Magic as always. Talking of which. I'm reading The Magic Mountain as we speak. I'm half way through, it's a long book, but I've been thinking throughout, could anyone ever write this today. It seems impausible for the simple fact that Mann was an idealist, and even if he had censorship, which he didn't really, he would have found a way to write what he did. Plenty of writers wrote mind-blowing books after that novel of course! But there's something ultimately pure about The Magic Mountain I doubt we'll see again.