Death in Venice

by Thomas Mann

Almost every artistic individual has a luxurious and treacherous propensity to recognize beauty-creating inequity and to render homage to aristocratic entitlement.

To find peace in the presence of the faultless is the desire of the one who seeks excellence; and is not nothingness a form of perfection?

Nothing in the educated and dignified expression of the older one betrayed an inner motion; but in Tadziofs eyes there was an inquiry, a pensive questioning, he hesitated in his walk, cast down his eyes, looked up again in a lovely way, and when he had passed, something in his attitude suggested that only good manners were keeping him from turning around.

He was more beautiful than can be expressed in words and Aschenbach again felt pain about the inability of words to truly describe beauty instead of just praising it.

It was the smile of Narcissus who bends above the reflecting water, that deep, enchanting, protracted smile, with which he extends his arms towards the mirror image of his own beauty-a slightly distorted smile, distorted from the hopelessness of his longing to kiss the pretty lips of his shadow, flirtatious, curious and somewhat tormented, infatuating and infatuated.

Like any other lover he wanted to please and feared this would be impossible. He added little embellishments to his suits to make them look more youthful, he wore jewelry and used perfume, multiple times a day he required a lot of time for his toilette, he was ornate, excited, and tense when he came to the dining room. In view of that sweet youth that infatuated him his worn-out body disgusted him, his gray hair, the sharp features of his face caused him to feel shame and despair. He felt compelled to rejuvenate himself; he frequently visited the barber of the hotel.