Women And Femininity In Thomas Mann's Death In Venice

German novelist, Thomas Mann in his novella, Death in Venice suggests that Death in Venice suggests that the lack of feminine presence is a major problem in Aschenbach’s life. He lacks inspiration and women are commonly used by male artists as muses. Aschenbach lives his life with a majority of male influences which causes him to be attracted to Tadzio’s “feminine traits” and without a female character in his life, Aschenbach lacks proper morality. Mann supports his claim by showing that without inspiration from a muse, Aschenabach’s writing becomes dull and “lifeless”; his attraction and “love” towards Tadzio is due to his lack of female influences and his wife’s death which lowers his morality . In Mann’s novella, his protagonist, von Aschenbach

Aschenbach in Death in Venice lives a lonely life after he is left widowed after his wife had died and his daughter married. Due to this, he does not have female contact in years and subconsciously he would crave for anything that resembles femininity. “ He married young, the daughter of a university family; but after a brief term of wedded happiness, his wife had die “(Mann). As he always lives his life full of male and not much female influences, thus he is attracted by Tadzio. Tadzio has a feminine aura and his femininity attracted Aschenbach.
“Aschenbach noticed with astonishment the lad's perfect beauty. His face recalled the noblest moment of Greek sculpture-pale, with a sweet reserve, with clustering honeycoloured ringlets, the brow and nose descending in one line, the winning mouth, the expression of pure and godlike serenity. Yet with all this chaste perfection of form it was of such unique personal charm that the observer thought he had never seen, either in nature or art, anything so utterly happy and consummate.