  20. Faust, First Part

    by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
    A timeless story of a man's struggle between the forces of good and evil.

    Goethe’s masterpiece and perhaps the greatest work in German literature, Faust has made the legendary German alchemist one of the central myths of the Western world. Here indeed is a monumental ... (Goodreads)

  21. Beneath the Wheel

    by Hermann Hesse
    A young man struggles against the oppressive rigidity of a school system.

    In Hermann Hesse's Beneath the Wheel or The Prodigy , Hans Giebenrath lives among the dull and respectable townsfolk of a sleepy Black Forest village. When he is discovered to be an exceptionally ... (Goodreads)

  22. In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower

    by Marcel Proust
    A young man's coming of age in a world of high society, exploring the depths of his own heart.

    In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower is Proust’s spectacular dissection of male and female adolescence, charged with the narrator’s memories of Paris and the Normandy seaside. At the heart of the ... (Goodreads)

  23. Norwegian Wood

    by Haruki Murakami
    A young man's journey of love and loss set against the backdrop of the 1960s.

    Toru, a quiet and preternaturally serious young college student in Tokyo, is devoted to Naoko, a beautiful and introspective young woman, but their mutual passion is marked by the tragic death of ... (Goodreads)

  24. All Quiet on the Western Front

    by Erich Maria Remarque
    A soldier's harrowing experience of the horrors of war.

    The book tells the story of Paul Bäumer, who belongs to a group of German soldiers on the Western Front during World War I . The patriotic speeches of his teacher Kantorek had led the whole class to ... (Wikipedia)

  25. Johnny Got His Gun

    by Dalton Trumbo
    A young soldier's harrowing journey through physical and psychological trauma of WWI.

    Joe Bonham, a young American soldier serving in World War I , awakens in a hospital bed after being caught in the blast of an exploding artillery shell . He gradually realizes that he has lost his ... (Wikipedia)

  26. Fathers and Sons

    by Ivan Turgenev
    A story of generational divide, exploring the differences between fathers and sons.

    Arkady Kirsanov has just graduated from the University of Petersburg . He returns with a friend, Bazarov, to his father's modest estate in an outlying province of Russia. His father, Nikolay, gladly ... (Wikipedia)

  27. The Brothers Karamazov

    by Fyodor Dostoevsky
    A philosophical exploration of morality, faith, and family dynamics among a group of brothers.

    The Brothers Karamazov is a murder mystery, a courtroom drama, and an exploration of erotic rivalry in a series of triangular love affairs involving the “wicked and sentimental” Fyodor Pavlovich ... (Goodreads)

  28. What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

    by Raymond Carver
    Exploration of relationships, revealing the complexities of love and its many forms.

    Alternate-cover edition can be found, here, In his second collection, Carver establishes his reputation as one of the most celebrated and beloved short-story writers in American literature—a haunting ... (Goodreads)

  29. Les Fleurs du Mal

    by Charles Baudelaire
    Collection of poems exploring the beauty and depravity of human nature.

    Charles Baudelaire's 1857 masterwork was scandalous in its day for its portrayals of sex, same-sex love, death, the corrupting and oppressive power of the modern city and lost innocence, Les Fleurs ... (Goodreads)

  30. The Gambler

    by Fyodor Dostoevsky
    A story of addiction and gambling, and the psychological depths of a man’s desperation.

    The first-person narrative is told from the point of view of Alexei Ivanovich, a tutor working for a Russian family living in a suite at a German hotel. The patriarch of the family, The General, is ... (Wikipedia)