Sense of Forboding

So, my German prof was talking about the tendency of German writers to produce long sentences, with many subordinate clauses, with many verbs at the ends of sentences. As an example, he cites a two-and-a-half page sentence in one of Thomas Mann's books. "But you don't have to translate Thomas Mann," he reassured the class.

"But what if you're a Weimar historian?" I asked my professor.