Death in Venice and Seven Other Stories by Thomas Mann
My rating: 3/5 cats
european men, stay put. seriously, nothing good ever happens to you when you leave whatever small european town you are from and venture into the wider world. whether it is gide and tunisia, conrad and the congo, robbe-grillet and wherever that was, various graham greenes; statistically, there will be temptations which you are not equipped to resist and you will either succumb or drive yourself to humiliation and despair with the wanting to succumb. and i totally get it – different surroundings, absence of judgmental peer group, it’s vacation morality. when i was in prague, i totally stole a guinness mug from the irish pub i fell in love with. so i am no stranger to a wild life of crime and transgression. i left the children alone, though…
(for the record, lawrence durrell is totally exempt from this advice, although since he is dead, it doesn’t really matter…)
and just so we’re clear – i only read death in venice. the other seven stories can go screw for now – this is just book club fare, and if i have time in my life to read more troubled intellectual germans, i will know where to turn. but for now, i must bake book club cake and enjoy my free snow day.
readers, thinkers, and drinkers feb 2010
