Quotes from Death in Venice

“Nothing is stranger or more ticklish than a relationship between people who know each other only by sight, who meet and observe each other daily - no hourly - and are nevertheless compelled to keep up the pose of an indifferent stranger, neither greeting nor addressing each other, whether out of etiquette or their own whim.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“The observations and encounters of a solitary, taciturn man are vaguer and at the same times more intense than those of a sociable man; his thoughts are deeper, odder and never without a touch of sadness. Images and perceptions that could be dismissed with a glance, a laugh, an exchange of opinions, occupy him unduly, become more intense in the silence, become significant, become an experience, an adventure, an emotion. Solitude produces originality, bold and astonishing beauty, poetry. But solitude also produces perverseness, the disproportionate, the absurd and the forbidden.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“A lonely, quiet person has observations and experiences that are at once both more indistinct and more penetrating than those of one more gregarious; his thoughts are weightier, stranger, and never without a tinge of sadness. . . . Loneliness fosters that which is original, daringly and bewilderingly beautiful, poetic. But loneliness also fosters that which is perverse, incongruous, absurd, forbidden.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Solitude produces originality, bold & astonishing beauty, poetry. But solitude also produces perverseness, the disproportionate, the absurd, and the forbidden.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“(...) nearly all the great things that exist owe their existence to a defiant despite: it is despite grief and anguish, despite poverty, loneliness, bodily weakness, vice and passion and a thousand inhibitions, that they have come into being at all.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“It is as well that the world knows only a fine piece of work and not also its origins, the conditions under which it came into being; for knowledge of the sources of an artist's inspiration would often confuse readers and shock them, and the excellence of the writing would be of no avail.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“The observations and encounters of a devotee of solitude and silence are at once less distinct and more penetrating than those of the sociable man; his thoughts are weightier, stranger, and never without a tinge of sadness. Images and perceptions which might otherwise be easily dispelled by a glance, a laugh, an exchange of comments, concern him unduly, they sink into mute depths, take on significance, become experiences, adventures, emotions.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“The observations and encounters of a man of solitude and few words are at once more nebulous and more intense than those of a gregarious man, his thoughts more ponderable, more bizarre and never without a hint of sadness. Images and perceptions that might easily be dismissed with a glance, a laugh, an exchange of opinions occupy him unduly; they are heightened in the silence, gain in significance, turn into experience, adventure, emotion. Solitude begets originality, bold and disconcerting beauty, poetry. But solitude can also beget perversity, disparity, the absurd and the forbidden.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Because man loves and honors man as long as he is not able to judge him, and desire is a product of lacking knowledge.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Because passion, like crime, does not like everyday order and well-being and every slight undoing of the bourgeois system, every confusion and infestation of the world is welcome to it, because it can unconditionally expect to find its advantage in it.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“This yearning for new and distant scenes, this craving for freedom, release, forgetfulness -- they were he admitted to himself, an impulse towards flight, flight from the spot which was the daily theatre of a rigid, cold, and passionate service.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“For an important intellectual product to be immediately weighty, a deep relationship or concordance has to exist between the life of its creator and the general lives of the people. These people are generally unaware why exactly they praise a certain work of art. Far from being truly knowledgeable, they perceive it to have a hundred different benefits to justify their adulation; but the real underlying reason for their behavior cannot be measured, is sympathy.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“It is probably better that the world knows only the result, not the conditions under which it was achieved; because knowledge of the artist’s sources of inspiration might bewilder them, drive them away and in that way nullify the effect of the excellent work.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“...which seemed to hover in a limbo between creation and decay...”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“His love of the sea had profound roots: the hardworking artist's desire to rest, his longing to get away from the demanding diversity of phenomena and take shelter in the bosom of simplicity and immensity; a forbidden penchant that was entirely antithetical to his mission and, for that very reason, seductive-a proclivity for the unorganized, the immeasurable, the eternal: for nothingness.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“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?”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“his steps were dictated by the demon who delights in destroying manfs reason and dignity.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“His yearning for new and faraway places, his desire for freedom, relief and oblivion was as he admitted to himself, an urge to flee-an urge to get away from his work, from the everyday site of a cold, rigid, and passionate servitude.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Like any lover, he desired to please; suffered agonies at the thought of failure.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“you must know that we poets cannot take the path of Beauty unless Eros joins us and sets himself up as our guide; indeed, though we may be heroes after our fashion and virtuous warriors, we are nevertheless like women, for passion is our exaltation, and our longing must remain love-that is our bless and our shame.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Nothing is more curious and awkward than the relationship of two people who only know each other with their eyes who meet and observe each other daily, even hourly and who keep up the impression of disinterest either because of morals or because of a mental abnormality. Between them there is listlessness and pent-up curiosity, the hysteria of an unsatisfied, unnaturally suppressed need for communion and also a kind of tense respect. Because man loves and honors man as long as he is not able to judge him, and desire is a product of lacking knowledge.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“The happiness of writers is the thought that can be entirely emotion and the emotion that can be entirely thought. Such a pulsing thought, such a”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Pues el hombre ama y respeta al hombre mientras no se halla en condiciones de juzgarlo, y el deseo vehemente es el resultado de un conocimiento imperfecto”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Denn der Mensch liebt und ehrt den Menschen , solange er ihn nicht zu beurteilen vermag, und die Sehnsucht ist ein Erzeunis mangelhafter Erkenntnis.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“...nearly everything great owes its existence to “despites”: despite misery and affliction, poverty, desolation, physical debility, vice, passion, and a thousand other obstacles.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“I ako je lično shvatimo, umetnost je povišen život. Ona usrećuje dublje, ona troši brže. U lice svoga sluge ona reže tragove umišljenih i duhovnih doživljaja, i vremenom, čak i kada mu je spoljni život manastirski miran, stvara kod njega toliku razneženost, prefinjenost, zamor i radoznalost živaca da bi to jedva mogao stvoriti život pun razuzdanih strasti uživanja.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

“Only incorrigible bohemians find it boring or laughable when a man of talent outgrows the libertine chrysalis stage and begins to perceive and express the dignity of the intellect, adopting the courtly ways of a solitude replete with bitter suffering and inner battles though eventually gaining a position of power and honor among men.”
― Thomas Mann, quote from Death in Venice

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