[Intolerant in NJ]

Not just in Japan - part of the human psyche is that people "institutionalized" over long periods of time, including prisoners and mental patients, become accustomed to the structure, predictability and protection of the institution and become afraid and depressed once released into freedom - Thomas Wolfe's novel Magic Mountain is about a man who goes to a TB sanitarium for a period of time and has difficulty reestablishing himself in life outside the hospital when cured - liberty where one is responsible for oneself can be scary......

[GJones2]

Did you mean to say Thomas Mann, the German novelist? He wrote a novel called “The Magic Mountain”. If Thomas Wolfe wrote one too, I haven’t heard of it.