Death in Venice

A novella by German author Thomas Mann, Death in Venice is the story of a writer who visits Venice and is liberated, uplifted, and then increasingly obsessed by the sight of a young tourist.

Mann uses the story to illuminate certain convictions about the relationship between life and mind.

Although his original intention was to write about “passion as confusion and degradation”, Mann was also influenced by Sigmund Freud and his views on dreams, and by Friedrich Nietzsche, who had visited Venice several times.