Death in Venice

English 2

Stefan Mattessich

Paper #3- Death in Venice

For this paper I would like you to explore Aschenbach’s love, or desire, for Tadzio. Why does he fall in love with a boy, and what does that tell us about him, his world, or the time in which he lived? Why is his passion understood as a “cholera” that kills him in the end? What is the pleasure he takes in Tadzio’s death, or even his own? At the end of the novel, Mann alludes to Socrates. Howw can you see the story of Aschenbach’s passion for Tadzio in relation to the “Ladder of Love” theory we discussed at the beginning of the semester? You may consider both the novel and the movie, but be sure to pay attention to the differences as well as the similarities between them.