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Death in Venice

by Thomas Mann

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Critical Overview

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Death in Venice has occasioned numerous essays by critics exploring its thematic and stylistic richness, and is even more popular today than it was in 1912 when it was published. In “Myth Plus Psychology,” an essay appearing in Germanic Review, André von Gronicka examines the structural “ingredients” of Mann’s formula for his novella. In detailing how myth and psychology inform the work, von Gronicka expands upon conventional definitions of myth, arguing that it “encompasses legend, history, and the literary traditions of the more recent past.” This allows him greater freedom to show how mythic elements, apart from Greek stories and characters, operate in the story.

Manfred Dierks also seeks to pin down Mann’s use of myth, by making connections between Death in Venice and two texts that heavily influenced Mann: Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy and Euripides’s The Bacchae. In his essay, “Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy and Mann’s Death in Venice,” in Studies of Myth and Psychology in Thomas Mann, Dierks argues, “Mythological and other classical themes . . . can be grouped according to intensity and breadth of acquisition. This sort of differentiation by degree usually corresponds to their relative value as a textual element.” Rita A. Bergenholtz focuses on the question of genre, asking if von Aschenbach indeed is a tragic character, a question that continues to vex critics. In her essay, “Mann’s Death in Venice,” for The Explicator, Bergenholtz argues that because the story focuses on von Aschenbach’s fall rather than his rise, “Mann presents us with a parody of tragedy, which satirizes the romantic assumptions that enable such an exalted view of humankind.” Constance Urdang also considers the story a parody. In her essay, “Faust in Venice: The Artist and the Legend in Death in Venice,” in Accent, Urdang claims the story parodies the Faustian legend. Brendan Lemon is more concerned with the real-life implications of Mann’s story and how accurately, or not, it reflects an ageing gay man’s sexual desire. Writing for The Advocate, Lemon concludes in his essay, “Beached,” “What most distinguishes von Aschenbach and his kind . . . may be the fact that sex for them is primarily mental.”is primarily mental."

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