Death in Venice
An Aesthetic Novella of Forbidden Desire, Decadence, and Moral Disintegration in Plague-Shadowed VeniceBy Thomas Mann
Length2h 49m
About this audiobook
Thomas Mann's *Death in Venice* (1912) follows Gustav von Aschenbach, a celebrated, disciplined writer who travels to Venice seeking renewal and becomes enthralled by the beautiful adolescent Tadzio. Against the city's decaying splendor and concealed cholera epidemic, Mann examines artistic idealism, erotic obsession, mortality, and the instability of cultivated self-control. The novella's exquisitely controlled prose, symbolic imagery, ironic distance, and recurring opposition between Apollonian order and Dionysian impulse place it centrally within European literary modernism and the fin-de-siècle crisis of bourgeois culture. Born in Lübeck in 1875, Mann emerged from a prosperous mercantile family and made the conflicts between bourgeois respectability, artistic vocation, and forbidden desire central to his fiction. His engagement with Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Goethe, and the cultural anxieties preceding the First World War helped shape this work's philosophical density. Aschenbach's collapse can be read both as a personal tragedy and as Mann's searching critique of artistic authority, repression, and the fantasy that aesthetic discipline can master human nature. Recommended for readers interested in psychological fiction, aesthetic theory, and the darker currents of modernism, *Death in Venice* rewards close, attentive reading. Its brevity belies its interpretive richness: every image of beauty, illness, water, and ritual contributes to a haunting meditation on the price of desire and the limits of artistic control.
Audiobook details
Rating★★★★ 3.9 (155.7K)
Includes Goodreads, LibraryThing, StoryGraph, Amazon
GenreGeneral Fiction, Mystery and Thriller
Length2 hrs 49 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateJan 1, 2026
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1Doctor Faustus
4Chapter Three
2Chapter One
5Chapter Four
3Chapter Two
6Chapter Five
Thomas Mann: Beim ProphetenThomas Mann24m$2 · $0.00
Der junge JosephThomas Mann10h 34m4.4 (406)$1 · $0.00
Königliche HoheitThomas Mann10h 58m$1 · $0.00
Thomas Mann: Short Stories & NovellasThomas Mann35h 31m4.4 (1.7K)$0.99 · $0.00
Doktor FaustusThomas Mann26h 35m4.2 (17.5K)$1 · $0.00
Thomas Mann - Gesammelte WerkeThomas Mann261h 34m4.6 (180)$0.99 · $0.00
The Complete Works of Thomas MannThomas Mann236h 34m4.6 (153)$0.99 · $0.00
Doctor FaustusThomas Mann24h 27m4.2 (20.4K)$0.99 · $0.00
Die größten Klassiker der Weltliteratur: Philosophische RomaneThomas Mann, Herman Melville, Hermann Hesse, Joris-Karl Huysmans, Fjodor Dostojewski, Franz Kafka, Friedrich Nietzsche, Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, André Gide, Rainer Maria Rilke, Joseph Conrad, Knut Hamsun, Klaus Mann, Oscar Wilde, Thomas Wolfe224h 19m4.4 (11)$1 · $0.00
Royal HighnessThomas Mann10h 3m3.7 (1.8K)$0.99 · $0.00
Lotte in WeimarThomas Mann16h 6m3.6 (1.6K)$1 · $0.00
BuddenbrooksThomas Mann27h 41m4.3 (52.8K)$1 · $0.00
Thomas Mann - Sämtliche RomaneThomas Mann219h 15m4.7 (116)$2 · $0.00
Joseph und seine BrüderThomas Mann69h 34m4.5 (4.4K)$1 · $0.00
The Magic MountainThomas Mann35h 57m4.2 (67K)$0.99 · $0.00
La Montaña MágicaThomas Mann37h 2m4.2 (79.9K)$18 · $0.00
Thomas Mann: Herr und HundThomas Mann3h 53m3.9 (3.3K)$9 · $0.00
Thomas Mann: Gesang vom KindchenThomas Mann1h 11m$5 · $0.00
Thomas Mann: Tristan und IsoldeThomas Mann22m3.9 (3.3K)$2 · $0.00
Death in Venice (Annotated)Thomas Mann4h 36m3.9 (341)$2 · $0.00
Heart of IronC. M. Alongi15h 24m4.8 (665)$30
Ethic IIAshley Antoinette9h 1m4.7 (8K)$20
RiversnowTess Thompson8h 11m4.7 (1.3K)$20
Supreme ClienteleAshley & JaQuavis8h 58m4.7 (3.4K)$20
Body Refinement in a Beast Tamer’s World, Book 1Seth Ring14h 7m4.7 (1.3K)$27
Desperate MeasuresBrenda Jackson8h 59m4.7 (669)$28 · $0.00
Searching For ThanksgivingS.E. Smith4h 24m4.8 (395)$20
Naughty 4Brenda Hampton7h 30m4.7 (726)$17
The Dance with Me TrilogyShelley Shepard Gray21h 44m4.7 (1.2K)$35
The DopemanJaQuavis Coleman5h 25m4.7 (3.8K)$20
BAEJahquel J.5h 22m4.7 (3.1K)$20
Dark RisingJeffrey Wilson, Brian Andrews13h 47m4.7 (1.3K)$27
WhistlerAnn Patchett10h 45m4.6 (4.6K)$29 · $0.00
Grand Opening 2Carl Weber9h 16m4.7 (2.4K)$20
Sons of Valor II: Violence of ActionBrian Andrews, Jeffrey Wilson12h 34m4.6 (3.6K)$23
Malevolent MagicMildred Abbott7h 13m4.7 (1.2K)$17
Bikes, Toys, and Hot BoyzGenesis Woods, Shantaé13h 9m4.7 (722)$23
This Side of Paradise - The Original 1920 Edition (Annotated)F. Scott Fitzgerald11h 30m4.6 (1.6K)$2 · $0.00
War LordBernard Cornwell13h 21m4.6 (33.1K)$33 · $0.00
Ghetto BastardK’wan7h 37m4.6 (2.9K)$20
Unfinished BusinessBlair Howard7h 17m4.8 (373)$23
The New Human Revolution, vol. 1Daisaku Ikeda7h 46m4.7 (669)$12 · $0.00
Meddlesome MoneyMildred Abbott8h 21m4.7 (1.3K)$20
Dark RisingJeffrey Wilson, Brian Andrews13h 47m4.7 (1.3K)$27
Midnight ShadowsS.E. Smith5h 40m4.7 (2.5K)$17
CollateralBrian Andrews, Jeffrey Wilson13h 8m4.6 (7K)$23
The ReunionJana Deleon6h 31m4.6 (1.6K)$26 · $0.00
Animal 3K’wan6h 33m4.6 (2.8K)$20
To Hold and ProtectSandra Owens7h 59m4.6 (1.1K)$8 · $0.00
Extinction WarNicholas Sansbury Smith12h 1m4.6 (6K)$23
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (Complete Edition)Arthur Conan Doyle12h 28m4.6 (286.7K)$2 · $0.00
Savy WisdomPeggy McColl2h 53m4.7 (448)$15
3 a.m. Premium: Books 1–5Nick Pirog15h 27m4.6 (8.2K)$25
Farewell My Lovely (Annotated)Raymond Chandler10h 37m4.6 (1.2K)$2 · $0.00
The Labyrinth of the SpiritsCarlos Ruiz Zafon27h 55m4.5 (77.2K)$53 · $0.00
Tracing Killer EvidenceJodie Bailey5h 46m4.7 (242)$12 · $0.00
Sign of the MakerBrian Shea7h 13m4.6 (2.5K)$17
No Sin UnpunishedLynDee Walker7h 43m4.6 (1.4K)$17
Sherlock HolmesMade for Success14h 22m4.5 (4.3K)$25
Sons of War 4: SoldiersNicholas Sansbury Smith, Tom Abrahams12h 54m4.6 (507)$25
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