Death in Venice

“Thus—and perhaps his elevated position helped to give the impression—his bearing had something majestic and commanding about it, something bold, or even savage. For whether he was grimacing because he was blinded by the setting sun, or whether it was a case of a permanent distortion of the physiognomy, his lips seemed too short, they were so completely pulled back from his teeth that these were exposed even to the gums, and stood out white and long.”

The detailed description of the stranger’s appearance paints a clear and vivid picture for the reader, while the man’s dominating and intimidating aura creates an ominous and expectant mood. Aschenbach’s association of the man’s appearance with evocative emotional judgments “majestic”, “savage” etc. shows how susceptible his imagination is to the effects of an individual’s appearance—establishing a trait that later proves key to the plot, and foreshadowing the danger posed by Tadzio’s beauty.

“He saw a landscape, a tropical swampland under a heavy, murky sky, damp, luxuriant, and enormous, a kind of prehistoric wilderness of islands, bogs, and arms of water, sluggish with mud; he saw, near him and in the distance, the hairy shafts of palms rising out of a rank lecherous thicket, out of places where the plant-life was fat, swollen, and blossoming exorbitantly; he saw strangely misshapen trees sending their roots into the ground, into stagnant pools with greenish reflections; and here, between floating flowers which were milk-white and large as dishes, birds of a strange nature, high-shouldered, with crooked bills, were standing in the muck, and looking motionlessly to one side; between dense, knotted stalks of bamboo he saw the glint from the eyes of a crouching tiger—and he felt his heart knocking with fear and with puzzling desires.”

Mann provides a detailed and highly sensory description of the foreign vistas evoked by Aschenbach’s sudden wanderlust. Elements of the landscape are listed in turn so that each subclause builds on the previous to construct a complex and multifaceted picture. The highly exoticized description, whose foreignness is emphasized through vocabulary such as “puzzling,” “strange,” etc., contrasts with the mundane setting of Munich and with the discipline and restraint of Aschenbach’s daily life.

“Especially now that his life was slowly on the decline, and that the artist’s fear of not having finished—this uneasiness lest the clock run down before he had done his part and given himself completely—could no longer be waived aside as a mere whim, he had confined his outer existence almost exclusively to the beautiful city which had become his home and to the rough country house which he had built in the mountains and where he spent the rainy summers.”

This quote introduces the omnipresent theme of The Inevitability of Death and Decay by showing how Aschenbach’s life is currently influenced by an awareness of his mortality and a sense of duty to his art. This prudence will be reversed in the later chapters of the novella, as Aschenbach actively courts an early death. This will clearly illustrate the changes that his character had by then undergone.

“Were these enslaved emotions now taking their vengeance on him, by leaving him in the lurch, by refusing to forward and lubricate his art; and were they bearing off with them every enjoyment, every live interest in form and expression?”

This quote establishes the adversarial nature of Aschenbach’s relationship with his sensuality and emotions. The emotions are personified and imbued with negative intentions such as “vengeance,” showing Aschenbach’s unsustainable insecurity despite (and because of) his having “enslaved” those emotions. The use of a rhetorical question shows Aschenbach’s uncertainty as he attempts to discern the origins of his discontent and encourages the reader to ponder such questions about the unconscious.

“A marriage of sober painstaking conscientiousness with impulses of a darker, more fiery nature had had an artist as its result, and this particular artist.”

This quote presents Aschenbach’s psychology as a product of his parents’ disparate personalities and heritages. However, whereas these traits were combined into a state of balance and harmony in the union between Aschenbach’s parents, within Aschenbach himself The Conflict Between Rationality and Sensuality places the two elements of his character in contention.

“When, around thirty-five years of age, he had been taken ill in Vienna, one sharp observer said of him in company, ‘You see, Aschenbach has always lived like this,’ and the speaker contracted the fingers of his left hand into a fist; ‘never like this,’ and he let his open hand droop comfortably from the arm of his chair.”

This quote establishes Aschenbach’s ill health as an ongoing problem, foreshadowing his susceptibility to the climate of Venice and to the cholera that kills him. Aschenbach is described by a peer as a closed fist. This metaphor provides a clear and visceral physical representation of his inability or unwillingness to relax, and hints at the unsustainability of this way of life since no one can maintain a clenched fist indefinitely.

“Aschenbach had once stated quite plainly in some remote place that nearly everything great which comes into being does so in spite of something—in spite of sorrow or suffering, poverty, destitution, physical weakness, depravity, passion, or a thousand other handicaps.”

This quote summarizes Aschenbach’s view of heroism as the act of defiantly remaining and producing great works despite hardship. This view exists prominently in the character’s work and guides his behavior in life. The listing of potential handicaps, followed by the elided expansion of the list by “a thousand” other impediments highlights the extent and variety of adversity which must be overcome for greatness to come into being.

“But he had acquired the dignity which, as he insisted, is the innate goad and craving of every great talent; in fact, it could be said that his entire development had been a conscious undeviating progression away from the embarrassments of scepticism and irony, and towards dignity.”

The importance of dignity to Aschenbach’s sense of self and self-worth is established here. This lays the foundation for the irony of his later abandonment of that dignity in favor of indulging his sensual and passionate urges for Tadzio. This explicit explanation of Aschenbach’s perspective and priorities before meeting Tadzio is necessary for Mann to then illustrate the extent to which they eventually change.

“Even as it applies to the individual, art is a heightened mode of existence. It gives deeper pleasures, it consumes more quickly. It carves into its servants’ faces the marks of imaginary and spiritual adventures, and though their external activities may be as quiet as a cloister, it produces a lasting voluptuousness, over-refinement, fatigue, and curiosity of the nerves such as can barely result from a life filled with illicit passions and enjoyments.”

Although Aschenbach has lived a relatively sheltered life up to this point, he is nonetheless deeply affected by the strains of his artistic calling. The description of the artist as a “servant” to art highlights the sense of duty Aschenbach feels toward his work.

“Fascinated with loathing, Aschenbach watched him in his intercourse with his friends. Did they not know, did they not observe that he was old, that he was not entitled to wear their bright, foppish clothing, that he was not entitled to play at being one of them?”

Aschenbach’s hostility toward the old man here highlights the difference between them. While the old man pursues youth, Aschenbach prioritizes reputation and dignity. Ironically, Aschenbach later adopts the same strategies—foppish dress, dye, cosmetics—to attempt to appear pleasing to Tadzio. The rhetorical question expresses Aschenbach’s incredulity at the situation, while the repetition of the phrase “not entitled” highlights his belief that the old man is committing an affront, and hints at the jealousy he might feel for the man’s inexplicable inclusion in the group of youths.

“The strange craft, an entirely unaltered survival from the times of balladry, with that peculiar blackness which is found elsewhere only in coffins—it suggests silent, criminal adventures in the rippling night, it suggests even more strongly death itself, the bier and the mournful funeral, and the last silent journey. And has it been observed that the seat of such a barque, this arm-chair of coffin-black veneer and dull black upholstery, is the softest, most luxuriant, most lulling seat in the world?”

In this quote, the gondola—a vessel so closely associated with Venice as to be synonymous with the city—is strongly associated with deathly imagery. This is an important element of the city of Venice’s symbolic function in the novella. The boat is compared with a coffin and its voyage with a funeral or a figurative journey to the afterlife. This association foreshadows Aschenbach’s eventual demise, as well as his complacency and comfort with staying at the hotel even as the danger posed by the plague grows.

“Loneliness ripens the eccentric, the daringly and estrangingly beautiful, the poetic. But loneliness also ripens the perverse, the disproportionate, the absurd, and the illicit.”

Aschenbach is presented as a solitary character throughout the novel, and this quote emphasizes the impact that loneliness and isolation can have on a person through its iterating list of adjectives. The presentation of both positive and negative qualities in quick succession shows how closely intertwined the various effects of solitude are and foreshadows Aschenbach’s forthcoming descent into excessive sensuality.

“An offensive sultriness lay over the streets. The air was so heavy […] The farther he went, the more he was depressed by the repulsive condition resulting from the combination of sea air and sirocco, which was at the same time both stimulating and enervating. He broke into an uncomfortable sweat. His eyes failed him, his chest became tight, he had a fever, the blood was pounding in his head.”

This quote establishes a connection between the city of Venice and Aschenbach’s health by showing the negative physical effects of its climate on his constitution. The emotional and evocative language “offensive,” “depressed,” and “repulsive” to describe the air adds emotional weight to the unfavorable impression of the city, while “sultriness” implies a sensual dimension in the state of the city and Aschenbach’s health. Overall, this creates a negative and charged impression of the city which builds tension in the novella.

“He felt the exhilaration of his blood, a conflict of pain and pleasure, and he realized that it was Tadzio who had made it so difficult for him to leave.”

In the Classical medicine of Ancient Greece, which divided the body into four humors affecting health and temperament, blood is the humor associated with passion, lust, and youth. Aschenbach’s feelings for Tadzio are associated with his blood, showing their lustful and amorous characteristics.

“Day after day now the naked god with the hot cheeks drove his fire-breathing quadriga across the expanses of the sky, and his yellow locks fluttered in the assault of the east wind. A white silk sheen stretched over the slowly simmering Ponto. The sand glowed.” 

The weather and surroundings of the hotel are described fantastically, creating an aura of magic and wonder that echoes Aschenbach’s awe at his reawakened passions. The metaphorical elements of the description “white silk sheen” and personifications such as “the naked god” imbue nature with a benevolent agency, which contributes to the wonderous mood.

“And amid gallantries and skillfully engaging banter, Socrates was instructing Phaedrus in matters of desire and virtue. […] For beauty, my Phaedrus, beauty alone is both lovely and visible at once; it is, mark me, the only form of the spiritual which we can receive through the senses.”

This quote references one of Plato’s Discourses, Phaedrus, casting Aschenbach and Tadzio as Socrates and Phaedrus respectively. In Aschenbach’s imagination, he and Tadzio share one of the most famous explorations of a “pederastic” relationship in literature (pederasty being the Ancient Greek custom of a respected man mentoring a prepubescent boy with whom he also typically has a sexual relationship). This shows the influence of Classicism on Aschenbach’s desires and the nature of his passion for Tadzio.

“‘Too late!’ he thought immediately. Too late! Yet was it too late? This step which he had just been on the verge of taking would very possibly have put things on a sound, free and easy basis, and would have restored him to wholesome soberness. But the fact was that Aschenbach did not want soberness: his intoxication was too precious.”

The repetition of “too late” reinforces the hopelessness and despair of Aschenbach’s situation. However, the fact that the words are repeated with different punctuation; as thought within quotation marks, with an exclamation mark, and then with a question mark, gives each iteration of the phrase a different tone. This creates ambiguity as to the validity of the reflexive conclusion, and shows Aschenbach’s uncertainty even as he resigns himself to the unwholesomeness of “intoxication” which is here juxtaposed with “wholesome soberness.”

“And that first sweet reddening in the farthest stretches of sky and sea took place by which the sentiency of creation is announced. The goddess was approaching, the seductress of youth who stole Cleitus and Cephalus, and despite the envy of all the Olympians enjoyed the love of handsome Orion. A strewing of roses began there on the edge of the world, an unutterably pure glowing and blooming. Childish clouds, lighted and shined through, floated like busy little Cupids in the rosy, bluish mist. Purple fell upon the sea, which seemed to be simmering, and washing the colour towards him. Golden spears shot up into the sky from behind. The splendour caught fire, silently, and with godlike power an intense flame of licking tongues broke out—and with rattling hoofs the brother’s sacred chargers mounted the horizon.”

This lengthy description of the beauty of the sunrise is full of Classical references as well as detailed accounts of the colors and components that make up the sunrise. This description includes similes such as “floated like busy little Cupids,” metaphors such as “The splendour caught fire,” and dynamic figurative language such as “godlike power,” “sweet,” and “unutterably pure.” All of this creates a vivid and evocative picture, as well as a mood of awe and reverence. It also harks to the same aesthetic sense of beauty that made the artist in Aschenbach so susceptible to Tadzio’s beauty.

“And leaning back, his arms loose, overwhelmed, with frequent chills running through him, he whispered the fixed formula of desire—impossible in this case, absurd, abject, ridiculous, and yet holy, even in this case venerable: ‘I love you!’”

The strength of Aschenbach’s emotions is illustrated here through their physical effect on his body. The irony of his using a “fixed formula” to express so unconventional a passion echoes Aschenbach’s earlier despair at never being able to capture the full effect of Tadzio’s beauty in his art, hinting at the hopelessness of his feelings. The listing of derisive adjectives—“absurd, abject, ridiculous”—presents Aschenbach’s objections to his feelings as a litany of self-recrimination. This is juxtaposed, however, by the supposition that the love is “holy” and “venerable,” thereby more akin to the Classical Platonic ideal of love as spiritually elevating.

“This wicked secret of the city was welded with his own secret, and he too was involved in keeping it hidden. For in his infatuation he cared about nothing but the possibility of Tadzio’s leaving, and he realized with something like terror that he would not know how to go on living if this occurred.”

The deceptions perpetuated by the officials of Venice to preserve the tourist trade despite the threat of plague are explicitly linked with Aschenbach’s own secrets. He conceals his age with cosmetics, hides his obsession with Tadzio through affected indifference, and does not share his knowledge of the cholera with fellow hotel guests. He flouts his moral duty by failing to inform Tadzio’s family of the danger, revealing the selfish and avaricious reality of his so-called “love.”

“Yes, he had often observed with a kind of numbness how, when Tadzio was near him, on the beach, in the hotel lobby, in the Piazza San Marco, they called him back, they were set on keeping him at a distance—and this wounded him frightfully, causing his pride unknown tortures which his conscience would not permit him to evade.”

Aschenbach’s willingness to endure the humiliation of the ladies’ suspicion without amending his behavior shows how far sensuality and passion have led him from his former commitment to dignity and reputation. The extent of his conflict and suffering is emphasized through violent language such as “wounded,” “frightfully,” and “tortures,” foreshadowing just how much he is willing to endure and sacrifice for the sake of his obsession.

“The Englishman pronounced the final verdict on these facts. ‘You would do well,’ he concluded, ‘to leave to-day rather than to-morrow. It cannot be much more than a couple of days before a quarantine zone is declared.’”

The characterization of the Englishman reflects common stereotypes of the age, which painted the British as reliable, authoritative, and officious. The matter-of-fact nature of the Englishman’s pronouncement reinforces this impression, while his honesty and practicality contrast with the behavior of both the Venetians and Aschenbach himself. The seriousness and urgency of the situation in Venice are driven home by the phrase “to-day rather than to-morrow,” crystalizing the formerly nebulous threat of plague into a real and impending danger, ratcheting up the tension.

“Men with horns on their foreheads, shaggy-haired, girded with hides, bent back their necks and raised their arms and thighs, clashed brass cymbals and beat furiously at kettledrums, while smooth boys prodded he-goats with wreathed sticks, climbing on their horns and falling off with shouts when they bounded. And the bacchantes wailed the word with the soft consonants and the drawn out u-sound, at once sweet and savage, like nothing ever heard before.”

The account of Aschenbach’s dream is chaotic in style and structure to reflect the ecstatic disorder of the festivities. It is rife with phallic imagery such as “horns,” “sticks,” and “prodding” as well as sensual and suggestive imagery, the listing of body parts, and an emphasis on the different but complementary roles played by “boys” and “men.” All of this combines to reflect the erotic, lust-driven aspect of erotic desire—particularly in the context of Aschenbach’s desire for men/boys. That Tadzio’s name features so prominently in the proceedings shows the inextricable link between the boy and Aschenbach’s newly reawakened desires.