Thomas Mann's Doktor Faustus and Poetics of Biography

This study is focused on the issue of poetics of biography in relation to Thomas Mann’s novel Doktor Faustus (1947). Written in a form of a fictional biography, the novel is not often observed from this perspective. Using multiply modern theoretical sources on the biographical theory, including Christian von Zimmerman, William H. Epstein, Ira Bruce Nadel, Leon Edel and Ansgar Nünning, the author attempts to outline how various elements of biographical writing intertwine and affect our perception of Doktor Faustus. Moreover, the study provides a brief overview of the research on Doktor Faustus and, in particular, on the topic of biographical form of the novel. With accumulated remarks on narrative’s structure and the role of the fictional biographer, Serenus Zeitblom, the author observes both similarities of Doktor Faustus to modern biography and discrepancies with the tradition the genre. In addition, the study aims at illuminating genre borders of Doktor Faustus with other types of life-writing like hagiography, autobiography or biographical metafiction.