Huh. Interesting that I marked this book as read when I have little to no recollection about the story's plot, nor even of the prose that in my "second" reading seems so memorable now. Also interesting how two-ish years can change a person. I can imagine how the prose and the story bears no impact on my younger self, but now in my re-reading, I reel from the sometimes-confusing rhythms of Michael Henry Heim's translation.

The initial experience of this text was sluggish. If it weren't for Michael Cunningham's incisive introduction, I would have given up altogether. Cunningham outlined the themes of Death in Venice clearly, presenting Aschenbach as this devastating romantic figure.

For such a short text, it contained a lot within. Aschenbach, sometimes referred to as the "solitary traveler" or simply, the "traveler", has an air of Humbert Humbert about him, but less charming, perhaps, because Aschenbach was hardly given the space to show his charms (unlike HH and his 330+ page playground).

Sure, sure. Aschenbach becomes obsessed with a fourteen year old boy, but somehow that aspect is inconsequential. His rhapsodizing, his thoughts on beauty, his obsessive tendencies, and his subconscious refusal to return to a state of reason are the things that mattered; Tadzio is only the vehicle for his lines of thought. The excuse to talk about art and beauty, in a way.

And so, in Aschenbach's half-slumbering brain, thought, "we poets can be neither wise nor dignified," I shudder in vague agreement. These all bleeds into the internal consideration of 'what would I do if I could live my life again, knowing what I know now?' and it is the longing to be more dignified. Don't I realize that I grew up with wanton emotions for a reason?

Anyway, damn. I really like this book now.