Klaus Mann
Alexander: A Novel of Utopia
Marion Saunders, trans.
Brewer & Warren, c1930 (English) (No ISBN)
 

Mann's book is easily the oddest Alexander novel I have ever read.  In fact, it would be better to call it a romantic fantasy based on the history of Alexander the Great than to call it historical fiction.  It definitely shows the influence of his father's style of literary modernism, but not so adeptly handled so that the adjective "weird" -- in both traditional and modern colloquial meanings -- is truly apropos.

But before one attempts to describe the novel, a word should be said about the translation.  It is not particularly good.  There are times when Saunders seems to forget that English has a much larger vocabulary than German, repeating words over and over until they threaten to fall off the page; at other times she gets the wrong English word altogether, particularly in the case of proper names (Milet rather than Miletus).  Also, there are occasional lapses into historic present tense, and the language is overwrought, even for a romantic novel.  I can't say whether this faithfully represents the original German, or whether Saunders has made a peculiar book even worse.  Surely Klaus Mann didn't write this poorly.  Mann himself is the son of Nobel-winning German novelist Thomas Mann.

Aside from its general peculiarity, a meandering plot and a lack of consistent characterization are the novel's worst faults.  Whatever one thinks of Mann's Alexander the Mad, his characterization of the king varies from scene to scene so that one never quite gets a grip on just what Mann means to convey -- or perhaps that complexity is the point.  But if so, the result is unfortunately more confusing than clever.  One is reminded of Alexander's own quip that he would rather be Homer's Thersites than Choirilos' Achilles.  Mann is more akin to Choirilos, even if his father was a German Homer.  If he meant to evoke pity and disgust in his readers, he failed, evoking instead a morbid fascination akin to drivers who slow down to view a car crash.

Not that any of Mann's characters, with the possible exception of poor love-lorn Hephaistion, is likable.  (And one can't help but wonder if a bit of Mann is in Hephaistion.)  We have Philip the socially-inept barbarian; Olympias the vicious matriarchal priestess; Philotas the arrogant ape; Eumenes the sneaky flatterer; and of course a mystically stupefied, knowledge-starved -- and insane -- Alexander.  Yet each of these is just an exaggeration of hostile ancient portraits.  The strangest characterization of all is Kleitos (Cleitus) as a childhood friend of Alexander, a brilliant but indifferent, manipulative ascetic whose love Alexander vainly strives to win.  It is Kleitos who pricks Pausanias to murder Philip, and it is Kleitos whose rejection of Alexander drives the king to seek love from others in an increasingly frenzied fashion.  It is also Kleitos who subverts the men around Alexander with "pretty stories."  In fact, it is one of these pretty stories which eventually drives Alexander so around the bend that he kills this man he futilely loves -- and one gets the impression even that was part of Kleitos' plan, too.  (Given what we know of Mann's own homosexuality and fascination with 'rough trade,' one can't help but see in Kleitos Mann's fascination with the "quick and dangerous," as he called them.)

Mann shows a perverse taste for the sordid and fantastical, although his later work (in English), Speed, is better at conveying the underbelly of society.  Before Alexander leaves for Asia, Olympias gives him a commission to prepare the world for the resurrection of goddess worship and rule by women, then she kisses him in frank sexual fashion:  Mother Isis with her son-lover Osiris.  There are other fantastical-allusive scenes including Alexander's visit to Siwah, and his fascination with the "whore of Babylon."  He also meets the "Amazon Queen" Roxane and falls in love at first sight -- but can do nothing on their wedding night, presumably because he is still saving himself for his proper wedding (to Isis-Mommy? -- it's unclear).  Frustrated, he takes up with Bagoas instead.  He also has a psychedelic experience in India, and hears voices in Gedrosia.  Generic orgiastic scenes occur at regular intervals.  One is reminded that Mann spend a good deal of time in the counter-culture and avant-garde theater of Weimar Berlin in the 1920s.

Other amusing oddities:  On the night of his murder, Kleitos recounts the tale of Gilgamesh and Enkidu to punish Alexander with knowledge of what Kleitos refused him; and in India, Alexander, pretending to be Hephaistion, has an encounter with the mythical Candice.  These are only a few of the stranger turns, but the book is filled with them.  This is why I say the novel is really a fantasy, based as much on The Alexander Romance as on Arrian or even Curtius.  Mann uses history as suits his whim, altering, editing, and transposing events when he wishes:  e.g., The Philotas Affair comes after the Conspiracy of the Pages.

Mann clearly has a thematic goal in mind and, given the date of original publication (1929) and the fact that the novel was originally published in Germany, one might even make a guess as to what that theme is -- particularly if one knows of Klaus Mann's later anti-facist activities.  The subtitle "of utopia" tells us a lot, and Mann's utopia is, of course, not one.  And Alexander is a far madder, more megalomaniacal tyrant than Ernst Badian at his most cynical would cast him.  Although Mann's political activities date more to the 1930s, one still cannot escape the conclusion that this early romantic fantasy of Mann is really a very political novel.

Students of modern Germany, Hitler, and WW II would find the work fascinating.  Students of Alexander will probably find it less so.  Nevertheless, it is worth perusing for the amusement factor and historic value alone.