Britten had been contemplating the novella for many years and began work in September 1970 with approaches to Piper and to Golo Mann, son of the author.

Because of agreements between Warner Brothers and the estate of Thomas Mann for the production of Luchino Visconti's 1971 film, Britten was advised not to see the movie when it was released.

[2] According to Colin Graham, director of the first production of the opera, some colleagues of the composer who did see the film found the relationship between Tadzio and Aschenbach "too sentimental and salacious".

[3] Ian Bostridge has noted themes in the work of "formalism in art and the perilous dignity of the acclaimed artist".

[4] Scene 1: Munich Aschenbach, a famous German novelist, is weary and opens the opera bemoaning the fading of his artistic inspiration.

He obtains a wry satisfaction from the discovery that Tadzio has flaws: as a Pole, the boy hates the Russian guests ("He is human after all.

Seeing rubbish on the streets and smelling the foul water of the canals, he feels nauseated and claustrophobic, and decides that he must leave Venice.

On arriving at the station, Aschenbach finds that his luggage has been sent on the wrong train ("I am furious because I am forced to return, but secretly I rejoice.

Scene 7: The Games of Apollo Aschenbach sits in his chair on the Lido beach, watching Tadzio and his friends play.

Sitting with a book but distracted by his own thoughts, Aschenbach decides to accept his feeling for the boy as it is: "ridiculous, but sacred too and no, not dishonourable, even in these circumstances".

In due course, the family leaves and takes a gondola back to the hotel, with Aschenbach in pursuit and in a state of some excitement: "Tadzio, Eros, charmer, see I am past all fear, blind to danger, drunken, powerless, sunk in the bliss of madness."

Scene 11: The Travel Bureau A young English clerk is dealing with a crowd of hotel guests, all urgently trying to leave Venice.

As the clerk closes the bureau, Aschenbach asks him about the plague and is told that the city is in the grip of Asiatic cholera.

Scene 12: The Lady of the Pearls Aschenbach decides to warn Tadzio's mother of the danger posed to them by the plague, but cannot bring himself to do it.

He initially chastises himself for having failed to "make everything decent and above board", but then decides that he was right not to speak out, and idly wonders "What if all were dead, and only we two left alive?"

(The music for Apollo in this scene derives from the First Delphic Hymn, an early Greek melody Britten heard Arda Mandikian sing at the 1954 Aldeburgh Festival.)

Aschenbach inquires as to their time of departure, then leaves to sit on the deserted beach where Tadzio and another boy, Jaschiu, are playing.