The Narcotic Aesthetics Of Desire In Thomas Mann’s Death In Venice: Psychological Disintegration

Abstract

Thomas Mann's Death in Venice (1912) is a comprehensive psychological exploration of aesthetic addiction, depicting beauty not as a noble ideal but as a tempting and deadly power. This study analyses the novella using the concept of aesthetic narcotisation, positing that beauty in Mann’s work operates as a psychological narcotic that progressively erodes reason, ethics, and identity. In contrast to Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, which has Lord Henry as the external agent of corruption through his seductive hedonism, Mann depicts Gustav von Aschenbach as being ensnared by the artistic standards themselves, devoid of any external corrupter. His interaction with the youngster Tadzio initiates a compulsive loop whereby beauty provokes, confounds, and finally subjugates his awareness. This study, utilising Freudian concepts of repression, sublimation, and hallucination, alongside critiques from scholars like Andre Aciman and Camille Paglia, contends that Aschenbach’s decline exemplifies the psychological processes of addiction—initial euphoria, escalating dependency, loss of control, and ultimate collapse. With its beautiful atmosphere and underlying ruin, Venice makes his condition worse by making him feel sleepy. In the end, Death in Venice shows how dangerous it is to be too strict about how things should look. When beauty turns into a drug instead of a creative drive, it changes from a way to get ideas to a trap that can kill you mentally.