Has anybody else here read any novels by Herman Hesse? I discovered this author this summer while working at a spiritual bookstore and im hooked! I'm sure somebodies come across his book 'siddartha'
I devoured all his books when I was your age, raincoast. They open a door or two in the corridors of the mind.
Yeah, just started Magister Ludi. My old spirtual teacher/boss had given it to me after i had finished a whole slew of HH books. I was told to read the 3 past lives at the end of the book before the main story. Very intense stuff! All the threads that began in his early works all seem to come together in a cosmic knot in this last book..
I've read just about everything by Hesse translated into English except Magister Ludi. Somehow I got stopped up in the beginning. Maybe I should give it another try.
Yes, give Magister Ludi another try if you can. Read the 3 short stories at the end of the book first, and then muscle your way through the first 60 pages or so (The start of the book is kind of dry but it gets really interesting).. Steppenwolf is a great book as well. I want to re-read it to get a deeper message. (I re-read 'The Journey to the East' and it FUCKING BLEW MY MIND the second time). Hesse is a genius..
I've read most of his books, Siddartha, Narcissus and Goldmund, Steppenwolf, Beneath the Wheel, Demian, just now digging into The Glass Bead Game. I've always liked his writing style and I think his philosophies are a real interesting blend of both Eastern and Western ideas. Not to mention the fact that he is able to convey these ideas in simple, yet engrossing storylines
I have only read Siddhartha. I lovee that book. I have always wanted to read more by Herman Hesse but wasn't sure what was good. Now I have some suggestions!
Siddhartha blew my mind, opened me up to a whole new spiritual understanding of the cosmos. I read everything Herman Hesse wrote after that. Unfortunately, I was never around many people that had read it or who I felt I could talk to about these books back then. I was often left with a feeling of confusion, not sure what to do with the experiences and ideas I had immersed myself in with these books. I found the violence at the end of Steppenwolf very disturbing. Never was able to reconcile it being from the same author as Siddhartha. I loved "The Glass Bead Game: (Magister Ludi)", for the concept of a "college" and a game in which the entire cosmos and all of its complexities could be abstractly represented. I read all of these novels before I ever went to college, so read them from the perspective of a more naive mind. The Glass Bead Game made me want to go to college purely for the joy of learning, which I did. Such a shame Castalia was not available. Perhaps I should probably read them again.
