The Magic Mountain (Thomas Mann)

I confess: I skimmed this book. I'm just not cut out for speeches on philosophy and reality that go on for pages and pages without a break. It's a classic, though, so I stuck to the end, all 854 pages. In the years before WWI, a young German engineer, Hans, goes to a sanitarium high in the Swiss Alps to visit with his cousin who is being treated there for TB. His visit is meant to last three weeks, but shortly after his arrival he is himself diagnosed with TB and winds up staying for seven years. During his time there other patients arrive and leave, some via cure, some via death, some via simply being fed up with the routine of the place. And routine it is, with patients spending hours each day in mandatory rest cures, constantly taking and tracking their temperatures, and indulging in five hearty meals each day. There are numerous interesting incidents--romantic infatuations, seances, blizzards, duels--but none of it seems to add up to much, at least not for me. I suppose it has given me an insight into the life and times of pre-war Europe, but that doesn't seem enough to counterbalance those 854 pages.