Thomas Mann was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, winning the 1929 Nobel Prize in Literature. He was born on this day, June 6, in 1875 (d. 1955). Mann was photographed by Karsh for LIFE magazine in 1946, one of more than 50 people Karsh photographed for that publication between 1943 (M. Jan Masaryk, Deputy Prime Minister & Foreign Minister of Czechoslovakia) and 1982 (Judith Anderson and Zoe Caldwell in costume for parts in Medea. Photographed together and individually.)