Reviews with content warning for Pedophilia - Death in Venice

A lonely and old man travels from Munich to Venice to feel alive again. There he falls in love with a twelve year old, blond haired, blue eyed, Polish boy. His whole trip consists of stalking this boy and his family at the beach, in the hotel, in the restaurants. His mind is only fantasizing about his “angel”. Is it disturbing just to me?
In the end he dies due to eating strawberries that were infected with cholera.
No dialogue, no action, a bland yet unsettling book.

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doomslug_is_batman's review against another edition

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ember_eyes_are_for_tigers's review against another edition

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challenging reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

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salma__m's review against another edition

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reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

3.5

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franciscoperez's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging inspiring mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

4.0

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vici24kl's review against another edition

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slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

0.5

This book is horrible!!! If you have any appreciation for yourself stay away from this book!! Another example why German classics suck :)

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edwardian_girl_next_door's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

2.0

I read this book for an AP English class. Due to extenuating circumstances, I didn't get a whole lot of class/teacher-led instruction or conversation on this book, so my opinions are totally based off my first impressions and what I gathered from independent study.

The elephant in the room sticks out like a sore thumb, to mix metaphors.

yeah, I'm talking about the *pedophilia*. Oh..........my goodness. I have to say my stomach was churning with disgust while I was reading this. I understand Tadzio represents Death, but the way the protagonist becomes obsessed with him was really horrible. In his artistic mind he lingers on and describes every physical feature - of a MINOR!!! - and even declares "I love you!" at one point to an oblivious Tadzio. He stalks this poor boy's every move and derives immense happiness from it. He never is explicitly sexual about it (although he does have a dream about the orgastic rites of the cult of Dionysus); it's more of a obsession/no proper boundaries/puppy love/aesthetic attraction situation. Maybe it's hard for me to see past this to understand Mann's literary objective. I've heard it takes people a few times to read Nabokov's Lolita before they can appreciate its more palatable and artistically sophisticated elements. But it was Really Hard not to focus on that. I was indirectly connected with a case of alleged child m*lestation and it was all I could think about. Not the best thing to dwell on while reading the middle-aged MC's drawn out, flowery prose about the body of a teenage boy.

Again, I have the feeling my emotions are getting in the way of serious explication here, but I can't shake the feeling.

Other than that, there wasn't much to say. I'm not a short story or novella person, but the pace was pretty decent and the arc believable for the amount of pages. It reminds me very much of di Lampedusa's The Leopard. Basically, if you liked Heart of Darkness and slow, winding, 19th century European books about a white man having a midlife crisis, this one's for you! Just keep a garbage can nearby for the vomiting...

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