Literary Theory and Criticism
By NASRULLAH MAMBROLon
The German-Swiss writer Hermann Hesse (–) started the novel Siddhartha at the end of , when his psychoanalytical novel Demian, () was published, but after a few chapters he suspended his work on the novel for more than 20 months, finishing it only three years later, in summer In a letter written on August 19, , to the French novelist Roman Rolland, an international champion of the pacifist ideology at the time, Hesse announced the completion of Siddhartha and its prospective printing scheduled for late autumn that same year. The work was translated into English in under the same title. The month suspension of the work is still intriguing, since it represents, perhaps, the main key for understanding the message and the symbolism of the text.
As Hesse himself would claim, Siddhartha had been conceived as an “Indian poem,” which means that the plot and the symbols of the text do not follow closely the classical myth of the Gautama Buddha complex. The novel is merely a meditation on how to achieve serenity by contemplation, not a textbook on spiritual exercise and practice. Hesse’s Buddha goes beyond a
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Published in , Siddhartha is the most famous and influential novel by Nobel prize-winning () German author Hermann Hesse. Though set in India, the concerns of Siddhartha are universal, expressing Hesse's general interest in the conflict between mind, body, and spirit. While people have contemplated this conflict since time immemorial, it took on a special urgency for Hesse. Psychoanalysis had exploded onto the European intellectual scene in the first decades of the 20th century, and its investigations into the fundamental well-springs of human behavior revolutionized the our self-conceptions; the sovereignty of reason was crumbling as the Id emerged supreme. As a result, a new understanding of the whole human animal had to be worked out. Also, political conflicts in the second decade let to a war in which technological inventions, monuments to human reason and ingenuity, were used to slaughter people in terrible ways. This also called for a reexamination of the relationship between the various aspects of ourselves. These two events, the emergence of psychoanalysis and World War I, then, set
Siddhartha
(Hermann Hesse)
Siddhartha was written during Hesse’s mid-life. As his family- extending to his grandparents- were missionaries in India, the region’s literature and philosophy was constantly available to him through his grandfather’s book collection. While he dived into Western thought for much of his adulthood, his interest in the East was sparked anew, taking a trip that while may not have provided the emotional and spiritual relief he sought, did serve as the foundation for Siddhartha.
The novel itself is an allegory to the Buddhist concepts of the four noble truths and the eightfold path, making up the twelve chapters of the book, as long as the three stages of life for a Buddhist male- student, householder, and recluse.
Hermann Hesse: A Short Biography
Born in Germany in to a devoutly religious family, Herman Hesse grew up amongst two parents who both served as missionaries in India. His grandparents were also missionaries in the same country, so Hesse’s attraction and familiarity with the place is understandable. He received an excellent education in Germany during his childhood, but his attendance to a seminary in Wurttemberg as a teenager started a
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Hermann Hesse was born on July 2, , in Calw, Germany. The son of a former Pietist missionary, Hesse was expected to join the ministry and was sent to the Maulbronn seminary in to complete his education. Three short months after arriving in Maulbronn, Hesse began to suffer from chronic headaches and insomnia. He was promptly sent to the Pastor Christoph Blumhardt at Bad Boll to be cured. The treatment was not very effective, though, as Hesse's unrequited love for the pastor's daughter made him suicidal. He was then sent to a school for the mentally retarded and emotionally unstable for convalescence. After a few months, Hesse was released for good behavior and resumed his education at Cannstadt. At Cannstadt, though, Hesse began to drink, smoke, and incur heavy debts. In , his formal education was at an end and his parents called him back to Calw.
After helping his father in his publishing business, Hesse became an apprentice bookseller in Tubingen, a usual occupation for budding German authors. Hesse's time in Tubingen was characterized by obsessive reading and solitary contemplation. It was duri
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