Reviews

Death in Venice & a Man and His Dog: A Dual-Language Book by Thomas Mann

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astroneatly's review against another edition

challenging reflective relaxing slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I saw an actress reading Death in Venice in the movie “The Bagdad Cafe” which was hilarious. That movie was cracking me up, even Jack Valance made me giggle. Cause the humor was just so deadpan, and then I thought I’d go read it. I don’t have a lot to say, because as far as Thomas Mann goes, the text speaks for itself. I’ve run across discussions about Thomas Mann especially in books about music and opera. And back in 2020 when we were facing a major election and everything was going to hell, I was off reading Thomas Mann.
Anyway, all I really have to say is that I have always by some circumstance of my upbringing hated commercialism. Some part of me craves nationality that isn’t so caught up in what’s popular. Movies, for instance, I enjoy alot but I’m very picky too, because I can’t be pleased with the same faces, wealthiest of the wealthy, dressed in suits… I always lean toward obscurity I guess. And I feel like a foreigner in my own country, because where other people were happy with following their favorite icons and role models, I guess I just never picked up on it. Well, anyway…
I know too that I don’t really want to be an artist. And I don’t deserve love or life, and what is life without love? The cynicism that I’ve always expressed for everything under the sun puts me at a division between me and society. I don’t know what the word pretentious means, and I’m not really a snob. But I always looked at the people with like interests and nerding out together at things together and I could never see myself as one of them. I hardly have a pretext for living, when everything I’ve shunned as against my nature… sets me too far afield from the norm. I want eclecticism, not commercialism… Eh…

quiktripcoke's review against another edition

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Moved on to other books

sarah_dietrich's review against another edition

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2.0

Lots of tortured artists wailing and gnashing their teeth. Three stars for Death in Venice, one star for the rest of the stories.

proust_mobile's review against another edition

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4.0

This short story collection works extremely well as a unit, and reading these back to back gives a kaleidescopic, messy view of a city in motion. With a focus on the odd behaviors, ticks, and desires of difficult characters and story structures that are either distracted, scattered, or entirely plotless, Thomas Mann makes a strong argument that the minutia and randomness of real life is worthy of study and documentation.

It's possible I'm putting too much focus on the variety of lives and lifestyles in these stories about early 1900s Germany because of the giant looming historical context. But these occasionally quick stories feel like putting your face into someone's window and getting a good hard look at their conflicted private lives before moving on to the next house. I really appreciated how unflinching and respectful these stories are of what it means to be an individual among thousands of other individuals. The prose is gorgeous but sometimes veers into overindulgence, and the stories that lacked a strong narrative skeleton could be hard to connect with, but that's probably because I'm a baby about that kinda thing. The longer novellas featured here are especially great.

sauna_mc's review against another edition

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3.0

Just read 'Death in Venice' from this collection.

marimoose's review against another edition

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1.0

Right. So I did try. But every time I picked the book up today, I fell asleep within the first few lines. The most I managed to surmise from the story was that Aschenbach wanted to go to Venice. And while I liked the description of certain things, I just couldn't see the point in continuing. Just not my type of writing style, that's all.