Exactly how steamy is this story?
R
If what you're looking for is sex, then Death in Venice will probably disappoint. What we get instead is lust, desire—okay, and a pretty steamy dream about an orgy.
On the most basic level, Death in Venice is about an older man who falls in love with a barely adolescent boy. That's enough to up the rating. But here at Shmoop, we're not all that interested in the basics. Mann's portrayal of Aschenbach's lust is not just perverse for the sake of being perverse—it comes with a whole lot of symbolism to make it something more. Aschenbach is a pedophile, but leaving it at that might prevent us from hearing all the things Death in Venice has to say about creativity, desire, and self-destruction.
In other words, this book is mature on every level—not just the lusty one.