Join the Chatham Pride Alliance and 79°West for this month’s Rainbow Readers Book Club, an evening of great conversation and community hosted on Thu, Jun 11, 6pm-7:30pm. This month, they’re diving into The Magician, by Colm Tóibín.

For more information, contact Dan at [email protected]. Participation is free, and all are welcome. This event takes place indoors. 79°West is ADA-compliant. Free parking is available on-site. Pets are not allowed. Part of MOSAIC at Chatham Park. See all events at MOSAIC.

BOOK SUMMARY

The Magician opens in a provincial German city at the turn of the twentieth century, where the boy, Thomas Mann, grows up with a conservative father, bound by propriety, and a Brazilian mother, alluring and unpredictable. Young Mann hides his artistic aspirations from his father and his homosexual desires from everyone. He is infatuated with one of the richest, most cultured Jewish families in Munich, and marries the daughter, Katia. They have six children. On a holiday in Italy, he longs for a boy he sees on a beach and writes the story Death in Venice. He is the most successful novelist of his time, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature, a public man whose private life remains secret. He is expected to lead the condemnation of Hitler, whom he underestimates. His oldest daughter and son, leaders of Bohemianism and of the anti-Nazi movement, share lovers. He flees Germany for Switzerland, France, and, ultimately, America, living first in Princeton and then in Los Angeles. In this “exquisitely sensitive” (The Wall Street Journal) novel, Tóibín has crafted “a complex but empathetic portrayal of a writer in a lifelong battle against his innermost desires, his family, and the tumultuous times they endure” (Time), and “you’ll find yourself savoring every page” (Vogue).