Yeay! I started reading last night. So far very good (as an aside, I'd very much recommend Kokoro by Natsume Soseki, very good).
How do you know if you haven't read it
Like Virgil said, it's part of the story. If you missed it out then you've effectively started reading at chapter 2.
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I think he did. I've just read a potted bio here:
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/l...e-autobio.html
and the main themes - pacifism, the problems with nationalism in Germany, eastern studies, living alone after divorce - are mentioned.
It seems as if there is a lot of his experience in the novel.
Last edited by Paulclem; 03-09-2010 at 06:12 PM. Reason: Knuckle obstinacy
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
While this book is littered with a wide variety of literary allusions which play an important role within the story, and helping to shape the character of Haller and the ideas of the Steppenwolf and his struggles, it seems there is particular attention given to Goethe.
He is mentioned a few different times throughout the book and there was the episode of the portrait of Goethe which played a key role within the story.
I am not that familiar with all of the works of Goethe and I am curious as to just why he does seem to play such a role within the story, and if any of his works have elements that directly relate to the themes expressed within Steppenwolf and Haller's ideas.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
That idea of "the immortals" which comes up often within the story also rather intrigues me.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
I get the impression that they are metaphorically immortal - he does say it is poetic writing- in the appreciation of what they produced.
As for the preface, I think Hesse sets us up with an expectation that this will be a conventional novel. In fact the narrator - the straight young fellow who spies a bit on Haller- gives us a conventional narrative in the preface. He observes Haller, gives his opinion, and relates the whole story to us up to the departure of Haller. What Haller has written goes far beyond that - it relates the inner poetic story thast is invisible to the bourgeois narrator. So we get two versions - the conventional and the poetic, which are quite different.
I wonder are the "immortals" suppose to be fellow Steppenwolves? They do seem to be literary or otherwise artistic types, and interestingly enough, as you mentioned the connection to poetic writing and the immortals, many of the so called immortals are also composers of music which can be seen as a form of poetry.
They are figures were were different, and outside the norms of society, as well as being highly intellectual and/or visionary and seeming to be elevated a step above the rest.
And in Haller's dream with the spirit of Goethe, Goethe speaks of his own constant struggles against death and seems almost regretfully that he had lived for as long as he did, which seems to reflect Haller's own constant struggle against death.
Also didn't Haller express at one point his own desire to become and counted one among the "immortals?"
That is quite an interesting thought. In a way it is like showing the external world vs the internal. And it is interesting to have a brief glimpse of Haller through the eyes of another and the way in which he is perceived and than to go from that to see Haller's own Self-Perception. That is an interesting narrative technique to view the character in two different ways as a way to gain a more complete picture of him by seeing him both through his own eyes, and through the eyes of outsiders.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
I've just re-read the preface, and it does lay out the life of Haller up to his departure from the apartment he has rented.
It is worth the read, and re-read, as it offers insights into the nature of the ideas in the book.
I am curios about the business regarding the images, primarily the incident of the Goethe portrait, and Haller's reactions to it, and than his conversation with the currently nameless girl in the bar and her own expression about the saints and the savior, and the image she creates in her own mind vs the image that others create of them.
It seems almost like some sort of anti-idolatry sentiment, though not necessarily purely in a religious sense in spite of the example of the religious icons given, but rather as if these "immortals" in spite of the fact that they were in fact living flesh and blood people have transcended beyond having their own images depicted.
Particularly by those with him at least according to the Steppenwolf, who are in fact unworthy of the immortals and unable to truly understand or perhaps fully appreciate just who and what the immortals are/were and only the Steppenwolf might know them and be worthy of them.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before. ~ Edgar Allan Poe