Deaths in Venice
eBook - ePub
Available until 27 Jan |Learn more

Deaths in Venice

The Cases of Gustav von Aschenbach

  1. English
  2. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
Available until 27 Jan |Learn more

Deaths in Venice

The Cases of Gustav von Aschenbach

About this book

Published in 1913, Thomas Mann's Death in Venice is one of the most widely read novellas in any language. In the 1970s, Benjamin Britten adapted it into an opera, and Luchino Visconti turned it into a successful film. Reading these works from a philosophical perspective, Philip Kitcher connects the predicament of the novella's central character to Western thought's most compelling questions.

In Mann's story, the author Gustav von Aschenbach becomes captivated by an adolescent boy, first seen on the lido in Venice, the eventual site of Aschenbach's own death. Mann works through central concerns about how to live, explored with equal intensity by his German predecessors, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. Kitcher considers how Mann's, Britten's, and Visconti's treatments illuminate the tension between social and ethical values and an artist's sensitivity to beauty. Each work asks whether a life devoted to self-sacrifice in the pursuit of lasting achievements can be sustained and whether the breakdown of discipline undercuts its worth. Haunted by the prospect of his death, Aschenbach also helps us reflect on whether it is possible to achieve anything in full awareness of our finitude and in knowing our successes are always incomplete.

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Yes, you can access Deaths in Venice by Philip Kitcher in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Philosophie & Critique littéraire européenne. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover 
  2. Series Page
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Contents 
  7. List of Illustrations
  8. Preface
  9. List of Abbreviations
  10. A Note on Translations
  11. 1. Discipline
  12. 2. Beauty
  13. 3. Shadows
  14. Notes
  15. Index