Death in Venice and Other Stories

'impossible here, absurd, depraved, ludicrous and yet sacred, still honourable, even here: "I love you!"'

This volume contains a generous selection of the short fiction Thomas Mann published in the years 1897 to 1912, after which he turned to larger-scale projects. The acknowledged classic among the early shorter fiction is the novella Death in Venice, in which Mann develops a lyrical style and a range of mythological allusions, through the forbidden love of a middle-aged man for a teenage boy, a theme with roots in Mann's own emotional experience. In many of his shorter works, Mann uses irony and humour to treat the conflict between sensitive, often artistic souls and the vital, often brutal forces of life. The stories, usually about isolated figures, convey a mixture of humour, sadness, and irony which invites ambivalent responses from readers.

This new set of translations by Ritchie Robertson and Nicola Luckhurst is accompanied by explanatory notes and introduction.

ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Author: Thomas Mann,Nicola Luckhurst,Ritchie Robertson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 04/08/2026
Pages: 288
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.49lbs
Size: 7.71h x 5.39w x 0.67d
ISBN: 9780198850076

About the Author
Thomas Mann

Nicola Luckhurst is an academic and translator. A specialist in modernism, her publications include Science and Structure in Proust's A la recherche (2000), Virginia Woolf in Camera (2001), (as editor) The European Reception of Virginia Woolf (2002), and a translation of Freud's Studies in Hysteria (2004).

Ritchie Robertson retired in 2021 as Schwarz-Taylor Professor of German in the University of Oxford. For the greater part of his career he was Fellow and Tutor of St John's College, Oxford. He is now an Emeritus Fellow of the Queen's College. His many books include Kafka: Judaism, Politics, and Literature (1985), The Enlightenment: The Pursiuit of Happiness, 1680-1790 (2020) and German Political Tragedy: The Machiavellian Plot and the Necessary Crime (2024), as well as books on Kafka and Goethe in OUP's Very Short Introductions series. Since 2004, he has been a Fellow of the British Academy.