Tonio Creger is a writer, the protagonist of a novel, a representative of the “spirit”, who, although aware of his superiority over representatives of “life,” still does not despise it, since he understands that “if anything can be done from the poet’s literature, how time… a love for the human, living, ordinary “, and without this his voice” will remain buzzing with copper and cymbals squealing. ” Here the voice of Tonio Kräger merges with the voice of the author. The author’s image can be discerned in the writhing writer Tonio Kreger, who stands for art, which is born of feeling and life. Not only the thoughts of Tonio Kräger are related to the author. Many events in his life seem to have been taken from the biography of T. Mann. For example, the northern German city described at the beginning of the novel reminds Lubeck, the author’s homeland. And the memoirs of Tonio Kräger about his father’s “
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Manna’s hero is tormented by the thought of the dangerous impact of a soul-corroding reflection on people living a simple and natural life, not burdened by doubts. It seems to him, “that the kingdom of art on earth is expanding, and the realm of health and simplicity is getting smaller.” Very much in Tonio Creger, especially in the Tonio Kreuger-teenager, reminds Ganno Buddenbrook. Like Ganno, he is the son of a grain merchant, holding an elective office in the city; like Ganno, he is the fruit of a “strange”, unusual marriage. Tonio Creger is also “lonely and unlike all other people, respectable and ordinary.” But Ganno’s world view is absolutely integral. Tonio is tormented by meditations, who he is – an intellectual or a businessman. Tonio from the burgher environment, but it is dominated by an artist for whom the whole world is a matter of judgment, material for the work of creative consciousness. Music, writing poems, reflections on love and suffering constitute his “inner life.” However, he reaches out to people who are not like him, for example,
his gymnastic friend Hans Hansen, a cheerful handsome man, an athlete and a horse. Hans embodies an everyday life, absorbed in himself and his interests. Hans does not know the torments and worries that are characteristic of the creative reflective nature of Tonio. Any collision of Tonio with real life once again demonstrates the contradictoriness of his character. The contradiction is aggravated by the fact that Tonio will fall in love with a beautiful girl, Ingu Holm, who will appear on the side of “life” next to Hans. Nevertheless, the protagonist of the novel will not disturb the joy of the merry pair Ingeborg Holm – Hans Gansen. With admiration and melancholy, Tonio will look at the triumph of beauty, health and life. He loves these “blond and blue-eyed” not only for their beauty, but for their complete opposite to themselves. The contradiction between the surrounding world and the “inner life” of writer Tonio Kräger will become even more acute over time. The essence of this contradiction is formulated successfully by Tonio’s friend, Russian artist Lizaveta Ivanovna: “You are a burgher on the wrong path… The errant burgher…”. Bourgeois society refers to Tonio suspiciously and distrustfully. His very profession of the writer seems unreliable and questionable: Tonio returns to his hometown to refresh the memories of childhood, but he is almost arrested by a policeman who suspected in it a scam searched for throughout Germany. The irony of this episode is obvious. The attempt to return to oneself, to the old world that had gone to the past, was not successful. Tonio himself admits to the sensations of loneliness and duality: “I stand between two worlds, in no one feeling myself at home, and so I have to cool…” The writer bitterly notes that the artists call him “philistine”, and the townsfolk want him to arrest. “The burghers are stupid,” Tonio mentions to intellectual artists, “but to you, admirers of beauty who accuse me of phlegm and in the absence of exalted melancholy, it would be nice to understand that there is creativity so deep, so destined and fatal that there is not for him nothing is more sweet and desirable than a blessed routine.
