Confessions of Felix Krull, Confidence Man (The Early Years) [Paperback]

Those who know Thomas Mann for his weightier books will be surprised to see how light this short novel is.

Felix Krull is a "Con Man." This book recounts his early years, from early childhood, through his ingenious method of avoiding being drafted into the army, to his initial jobs. He avoids the army by appearing too eager to join, thus inducing suspicion regarding his mental stability. He works his way up by recognizing that having a good appearance and a willing attitude more than compensates for lack of experience or ability. Being a confidence man requires supreme self-confidence and Felix has that in abundance.

For me the pivotal scene is when Felix is taken to the theater by his father to see a play in which one of the father's old school chums 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.

Whether Mann had a sequel planned is uncertain. We do leave Felix as a young man, wondering what his further adventures and potential growth might have been.

As it is, this is a delightful story with a profound subtext. Are there any people like Felix around today?

This picaresque novel of adventure by the writer of such ponderous masterpieces as _The Magic Mountain_ is one of my favorite books.

Many readers who come to it after _Buddenbrooks_ or "Tonio Kroeger" note the parallels Mann felt existed between the artist and the confidence man. In Tonio Kroeger, the eponymous central character has an encounter in his home town where he's mistaken briefly for a con man. In the earlier story, it's an incident full of irony. In _Felix Krull_, Mann turns that theme on its head and plays it as a burlesque and shows us the artist seen through the fun-house mirror of the artist-equals-con man metaphor.

A number of the themes of Mann's earlier novels are taken up here in humorous and ironic form, e.g., the rise of the artist through the decay of a respectable family (a theme in _Buddenbrooks_) is transmogrified into Krull's lineage from a good-but-dissolute family; in consequence, their respectability is more apparent than real, and as much an illusion as Felix Krull's career of deceit.

It may be that Mann intends that Felix Krull symbolically represents decay beneath his disguise (like the actor Mueller-Rose in the story), but the reader doesn't *feel* this is true. Krull might be the healthiest character in Mann's work, full of that zest for life that so wearied the bourgeois manque' Tonio Kroeger in Italy. Felix Krull isn't a "manque'" anything; a consummate actor on the stage of life, he is simply whatever or whomever he wants to be.

The elegance and suavity of the writing, captured well by the Lindley translation, are both a pleasure to read, and an analogue for the well-oiled confidence skills of the first person narrator. It's helpful to remember that we are being told "true confessions" by a man who has made his way in life by taking people in.

Another feature of the work, not often commented on, is the element of parody. Mann wrote the book with one eye, as it were, on the great German picaresque novel by Hans von Grimmelshausen, _Simplicius Simplicissimus_. Krull's travails, talents, and successes are at times a humorous transposition of those in Grimmelshausen's famous work. (Grimmelshausen's book is worth seeking out in its own right.)

And then, there's the Goethe reference: the artful, confessional style was intended (or so Mann claimed in an interview) as a parody of Goethe's style in _Dichtung und Wahrheit_. Mann had a great deal to say about Goethe during his career, much of it freighted with a lot of seriousness (e.g., see his essay on "Goethe and Tolstoy"), but proves here he could regard his great predecessor with more than a little irony.

Because the book was started back in 1910, and reflects on a period 20 or more years earlier, it's a historical time capsule of sorts. This might annoy some readers; for others, it grants the work a certain period charm.

Finally, we should remember that the work is incomplete. This was intended to be the first part of a full-dress fictional memoir. Had he lived longer, Mann might have written 2 more volumes. The result is that the book is a bright fragment rather than a fully realized work of art. We're left to imagine what the remainder of Felix Krull's adventures might have been like. In an interview in 1955, Mann remarked that Krull would have a matrimonial adventure, as well as a prison sojourn and a retirement in England.

A pity we can never see the completed work, and cannot know with certainty how Krull's career would develop. I, for one, am happy with what Mann was able to bequeath us. I feel almost as if he left me a legacy.

Many readers associate Tom Mann with being super-erudite,solemn, and a tough read. Check out this book, and you'll learn this great author could be tongue in cheek, hilarious, and downright boisterous. Even more amazing is that he started this novel as young man (though an astoundingly successful and famous one after the phenomenal Buddenbrooks,published at the age of 26!), ands finished it 40 plus years and 2 world wars later, when in his 70's! A young man out to make his mark in the world evades the draft, frolicks with various high class ladies, learns the ins and outs of some mean European city streets, and generally proves himself a rogue of extraordinary powers! There are bits of the standards Mann philosophizing, comments on the Greek Gods,etc, but that is to be expected from this incredible genius of a writer. But for all those Mann doubters out there who stumbled over say, DEATH IN VENICE, MAGIC MOUNTAIN, FAUSTUS etc. give this a try, since this only proves the tasty froth on this vast and distinguished literary cake by the GREATEST 20th Century Author!!!