Portal:Literature/Biography archive/2007, Week 23

Thomas Mann (June 6, 1875 – August 12, 1955) was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate, known for his series of highly symbolic and often ironic epic novels and mid-length stories, noted for their insight into the psychology of the artist and intellectual. His analysis and critique of the European and German soul use modernized German and Biblical stories, as well as the ideas of Goethe, Nietzsche, and Schopenhauer.