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Part 5, Chapter 9: Walpurgis Night
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Magic Mountain, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Time
Coming of Age
Death and Illness
East vs. West
Abstract Ideals vs. Lived Experience
Summary
Analysis
The narrator muses about the nature of time and change. Without time, there would be no change. But because we measure time as circular motion, then time’s real change is “rest and stagnation,” with what’s happened in the past perpetually repeating into the future. These are the big ideas Hans considers, though he can’t settle on any concrete answers.
The narration continues to meditate on the tenuous and subjective nature of time, here reflecting on the challenges that humanity’s organization of time into circular motion (the cycles of seasons) poses regarding change and the passage of time.
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Joachim, meanwhile, grows frustrated with his uncertain health, specifically the “Gaffky” scale used to measure residents’ health and chances of recovery. Some patients who have come in horribly ill score an inconceivably low score, whereas others who seem hardly ill at all score high. Joachim himself was at a “two” two weeks ago, yet now he’s a nine—and thus his chances of returning to the service are fading before his eyes. He declares that he’s going to leave this place one way or another, even if it kills him. Joachim’s obstinance makes Hans think about what Clavdia said about Joachim being sicker than he realizes, but he keeps these thoughts to himself. Ever since Mardi Gras, he's felt a bit guilty about not telling Joachim about his interaction with Clavdia, though he’s sure Joachim knows the gist.
Joachim’s frustration with the “Gaffky” scale gestures toward the meaningless and arbitrary nature of illness. He wants there to be some logic to his recovery—if he was a “two” two weeks ago, it should follow that he continues to improve, not suddenly shoot up to a “nine.” But illness doesn’t operate like a logical equation: it doesn’t imbue a person’s life with meaning, as Hans wants it to. And whether a person gets better has nothing to do with whether or not they actually get better, as Joachim wishes were the case. Hans hasn’t told Joachim about his conversation with Clavdia, likely because he knows practical, driven Joachim would not approve. Hans’s guilt at not telling Joachim illustrates Hans’s characteristic ambivalence: he wants to be irrationally in love with Clavdia, yet he also seems to know that it’s not good for him and that Joachim’s judgment is warranted.
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Now, it’s been six weeks since Mardi Gras. Hans long ago returned Clavdia’s pencil to her, though he asked for a personal effect in return. She gave him her X-ray image, which Hans now carries around in his wallet. She promised to return (or intended to, anyway), but she isn’t sure when. Hans saw her step out of the sanatorium and into the carriage that was waiting for her. Like everyone else who leaves, she looked happy, just because leaving means that life will change—even if it’s uncertain how. Though she is physically absent, she remains present in Hans’s mind.
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As Clavdia sarcastically predicated, Hans’s fever did indeed rise after their interaction. As a result, Behrens starts giving him injections. On one such occasion, Hans mentions to Behrens the foolish optimism of people who choose to leave the Berghof, casually citing Clavdia as an example. He doesn’t know what the weather is like in Daghestan, where she said she was headed, but it can’t be great for her health. Then he admits to becoming casually acquainted with her just before her departure, and how unfortunate it was that it had to happen then. He also admits that she had no interest in keeping in touch via letters. Behrens laughs, noting that Clavdia is surely too lazy to write. Anyway, Behrens reassures Hans, she’ll surely be back—that’s just how it goes with people who leave too soon. When Hans interjects to ask Behrens how long he’ll be here, Behrens is evasive.
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Alone, Hans thinks more about Clavdia’s not wanting to write to him. He decides it probably shouldn’t be that much of a big deal to him—after all, isn’t keeping in touch rather bourgeois, anyway? Still, it bothers him. Another thing troubling him is that, ever since Settembrini stormed out of the room on Mardi Gras, things have been rather cold between Hans and him. Hans figures Settembrini probably thinks he’s a lost cause.
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Settembrini breaks the silence one day in passing, with a reference to classical mythology. He asks Hans if Hans “like[]d the pomegranate” and then cautions him that those who taste the fruit of the underworld belong to that realm forever. Then he continues on his way. Once alone, Hans scowls at the unsolicited advice, but he’s also grateful that Settembrini has finally broken the ice.
Several weeks later, at late breakfast on Easter, Settembrini asks Hans if he’s ever traveled across the ocean before. He tells Hans that the Easter eggs and rabbits that have been placed at each table remind him of life on a luxury ship: of the creature comforts that make one forget the endless horizon beyond. Hans listens to Settembrini philosophize a bit more about the Easter holiday, and then he responds with great praise, hoping to tell Settembrini everything he thinks Settembrini wants to hear. Then Settembrini makes a huge announcement: he’s leaving the sanatorium. Having been declared uncurable, staying here is just the same as leaving, and so he has chosen to leave and to accept whatever consequences will entail. He’s moving to Dorf, nearby, so it’s likely their paths will still cross. After that, Settembrini goes to live in town with Lukačnek, the ladies’ tailor.
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Residents leave the Berghof against their best interests all the time. Frau Salomon, for example, who’d been there for a long time before Hans first arrived, left in a huff after Behrens declared that her condition had worsened and that she needed to stay for five more months. She returned to the damp, cold environment of her native Amsterdam—clearly a worse environment for her condition than the Berghof. Behrens is convinced that Frau Salomon will be back.
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Meanwhile, Anton Karlovitch Ferge, whose condition was once so grave, takes over Settembrini’s spot at Hans and Joachim’s table, having made a remarkable and unexpected recovery. The cousins like the “simple martyr” and take to chatting and taking their constitutionals with him, though the melting snow makes the walking paths difficult to navigate. It’s March now, and soon new plant growth replaces the snow that formerly blanketed the meadow. When Hans expresses an interest in botany, Joachim sarcastically asks if it was Krokowski who inspired this new interest. Lately, Krokowski’s lectures have focused on botany. He has been talking about the link between love and death, citing as an example a type of morel mushroom that emits an odor of decay and is also an aphrodisiac.
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Joachim’s sarcastic tone has nothing to do with botany, though. Even if Joachim doesn’t know why he’s been on edge lately, Hans does—a while back, Hans was chatting with Krokowski when the doctor stopped by to record everyone’s temperature, something that Joachim can surely make out through his room’s thin walls, though he doesn’t mention so to Hans. Joachim also made another discovery, which he has clearly decided is a betrayal: he saw Hans go into Krokowski’s “analytical pit” for a psychoanalysis session. Since then, though, Hans has stopped doing this.
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