Hermann Hesse,German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. best-known works include Steppenwolf, Siddhartha, and The Glass Bead Game (also known as Magister Ludi), each of which explores an individual's search for authenticity, self knowledge and spirituality, was born on 2 July 1877 in the Black Forest town of Calw in Württemberg, Germany
Both of Hesse's parents served in India at a mission
under the auspices of the Basel Mission, a Protestant Christian missionary
society.In 1891, his parents sent him to a Protestant monastery near
Maulbronn, but he was unable to bear the Christian education and fled
just a few months later. Hesse knew exactly what he wanted to become - "a poet or nothing at
all."
His journey to writing was in itself an odyssey. After trying out
many different schools, he became so depressed at the age of 15 that he
tried to take his own life. He finally ended up working in a workshop,
then for a clock tower maker and in bookstores. His search for
identity and the difficult process of discovering oneself were topics
that Hesse addressed in his later novels. His stories were scattered
with references to his own experiences, analyses of himself, and poetic
avowals. Forever questioning he searched for a religious
doctrine that that was not militant or missionary, but open to
other lifestyles.
After fleeing his home country of Germany and settling in Italian-speaking Switzerland he supported German refugees, including Thomas Mann and Bertolt Brecht, as they fled the Nazi regime. It was during the war that he wrote his last great work, "The Glass Bead Game," which won him the 1946 Nobel Prize for Literature..
He developed a moral distaste for the Western industrial capitalist civilisation which allowed, and indeed encouraged, abominations such as wars .He made the connection explicit when he declared the wretched state of the world was down to “two mental disorders: the megalomania of technology and the megalomania of nationalism”, adding that resistance to these two phenomena was today “the most important test and justification of the human spirit” He wrote to one reader: “I don’t believe in our politics, our way of thinking, believing, amusing ourselves; I don’t share a single one of the ideals of our age”.His work is infused with a sense of deep alienation from contemporary society and of yearning for another existence. He wrote to one reader: “I don’t believe in our politics, our way of thinking, believing, amusing ourselves; I don’t share a single one of the ideals of our age
In December 1961, Hermann Hesse fell ill with a flu from which he had difficulty recovering. He had been suffering from leukaemia for some time without knowing it; at the Bellinzona hospital he was treated with blood transfusions. Hesse died of a stroke in his sleep on the night of August 9, 1962, at at his home in Swiss Montagnola aged 85. His words continuing to inspire.humanity across the world.
Herman Hesse - The Poet
Only on me, the lonely one,
The unending stars of the night shine,
The stone fountain whispers its magic song,
To me alone, to me the lonely one
The colorful shadows of the wandering clouds
Move like dreams over the open countryside.
Neither house nor farmland,
Neither forest nor hunting privilege is given to me,
What is mine belongs to no one,
The plunging brook behind the veil of the woods,
The frightening sea,
The bird whir of children at play,
The weeping and singing, lonely in the evening, of a man secretly in love.
The temples of the gods are mine also, and mine
the aristocratic groves of the past.
And no less, the luminous
Vault of heaven in the future is my home:
Often in full flight of longing my soul storms upward,
To gaze on the future of blessed men,
Love, overcoming the law, love from people to people.
I find them all again, nobly transformed:
Farmer, king, tradesman, busy sailors,
Shepherd and gardener, all of them
Gratefully celebrate the festival of the future world.
Only the poet is missing,
The lonely one who looks on,
The bearer of human longing, the pale image
Of whom the future, the fulfillment of the world
Has no further need. Many garlands
Wilt on his grave,
But no one remembers him.
After fleeing his home country of Germany and settling in Italian-speaking Switzerland he supported German refugees, including Thomas Mann and Bertolt Brecht, as they fled the Nazi regime. It was during the war that he wrote his last great work, "The Glass Bead Game," which won him the 1946 Nobel Prize for Literature..
He developed a moral distaste for the Western industrial capitalist civilisation which allowed, and indeed encouraged, abominations such as wars .He made the connection explicit when he declared the wretched state of the world was down to “two mental disorders: the megalomania of technology and the megalomania of nationalism”, adding that resistance to these two phenomena was today “the most important test and justification of the human spirit” He wrote to one reader: “I don’t believe in our politics, our way of thinking, believing, amusing ourselves; I don’t share a single one of the ideals of our age”.His work is infused with a sense of deep alienation from contemporary society and of yearning for another existence. He wrote to one reader: “I don’t believe in our politics, our way of thinking, believing, amusing ourselves; I don’t share a single one of the ideals of our age
In December 1961, Hermann Hesse fell ill with a flu from which he had difficulty recovering. He had been suffering from leukaemia for some time without knowing it; at the Bellinzona hospital he was treated with blood transfusions. Hesse died of a stroke in his sleep on the night of August 9, 1962, at at his home in Swiss Montagnola aged 85. His words continuing to inspire.humanity across the world.
Herman Hesse - The Poet
Only on me, the lonely one,
The unending stars of the night shine,
The stone fountain whispers its magic song,
To me alone, to me the lonely one
The colorful shadows of the wandering clouds
Move like dreams over the open countryside.
Neither house nor farmland,
Neither forest nor hunting privilege is given to me,
What is mine belongs to no one,
The plunging brook behind the veil of the woods,
The frightening sea,
The bird whir of children at play,
The weeping and singing, lonely in the evening, of a man secretly in love.
The temples of the gods are mine also, and mine
the aristocratic groves of the past.
And no less, the luminous
Vault of heaven in the future is my home:
Often in full flight of longing my soul storms upward,
To gaze on the future of blessed men,
Love, overcoming the law, love from people to people.
I find them all again, nobly transformed:
Farmer, king, tradesman, busy sailors,
Shepherd and gardener, all of them
Gratefully celebrate the festival of the future world.
Only the poet is missing,
The lonely one who looks on,
The bearer of human longing, the pale image
Of whom the future, the fulfillment of the world
Has no further need. Many garlands
Wilt on his grave,
But no one remembers him.
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