Reflections on 'Felix Krull'

Yes, I know the last post was misleading. I thought that I must blog more often and it was with a momentary lapse of reason* that I penned it for self motivation, only to find myself drowned again in mounds of other activities that was characteristic of the last semester. I have not much to write, so I thought I might as well write what I thought about the book 'Confessions of Felix Krull' by Thomas Mann, as part of a reading assignment for my humanities course.

Read on...

Basically, the novel recounts the confessions from the enchanted career of the con man extraordinaire Felix Krull, a man unhampered by the moral precepts that govern the conduct of ordinary people. According to me, the central theme that Mann probably envisaged to convey through this novel is the idea of Interchangeability. 'With a change of clothes and make-up, the servitors might often just as well have been the masters, and many of those who lounged in the deep wicker chains, smoking their cigarettes, might have played the waiter. It was a pure accident that the reverse was the fact, an accident of wealth; for an aristocracy of money is an accidental and interchangeable aristocracy’. Mann reflects extensively on this concept throughout the novel, particularly the Marquis de Venosta episode seems to bring this out clearly. Felix is charmed by the ambiguity of his dual existence. Which was the real one? Which was the masquerade? He says ‘ Seldom do we realize that with just a change of appearance, consciously or not, we are able to lead parallel existences in society... ‘I masqueraded in both capacities, and the undisguised reality behind the two appearances, the real I, could not be identified because it actually did not exist.’

Another highlight is Professor Kuckuck’s lengthy monologue addressed to Krull. Though it seems out of place in the book, the ideas conveyed in it are singular. For example, ‘The Lust for the new’ is supposed to be the most important attribute of travel. The ephemeral nature of ‘Life’ in space-time and the three spontaneous generations – Being out of Nothingness, the awakening of Life from the Being, and the Birth of Man are other important motifs that Mann discusses gave me food for thought.

Mann’s fundamental definition of perception is overawing. The musing “Perception, that visual feasting on the human spectacle as it unfolds in the fashionable districts of a great city – whither I went by preference ……… passionately ambitious youth” makes interesting reading.

Mann’s interpretation of the principle of duality is revealed through his description of the dual entities/combinations like the brother-sister couple in Frankfurt and the mother-daughter duo of Madame Kuckuck and Zaza. Krull is enchanted by the nature of these relationships. It is probably reflective of Mann’s own eccentricities and his way of looking at human bonds and their significance

One of the pivotal episodes that has been etched in my mind is the Muller Rose incident. Felix is taken to the theater by his father to see a play in which one of the father's old school friends (Rose) is starring. Felix is captivated by the magnetic attraction between audience and star. This is made even greater by the back stage visit he and his father make after the show. The star turns out to be much shorter than he appeared to be, with reddish hair instead of black and rough skin instead of the smooth skin he appeared to have. His manner is coarse, not like the refined character he portrayed. Topping it off, he is in need of continuous reassurance that he did a good job, whereas the character he played was supremely confident and poised. This is the key to Felix's realization that for most of the world illusion is reality, and that the illusionist needs the audience just as the audience needs the illusionist. For most of us, the layman’s precept that ‘Illusion is reality’ is an integral part of our mental makeup, perhaps.

Wow that was a lot of typing indeed. I'll sign off with a very interesting quote I came across on the web about this novel ...

The famous Scot critic Edwin Muir: "Here is that unheard of, that supposedly impossible thing, a good German comic novel…". Are the Germans listening?!

* Floydian plagiarism.