Great Lives: Susie Dent on Thomas Mann

Series 13, episode 1

Lexicographer and Countdown word expert Susie Dent says German was her first love and she first read works by Thomas Mann while studying at university. She loves the tension in the Death in Venice writer's work, between the pull of one's senses and the desire to stay aloof and detached. Susie and presenter Matthew Parris are joined by Karolina Watroba, research fellow in German and Comparative Literature at the University of Oxford, who was born in Poland where Mann is a huge cultural icon and first read The Magic Mountain in the summer before she went to university

Cast (unconfirmed)

Matthew Parris
Susie Dent