German essayist, cultural critic, and novelist, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1929. Among Mann's most famous works is Buddenbrooks (1901), which appeared when he was 26. He began writing it during a one-year stay in Italy and completed it in about two and a half years. The book outraged the citizens of Lübeck, who saw it as a thinly veiled account of local incidents and figures, although Mann never mentions the name of the city.

"A man lives not only his personal life, as an individual, but also, consciously or unconsciously, the life of his epoch and his contemporaries." (from The Magic Mountain, 1924)

Paul Thomas Mann was born in Lübeck, where he was baptized as a Protestant in St. Mary's Church. He was the son of a wealthy father, Thomas Johann Heinrich Mann, who owned a grain firm and was elected the senator overseeing taxes for Lübeck. Mann's mother Julia, née da Silva-Bruhns, came from a German-Portugese-Creole family. After Mann's father died in 1891, his trading firm was dissolved, and the family moved to Munich. Mann was educated at the Lübeck gymnasium and he also spent some time at the University of Munich. He then worked for the south German Fire Insurance Company for a short period. Mann's career as a writer started in the magazine Simplicissimus. Mann's first book, Der kleine Herr Friedmann, came out in 1898.

While at university, Mann became immersed in the writings of the philosophers Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche as well as in the music of composer Richard Wagner. In Buddenbrooks, Mann's early masterpiece, he used the technique of the leitmotif, which he adapted from Wagner. Mann had started the book in 1897 as a small story about one member of the family. However, the "protracted finger practice with no ulterior advantages" enlarged into a saga of a wealthy Hanseatic family, which declines from strength to decadence. The last Buddenbrook, the musically gifted young Hanno who dies of a typhoid infection; he is the first of many similar, often morally suspect aesthetes in Mann's novels, continuing in Tonio Kröger, Gustav Aschenbach, Felix Krull, and Adrian Lewerkühn.

After Buddenbrooks, Mann concentrated on short novels or novellas. In 1902 he published Tonio Kröger, a spiritual autobiography exploring art and discipline. He married in 1905 Katja Pringsheim, the daughter of a wealthy Munich family; they had a total six children over the ensuing years. Königliche Hoheit (1909, Royal Highness) reflected Mann's views of duty and sacrifice. Der Tod in Venedig (1912, Death in Venice), Mann's famous multilayered novella, was inspired by a young, sailor-suited boy, Wladyslaw Moes, to son of Baron Moes, whom the author saw in Venice in 1911. Later in life Wladyslaw remembered "the old man", who had been watching him, and noticed after reading the story in Polish translation, how accurately Mann had described his linen suit and his favorite jacket. Other characters have also their counterparts in real life. However, Tadzio in the book is 14, but Wladyslaw was actually ten and a half. In the story an author, Gustav von Aschenbach, whose character is said to be based on the composer Gustav Mahler, fells hopelessly in love with a young teenager, Tadzio. Obsessed with the boy, he stays in Venice during a cholera epidemic, and also dies of cholera. The story was adapted into screen by Luchino Visconti, starring Dirk Bogarde and Bjorn Andresen. As a theme Visconti used the Adagietto from Mahler's Fifth Symphony.

During World War I Mann supported Kaiser's policy and attacked liberalism. In Von Deutscher Republik (1923), as a semi-official spokesman for parliamentary democracy, he called the German intellectuals to support the new Weimar state.

After ten years of work Mann completed his second major work, Der Zauberberg (1924, The Magic Mountain), a novel about ideas and of lost humanism. It depicted again a fight between liberal and conservative values, enlightened civilized world and nonrational beliefs. Hans Castorp, the protagonist, goes to the elegant tuberculosis sanatorium in Davos, to visit his cousin. Castorp is not really ill, but he stays for a period of seven years, and undergoes an advanced education on the Magic Mountain, primarily through speaking and listening. Two men struggle for his soul, Settembrini, an Italian humanist, and Naptha (see: Georg Lukacs), a radical reactionary, who speaks of blind and irrational faith. Naptha cries out a prophecy that came true in Germany only a decade after publication of the book: "No!" Naphta continued. "The mystery and precept of our age is not liberation and the development of the ego. What our age needs, what it demands, what it will create for itself, is - terror." Naphta challenges Settembrini to a duel with pistols. Settembrini fires into the air, Naphta kills himself in a rage. Another weird character is Mynheer Peeperkorn, who arrives at the Mountain in the company of the beautiful Claudia Chauchat. Castorp falls in love with her at first sight. Claudia returns to Peeperkorn, and Castorp yearns her deeply. The vitalistic Peeperkorn, who confronts his own impotence, also kills himself. Castorp leaves the sanatorium to join the army at the outbreak of the war. Mann tells the reader that while the young man's chances of survival are not good, the question must be left open.

Mann's next major work was Joseph und seine Brüder (1933-42, Joseph and his Brothers), set in the biblical world. The story about the conflict between personal freedom and political tyranny was based on Genesis 12-50. The first volume recounts the early history of Jacob, and introduces then Joseph, the central character. He is sold to the Egypt, where he refuses Potiphar's advances and gains her enmity. Joseph develops into a wise man and the savior of his people.

During the writing process of Joseph and his Brothers the political control in Germany was seized by the Nazis. On Hitler's accession to power, Mann moved to Switzerland, where he edited the literary journal Mass und Wert. He settled finally in the United States in 1936, working among others at the University of Princeton. Lotte in Weimar (1939, The Beloved Returns) focused on the world of Goethe's novel The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774). In 1941 Mann moved to Santa Monica, California. He lived in the U.S. some ten years, but was disappointed with the American persecution of Communist sympathizers. The Manns were frequent visitors to Salka Viertel’s Santa Monica salon. Her Sunday tea parties were also attended by Bertolt and Helli Brecht, Bruno and Liesel Frank, and various other intellectuals exiled from Nazi Germany.

Mann admired greatly Russian literature and wrote several essays about on Leo Tolstoy and his "undying realism." Especially he loved Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. However, he disliked the later Tolstoy and considered him less noble than Goethe. In the essay 'Dostoevsky - With Moderation' (1945) he deals with the author's supposed confession to Turgenev that he had violated an underage girl. René Wellek has dismissed Mann's speculations and considers the whole business of Dostoevsky's criminality totally misconceived (A History of Modern Criticism, vol. 7, 1991).

Mann's last great work was Doktor Faustus (1947), the story of composer Adrian Lewerkühn and the progressive destruction of German culture in the two World Wars. In the background of the story was the innovative 12-tone music of Arnold Schönberg. Mann's account of the genesis of Doctor Faustus appeared in 1949. (Faust theme / Pact with the Devil, see J.W. Goethe.) After lung cancer operation Mann returned in 1947 to Europe. Demonstratively he avoided Germany, but he was made an honorary citizen of his hometown of Lübeck and he supported the rebuilding of its Marienkirche. Mostly Mann lived in Switzerland, near Zürich, where he died on August 12, 1955. Mann's parodic and light-hearted novel Confessions of Felix Krull was left unfinished.

For further reading: Thomas Mann by Henry Hatfield (1962); Thomas Mann: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. by Henry Hatfield (1964); Essays on Thomas Mann by G. Lucàcs (1965); Thomas Mann by J.P. Stern (1967); Thomas Mann by Ignace Feuerlicht (1968); Thomas Mann by H. Bürgin and H-O. Mayer (1969); Thomas Mann: The Devil's Advocate by T.E. Apter (1979); The Borthers Mann by N. Hamilton (1979); Thomas Mann by E. Heller (1979); Thomas Mann by M. Swales (1980); The Ironic German by Erich Heller (1981); Thomas Mann by Richard Winston (1981); Thomas Mann and His Family ny M. Reich-Ranicki (1989); Thomas Mann by M.P.A Travers (1992); Thomas Mann: A Life by Donald Prater (1995); The Real Tadzio: Thomas Mann's "Death in Venice" and the Boy Who Inspired it by Gilbert Adair (2001); The Cambridge Companion to Thomas Mann, ed. by Ritchie Robertson (2001); Thomas Mann: Life as a Work of Art by Hermann Kurzke (2002) - See also: Elias Canetti, Abraham Polonsky, W.H. Auden who was married to Thomas Mann's daughter. Brother Heinrich Mann was a noted writer.  Klaus Mann, his son, published several novels, among them Kindernovelle (1926), Flucht in der Norden (Pako pohjoiseen, 1934), Mephisto (Mefisto, 1936), Der Vulkan (1939). His autobiography The Turning Point (1942), appeared in Germany in 1952. Klaus Mann was born in Munich. He worked as a theater critic, actor and journalist. His play, Anja and Esther, produced in Munich and Hamburg in 1925, dealt with homosexual relationships. On stage, Klaus and his sister Erika interprered their own roles, Esther was played by her lover Pamela Wedekind. In the 1930s he emigrated in the United States, becoming an U.S. citizen in 1943. From 1939 he wrote mostly in English. Klaus Mann died in Cannes. His restless life ended in suicide.

Selected works

• Der kleine Herr Friedemann, 1898 (augmented edition, 1909)
  - Little Herr Friedemann (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, in Stories of Three Decades, 1936; in Little Herr Friedemann and Other Stories, 1972)
  - Pieni herra Friedeman (suom. Marja Wich-Markkula, teoksessa Wälsungien veri, 2009)
  
• Buddenbrooks, 1901
  - Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1924; John E. Woods, 1993)
  - Buddenbrookit (suom. Siiri Siegberg, 1925)
  - films: Die Buddenbrooks, 1923, dir. by Gerhard Lamprecht, starring Peter Esser, Mady Christians, Alfred Abel, Hildegard Imhof; Buddenbrooks, 1959, dir. by Alfred Weidenmann, starring Liselotte Pulver, Hansjörg Felmy, Hanns Lothar, Lil Dagover, Werner Hinz; Buddenbrooks, 2008, dir. by Heinrich Breloer, featuring Armin Mueller-Stahl, Iris Berben, Jessica Schwarz, August Diehl, Mark Waschke, Raban Bieling
• Tristan: Sechs Novellen, 1903 (contains Der Weg zum Friedhof; Tristan; Der Kleiderschrank; Luischen; Gladius Dei; Tonio Kröger)
  - Tonio Kroger (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, in Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories, 1930; David Luke, in Tonio Kroger and Other Stories, 1970); Gladius Dei (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, in Stories of Three Decades, 1936); Tristan (translated by David Luke, in Death in Venice and Other Stories, 1988)
  - Tonio Kröger (suom. Aarno Peromies, teoksessa Kolme novellia, 1966); Tie Hautuumaalle; Luischen; Gladius Dei (suom. Marja Wich-Markkula, teoksessa Wälsungien veri, 2009)
  - film: Tonio Kröger 1964, dir. by Rolf Thiele, starring Jean-Claude Brialy, Nadja Tiller
• Fiorenza, 1904 (play)
• Bilse und Ich, 1908
• Der kleine Herr Friedemann: und andere Novellen, 1909 (contains Der kleine Herr Friedemann; Der Wille zum Glück; Enttäuschung; Der Bajazzo; Tobias Mindernickel; Luischen; Die Hungernden; Das Eisenbahnunglück)
  - Little Herr Friedemann (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, in Stories of Three Decades, 1936; in Little Herr Friedemann and Other Stories, 1972); The Hungry (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, in Stories of Three Decades, 1936)
  - Tahto onneen; Tobias Mindernickel (suom. Marja Wich-Markkula, teoksessa Wälsungien veri, 2009)
• Königliche Hoheit, 1909
  - Royal Highness (translated by A. Cecil Curtis, 1916)
  - Kuninkaallinen korkeus (suom. Sinikka Kallio, 1982)
• Der Tod in Venedig, 1912
  - Death in Venice (translators: Kenneth Burke, 1925; H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1930; David Luke, 1988; Clayton Koelb, 1994; Stanley Appelbaum, 1995; Naomi Ritter (ed.), 1998; Joachim Neugroschel, 1998; Jefferson S. Chase, 1999; Michael Heim, 2004)
  - Kuolema Venetsiassa (suom. Toini Kivimäki, 1928)
  - films: Morte a Venezia, 1971, dir. by Luchino Visconti, starring Dirk Bogarde, Bjorn Andresen, Silvana Mangano, Marisa Berenson. "This movie is a unique insult: it is a travesty of the work of two of the most beloved artists of the early twentieth century - Thomas Mann and Gustav Mahler." (David Denby in the Atlantic, September 1971); Mystique, 1979, dir. by Roberta Findlay, starring Samantha Fox, Georgina Spelvin, Jake Teague; Death in Venice, TV drama 1990, dir. Robin Lough, libretto by Myfanwy Piper
• Das Wunderkind: Novellen, 1914
• Friedrich und die große Koalition, 1915
• Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen, 1918
  - Reflections of a Nonpolitical Man (translated, with an introduction, by Walter D. Morris, 1983)
• Herr und Hund, 1919 (augmented edition, 1919)
  - Basham and I (translated by Herman George Scheffauer, 1923) / A Man and His Dog (tr. 1930)
  - Herra ja koira (suom. Markku Mannila, 1983)
• Wälsungenblut, 1921
  - Blood of the Walsungs (translated by H.T. Lowe Porter, in Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories, 1930)
  - Wälsungien veri (suom. Marja Wich-Markkula, teoksessa Wälsungien veri, 2009)
  
• Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull. Buch der Kindheit, 1922 (additional chapter published as Die Begegnung, 1953; complete version, 1953)
  - Confessions of Felix Krull, Confidence Man; The Early Years (tr. 1955)
• Rede und Antwort, 1922
• Novellen, 1922 (2 vols.)
• Okkulte Erlebnisse, 1924
• Der Zauberberg, 1924
  - The Magic Mountain (translators: H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1927; John E. Woods, 2005)
  - Taikavuori (suom. Kai Kaila, 1957)
  - film: Der Zauberberg, 1982, dir. by Hans W. Geissendörfer, starring Werner Eichhorn, Rod Steiger, Marie-France Pisier, Flavio Bucci, Christoph Eichhorn
• Bemühungen, 1925
• Unordnung und frühes Leid, 1926
  - Early Sorrow (translated by George Scheffauer, 1929)
  - Varhaista tuskaa (suom. Anna Leiwo, 1933)
• Death in Venice and Other Stories, 1925
• Von deutscher Republik, 1926
• Pariser Rechenschaft, 1926
• Children & Fools, 1928 (translated by Herman George Scheffauer)
• Three Essays, 1929
• Die Forderung des Tages, 1930
• A Sketch of My Life, 1930
• Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories, 1930 (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter)
• Mario und der Zauberer, 1930
  - Mario and the Magician (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, in Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories, 1930)
  - Mario ja taikuri (suom. Eeva-Liisa Manner, teoksessa Kolme novellia, 1966)
  - film: Mario und der Zauberer, 1994, dir. by Klaus Maria Brandauer, starring Julian Sands, Anna Galiena, Jan Wachtel, Nina Schweser, Klaus Maria Brandauer
• Goethe und Tolstoi. Zum Problem der Humanität, 1932
• Past Masters and Other Essays, 1933
• Joseph und seine Brüder, 1933-43 (tetralogy: Die Geschichten Jaakobs, 1933; Der junge Joseph, 1934; Joseph in Ägypten 1936; Joseph der Ernährer, 1943)
  - Joseph and his Brothers (translators: H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1934): The Stories of Jacob (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1934); Young Joseph (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1935); Joseph in Egypt (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1936); Joseph the Provider (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1944)
  - Joosef ja hänen veljensä: Jaakobin tarina; Nuori Joosef; Joosef Egyptissä; Joosef, ruokkija (suom. Lauri Hirvensalo, 1947-48)
• Nocturnes, 1934
• Leiden und Größe der Meister, 1935
• Stories of Three Decades, 1936 (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter; augmented edition, Stories of a Lifetime, 1961)
• Freud, Goethe, Wagner, 1937
• Dieser Friede, 1938
  - This Peace (tr. 1938)
• Achtung, Europa! Aufsätze zur Zeit, 1938
• Lotte in Weimar, 1939
  - Lotte in Weimar (tr. 1940) / The Beloved Returns (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1940)
  - Lotte (suom. Marita Salomaa, 1947)
  - film: Lotte in Weimar, 1975, dir by Egon Günter, starring Lilli Palmer, Martin Hellberg and Rolf Ludwig
  
• Schopenhauer, 1938
• Die vertauschten Köpfe: Eine indische Legende, 1940
  - The Transposed Heads: A Legend of India (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter, 1941)
  - Päiden vaihdos (suom. Risto Kautto, 1987)
• Dieser Krieg, 1940
  - This War (translated by Eric Sutton, 1940)
• Order of the Day: Political Essays and Speeches of Two Decades, 1942
• Das Gesetz: Erzählung, 1944
  - Tables of the Law (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1945)
  - Laki: kuunnelma (suom. Risto Kautto, 1985)
• Deutsche Hörer!, 1942
  - Listen, Germany! (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1943)
• Adel des Geistes, 1945 (augmented edition, 1956)
• Leiden an Deutschland: Tagebuchblatter aus den Jahren 1933 und 1934, 1946 [Suffering through Germany]
• Doktor Faustus: Das Leben des deutschen Tonsetzers Adrian Leverkühn erzählt von einem Freunde, 1947
  - Doctor Faustus: The Life of the German Composer Adrian Leverkühn as Told by a Friend (translators: H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1948; John E. Woods, 1997)
  - Tohtori Faustus: saksalaisen säveltäjän Adrian Leverkühnin elämä erään hänen ystävänsä kertomana (suom. Sinikka Kallio, 1979)
  - film: Doktor Faustus, 1982, dir. by Franz Seitz, starring Jon Finch, André Heller, Hanns Zischler, Margot Hielscher, Siemen Rühaak, Marie-Hélène Breillat
• Essays of Three Decades, 1947 (translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter)
• Nietzsches Philosophie im Lichte unserer Erfahrung, 1947
  
• Neue Studien, 1948
• Die Entstehung des Doktor Faustus. Roman eines Romans, 1949
  - The Story of a Novel; the Genesis of Doctor Faustus (translated by Richard and Clara Winston, 1961)
• The Thomas Mann Reader, 1950 (ed. by Joseph Warner Angell)
• Michelangelo in seinen Dichtungen, 1950
• Der Erwählte, 1951
  - The Holy Sinner (translated by H.T. Lowe-Porter, 1951)
  - Pyhä syntinen (suom. Jorma Partanen, 1953)
• Die Betrogene, 1953
  - The Black Swan (translated by Willard R. Trask, 1954)
  - Elämän uhri (suom. Jorma Partanen, 1955)
• Der Künstler und die Gesellschaft, 1953
  
• Altes und Neues: kleine Prosa aus fünf Jahrzehnten, 1953 (rev. ed., 1956)
• Luthers Hochzeit, 1954
  
• Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull, 1954
  - Confessions of Felix Krull (translated by Denver Lindley, 1955)
  - Huijari Felix Krullin tunnustukset (suom. Kai Kaila, 1980)
  - film: Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull, 1957, dir. by Kurt Hoffmann, starring Horst Bucholz, Liselotte Pulver and Ingrid Andree
• Versuch über Tschechow, 1954
  
• Versuch über Schiller, 1955
• Ansprache im Schillerjahr 1955, 1955
• Nachlese: Prosa 1951-1955, 1956
• Zeit und Werk: Tagebücher, Reden und Schriften zum Zeitgeschehen, 1956
• Last Essays, 1959 (translated by Richard and Clara Winston and Tania and James Stern)
• Briefe an Paul Amann 1915-1952, 1959 (edited by Herbert Wegener)
  - Letters to Paul Amann, 1915-1952 (translated by Richard and Clara Winston, 1960)
• Gespräch in Briefen, 1960 (with Karl Kerenyi, ed. by Kenenyi)
  - Mythology and Humanism: The Correspondece of Thomas Mann and Karl Kerényi (translated by Alexander Gelley, 1975)
• Thomas Mann an Ernst Bertram: Briefe aus den Jahren 1910-1955, 1960 (ed. Inge Jens)
• Briefe 1899-1955, 1961-65 (3 vols., ed. Erika Mann)
  - Letters of Thomas Mann 1889-1955 (2 vols., ed. by Richard and Clara Winston, 1970)
• Stories of a Lifetime, 1961 (2 vols., translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter)
• Wagner und unsere Zeit - Aufsätze, Betrachtungen, Briefe, 1963
• Addresses Delivered at the Library of Congress, 1963
• Über deutsche Literatur: ausgewählte Essays, Reden und Briefe, 1968
• Thomas Mann - Erich von Kahler. Briefwechsel im Exil, 1970 (ed. Hans Wysling)
  - An Exeptional Friendship: The Correspondence of Thomas Mann and Erich Kahler, 1975 (translated from the German by Richard and Clara Winston)
• The Letters to Caroline Newton, 1971 (edited by Robert F. Cohen)
• Gesammelte Werke, 1974 (14 vols.)
• The Hesse-Mann Letters: The Correspondence of Hermann Hesse and Thomas Mann, 1910-1955, 1975 (edited by Anni Carlsson and Volker Michels; translated from the German by Ralph Manheim; annotations by Wolfgang Sauerlander; foreword by Theodore Ziolkowski)
• Briefe an Otto Grautoff,1894-1901, und Ida Boy-Ed,1903-1928, 1975 (ed. by Peter de Mendelssohn)
• Tagebücher, 1977- (edited by Peter de Mendelssohn)
  - Diaries, 1918-1939, 1982 (selection and foreword by Hermann Kesten; translated from the German by Richard and Clara Winston)
• Gesammelte Werke, 1980-90 (13 vols.)
• Goethe's Laufbahn als Schriftsteller: zwölf Essays und Reden zu Goethe, 1982
• Tagebücher, 1944-1.4.1946, 1986 (edited by Inge Jens)
• Dichter oder Schriftsteller?: der Briefwechsel zwischen Thomas Mann und Josef Ponten 1919-1930, 1988 (edited by Hans Wysling and Werner Pfister)
• Briefwechsel mit Autoren: Rudolf Georg Binding ..., 1988 (edited by Hans Wysling)
  
• Tagebücher, 28.5.1946-31.12.1948, 1989 (edited by Inge Jens)
• Letters of Thomas Mann, 1889-1955, 1990 (selected and translated from the German by Richard and Clara Winston; introduction by Richard Winston)
• Tagebücher, 1949-1950, 1991 (edited by Inge Jens)
• Notizbücher: Edition in zwei Bänden, 1991-92 (2 vols., edited by Hans Wysling and Yvonne Schmidlin)
• Jahre des Unmuts: Thomas Manns Briefwechsel mit René Schickele, 1930-1940, 1992 (edited by Hans Wysling and Cornelia Bernini)
• Briefwechsel, 1937-1955 / Thomas Mann, Agnes E. Meyer, 1992 (edited by Hans Rudolf Vaget)
• Thomas Mann--Félix Bertaux: Correspondence, 1923-1948, 1993 (edited by Biruta Cap)
• Thomas Mann, Erich von Kahler: Briefwechsel 1931-1955, 1993 (edited by Michael Assmann)
• Tagebücher, 1951-1952, 1993 (edited by Inge Jens)
• Essays, 1993-1995 (6 vols., edited by Hermann Kurzke und Stephan Stachorski)
• Tagebücher, 1953-1955, 1995 (edited by Inge Jens)
  
• Herzlich zugeeignet: Widmungen von Thomas Mann 1887-1955, 1988 (edited by Gert Heine and Paul Schommer)
• Fragile Republik: Thomas Mann und Nachkriegsdeutschland, 1999 (edited by Stephan Stachorski)
• Briefwechsel, 1932-1955 / Thomas Mann, Käte Hamburger, 1999 (edited by Hubert Brunträger)
• Hermann Hesse - Thomas Mann: Briefwechsel, 1999 (3rd ed., edited by Anni Carlsson und Volker Michels)
  
• Collegheft, 1894-1895, 2001 (edited by Yvonne Schmidlin and Thomas Sprecher)
• Briefe an Richard Schaukal / Thomas Mann, 2003 (edited by Claudia Girardi)
• Grosse kommentierte Frankfurter Ausgabe: Werke, Briefe, Tagebücher, 2002- (edited by Heinrich Detering, et al.)
  
• Essays, 2002- (edited by Heinrich Detering)
  
• Briefe, 2002- (edited by Thomas Sprecher, Hans R. Vaget, and Cornelia Bernini)
• Frühe Erzählungen, 1893-1912, 2004 (edited by Terence J. Reed and Malte Herwig)
• Werden Sie nicht berühmt-!: Briefwechsel Thomas Mann und Harald Kohtz, 2005 (edited by Bernd M. Kraske)
• Thomas Mann, Katia Mann - Anna Jacobson: ein Briefwechsel, 2005 (edited by Werner Frizen and Friedhelm Marx)
• Briefe an Jonas Lesser und Siegfried Trebitsch 1939-1954, 2006 (edited by Franz Zeder)