Thomas Mann's early Erz hlungen and Buddenbrooks contain many leitmotivs: death, spring, the walnut-tree, the violin, the sea and the 'Liebestod' motif adopted from Act III of Richard Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. A complete index is neither possible nor practicable in a work of this size which charts the use and non-use of the leitmotiv in all Mann's Erz hlungen up until 1930, engages analytically with some previous research, examines possible literary...