Demian

Jan 17, 2011 Paquita Maria Sanchez rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: literature

Star-ratings are funny little things.* At the risk of putting words into your collective binary mouth, let me tell you how it goes with a (for loss of a better word) "good" book...you know, one that you finish all too quickly and must lick your fingers and frantically flip back several pages in order to absorb the end once more, this time wholly, slowly, meditatively. At last accepting that you have experienced the novel's final message, that final flash of imagery both resolute and interpretive...more Star-ratings are funny little things.* At the risk of putting words into your collective binary mouth, let me tell you how it goes with a (for loss of a better word) "good" book...you know, one that you finish all too quickly and must lick your fingers and frantically flip back several pages in order to absorb the end once more, this time wholly, slowly, meditatively. At last accepting that you have experienced the novel's final message, that final flash of imagery both resolute and interpretively open-ended, you gingerly set your paperback down (this isn't the Ritz, folks) feeling slightly dizzy, buzzy-brained, shifty-eyed, and maybe even a bit physically fatigued. Immediately you find yourself absorbed in thoughts of how much this book meant to you within the context of the particular time that it chose to stroll into your life, specifically its impact on your sense of self both internal and external (who you are to you, who you seem to others, how you feel that you appear to the world and how that actually manifests itself in your thoughts and actions...all, I assure you/me, vastly different animals).

If you were lucky in your selection of purchased/borrowed/stolen/traded book, this thought process will go on for several hours or even days. You may go out and have drinks with friends, you may go make an ass out of yourself at a dance party, you may go on a date (if anyone does THAT anymore) to a movie, concert, or art show, but that book (again, if you're lucky) is still with you like the taste of phlegm in the back of your throat, like the subtle but ever-present pangs of self-doubt and squelched dreams, like thoughts of what you shoulda woulda coulda said to a bully in third grade or during a fight with a friend or foe sometime last week. There that novel is, gently rapping at your chamber door. You engage with others, but a part of you is not there. This is the important part of you, the contemplative self striving for your soul's resolution, for answers to a myriad of unnameable questions whose answers are all riddles. Hesse struggled with this as we all, my neurotic friends, all too often do. In the process of analyzing the books in his life, from religious texts to Jungian psychology to the philosophical musings of Nietzsche, Hesse found an anchor for the quietly screaming, ever-present thoughts stirred within himself by the written word. For Hesse, it would appear, the answer was in fact hidden within the question. To regain his spiritual and mental equilibrium that had been cast asunder by books, Hesse funneled his scattered thoughts through the physical act of literature itself. He is arguably a meditative writer, forcing his greatest confusions onto the page as if they are fact, editing and re-editing until he finds his own brand of truth. In his quest for contentment, he has provided answers for many others. This was not his goal, however, as can be seen in the fact that he did not even initially publish this novel under his (at the time as much, if not even more than now) highly-recognizable name. All the same, many people claim stock in the Hesse cult, seeing him not as a path to self-questioning, but as a source for answers akin to the Bible or the Eight-fold Path. I do not take Hesse's words as scripture. I do not think that he would have wanted it that way. His novels ask questions of himself, provide answers to himself, and then shake the reader and say "but never mind what I said. Just who the hell are YOU, friend?"

I realize that this may all sound too overblown, like I'm trying to give you some sort of hammy "I'll never let go" Titanic finale-esque analysis of a relatively short and fairly dated novel. Please, do me the favor of bearing in mind that my words concerning the "Cult of Hesse" (the Hessians? No?)are all of the reasons that I was skeptical about reading Hesse's work to begin with. You see, it's a problem with sentimentality. I have this stubborn tendency to avoid overwhelmingly revered as "spiritually liberating" novels and films out of a very specific fear. What if I'm unmoved like a rock, like an iiiiiiiiiisland? I've always been so stern toward fictional worlds, and while I will let music move me to epic fits of tears, only three films (Titanic...KIDDING!) have made me weep in my life: Schindler's List (as a sorostitute-blogger would say, "totz obvi"), Dancer in the Dark (because FUCK) and Heavenly Creatures (which I definitely chalk up to a horrible case of Bronchitis, a whole bottle of liquid codeine, and the post-High School graduation "what the fuck NOW" jitters). Basically, dripping-with-sorrowful-sentimentality-films make me feel cold. I fear that such a book may do worse. However, having as of late been of a S.A.D.-inspired, melancholy disposition, I decided to dim the lights, hush the crowd, draw the curtain open and say "alright Herman, take it away!"

I am certainly glad that I did. This novel opened up several padlocked, bullet-proof doors in my chest, asking me to reanalyze what had really been bothering me. In this quest for self-awareness, we often see ourselves in an idealized fashion, constantly acknowledging what we could be without really recognizing that we actually aren't yet. Sure, we make plans...and we know that we could follow through with them, but we (more often than not) never do. It's always an obligation of tomorrow, something we will take care of later, an inevitable path that we subconsciously feel (due to its presumed inevitability) that we don't have to really struggle for as it will one day just pop itself in our lap like a stray cat looking for a home. Unfortunately, it is never, nor will it ever be, that easy. For many of us, it one day hits you like a cannonball that you were wrong, that you are not the you that you see you to be, and this crushing realization can often times cause you to implode. Sometimes we stay in this defeated state for far too long. We make all the wrong choices in order to hush the monster inside, rather than facing it a la David versus Goliath or the Joe versus the Volcano or whatever analogy you like. This listless wandering, this pain-numbing can go on for months or years or even entire lifetimes. But SOMETIMES something bitch-slaps you awake. In short, this novel woke me up. In his struggle for awareness, for personal equilibrium, the protagonist suffered through many of the same gestures as the rest of we lost souls. You try friends. You try drugs and drink. You try religion or philosophy or boyfriends or girlfriends, all to no avail. Why? Because the answer is there inside of you. You just have to stop day-dreaming, stop small-time scheming through your days. You have to make self-actualization a project, and you have to roll up your sleeves and dig deep. It will hurt. You will sweat. But that's what it takes, and it's probably better that way.

*Today, as you may have noticed either by my long-winded review or the more obvious rating-meter at the top of the page, this book is a five star for me personally. TODAY. I largely chalk this up to the cosmos aligning in pitch-perfect timing in my choosing to read it. Maybe I will change my mind one day. Maybe you will read it and feel that I've read too much into it. Whatever. Like I said, star-ratings are funny things, and constantly must bow to the whims of the mind of the reader.

(less)

61 likes · like · see review

Apr 11, 2011 RandomAnthony rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Hermann Hesse's Demian influenced me more than just about any book although I haven't read the novel in twenty years. Through my late teens and early twenties I searched out every Hesse book I could find, including the rarities, journals, letters, etc., going as far as to ferret out European editions in a Berlin bookstore on a solo trip as much influenced by Hesse as cheap airfare. My initial college experiences (three institutions in six semesters) ended badly. I became depressed and, although...more Hermann Hesse's Demian influenced me more than just about any book although I haven't read the novel in twenty years. Through my late teens and early twenties I searched out every Hesse book I could find, including the rarities, journals, letters, etc., going as far as to ferret out European editions in a Berlin bookstore on a solo trip as much influenced by Hesse as cheap airfare. My initial college experiences (three institutions in six semesters) ended badly. I became depressed and, although I had friends, spent much of my time isolated with books. My hostile, unsupportive parents created a tense, unsafe environment. The future looked bleak. I was terrified.

But I had Hesse. And many of the Hesse protagonists reminded my sad, desperate ass of myself. I eventually finished college, scraped out an existence, and learned to survive. Later a woman graciously and sympathetically agreed to marry me. We moved to Wisconsin. When packing up the apartment for the trek north I crated the Hesse books and didn't return to the author for twenty years.

A few weeks back I spotted a decent Demian edition, with the Thomas Mann introduction, for a couple bucks at a Borders closing sale. I read the book over seven illness-ridden gray spring days. And while my perceptions of the novel changed, of course, with the passing decades, Hesse's vision once again earned my appreciation.

Sinclair, the novel's narrator, is a German teenager transitioning from the warm, safe glow of his childhood world into a much scarier adulthood. He tries to follow the rules but feels himself called to something other than the town status quo. In school he meets a new student, the mysterious, adult and somewhat feminine Demian. Sinclair, through Demian, learns of the individuals with the “Mark of Cain.” These people are special; they can't feel fulfilled within the normal societal context and must look elsewhere for meaning. Sinclair spends much of his time alone, feels loss and terror, and almost fails out of boarding school. Do you see why this setup was attractive to a teenager who felt like he couldn't stand ten minutes in a room with his parents and couldn't pass his first university courses? I wanted to feel as if my isolation and third-rate social skills had meaning and set me apart with a purpose I couldn't comprehend. Demian and Sinclair separate after graduation and the latter experiments with alcoholic hazes before falling under the influence of a new mentor, the benevolent but drunken and limited church organist Pistorus. Sinclair paints and creates a vision of a bird breaking out of the egg as metaphor for his own process. I wanted so badly to embody that bird, to prove my failures as something deeper than incompetence. Sinclair catches up with Demian near the start of what seems to be the second world war, and when they next part they declare themselves part of a new vanguard who will help reshape the world after the military convulsions.

Demian is flawed. Some passages rely on vague, mythic language that mires in mystical and somewhat frustrating possibilities; in other words, one could accuse Hesse of taking the easy way out by framing Demian's insight as near indescribable. And when Sinclair and Hesse “call” each other the pair somehow telepathically sense the need to meet. This magic, romantic power is easier to describe than anything tangible and even as a teenager I knew this type of interaction was beyond my capabilities and probably bullshit. And when Demian says things like “The new world has begun and the new world will be terrible for those clinging to the old. What will you do?” he benefits from the lack of detail. But none of that mattered to me twenty, twenty-five years back. Hesse portrayed identity-challenged young men who struggled on the edge of mainstream daily existence and hoped for something more. And while I can see the inherent romanticism and frustrating pseudo-spiritualism with older, calmer eyes, I still feel the pull of Hesse's work. Without Demian and similar books I would have lacked a voice for emotions I couldn't articulate on my own; Hesse's work became a framework around which I could see potential self-value at a time in my life when I was precariously close to a feeling worthless. And while I can position Demian as a novel that resonates differently with me at forty-one than at nineteen, I recognize the camaraderie inherent in this book with a part of me that will never completely disappear. Demian is intrinsic to my narrative vocabulary and always will be. The vestiges of Hesse's influences are subtle but still present; while I like to think I would search for meaning in what I do, beyond convention, without ever reading Hesse, his work provided form and foundation, however mystical, on which I could build as I grew older and (hopefully) more capable. Thank you, Mr. Hesse, for being there when I needed you most.(less)

56 likes · like · see review

Jul 30, 2009 karen rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: my-summer-of-classix

i am so glad i give authors three books to make me love them. this was hesses last chance to woo me, and he really almost got a five-star valentine from me, but we will call it a four and a half - must be a little coy, after all. this is a book that i would love to go back in time and give myself upon graduating from high school. i would love to know whether it would have made me more or less insufferable than i am now. because i could see it going either way, at seventeen. i could see myself ta...more

32 likes · like · see review

Dec 03, 2012 Jenn(ifer) rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nobel-laureates, own, 5-f-ing-stars, game-changers, read-in-2012, the-germans, the-tops, you-should-read-this, my-reviews-that-dont-suck

I wanted only to try to live in accord with the promptings which came from my true self. Why was that so very difficult?

This quote stands alone on the very first page of the novel, and it tells you all you need to know.

I loved this book. I want to make you love it. I sit here at this keyboard and try to write, yet after reading this exquisite novel, everything I have to say sounds trite. I type. I delete. Type some more. Delete. Nothing I say is adequate.

I feel like I live inside Hermann Hess...more

46 likes · like · see review

Feb 16, 2013 Ahmed Azimov rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

حيثما شرعت في القراءة وابتدأ هيسه بالحديث عن عالم الصخب والعجائز والسجون والسكارى هذا العالم العنيف في كل مكان مقارنة ببيت والديه الذي يبدوا صالحا متسامحا محبا منيرا، أعتدلت في جلستي حيث أيقنت أن الفشيخ قادم

وعن صديقه ماكس دميان الذي حدثه بتفسير مختلف عكس النقل المتوارث لقصة الخطيئة الخاصة بقابيل وهابيل وكيف تشوشت حياته بينما كان يعيش في عالم نظيف وصحيّ عالم الفردوس المزعوم

حسنا لقد تحطّمت التعويذة، فكل ماهو طيب ونبيل وأخوي يُنسب إلى الله والنصف الآخر المتبقي يحمله الشيطان، انك لاتستطيع اعتبار جمي...more حيثما شرعت في القراءة وابتدأ هيسه بالحديث عن عالم الصخب والعجائز والسجون والسكارى هذا العالم العنيف في كل مكان مقارنة ببيت والديه الذي يبدوا صالحا متسامحا محبا منيرا، أعتدلت في جلستي حيث أيقنت أن الفشيخ قادم

وعن صديقه ماكس دميان الذي حدثه بتفسير مختلف عكس النقل المتوارث لقصة الخطيئة الخاصة بقابيل وهابيل وكيف تشوشت حياته بينما كان يعيش في عالم نظيف وصحيّ عالم الفردوس المزعوم

حسنا لقد تحطّمت التعويذة، فكل ماهو طيب ونبيل وأخوي يُنسب إلى الله والنصف الآخر المتبقي يحمله الشيطان، انك لاتستطيع اعتبار جميع من يمشي على قدمين بشرا لمجرد أنهم يمشون منتصبي القامة، ويحملون أطفالهم تسعة أشهر في بطونهم !

ويمكنه الآن التعبير عن خطيئة قابيل وهابيل صارخا " الجبناء الذين هم ورعون، وهم المختارون من قبل الله " وسط مجتمع بأكمله خائف من المجهول الذي فيهم ، ملئ بالذعر والكراهية

صورة غريبة ظليلة رسمت الإنسانية فيها نفسها على جدار الخلود *

أليس من الواجب أن نقدم صلاة للشيطان مثلا ؟

ربما لن أجد أكثر من هذه الرواية معبّره عن التحولات والقناعات التي مررت بها
وندمت كثيرا ومازلت على أنني لم أكتب مذكراتي، ولايوجد لديّ من الحجج سوى أنني لاأستطيع تجميع أفكاري ، ولو كتبت باستمرار لما كان

* على أية حال اتقدم بالشكر ل ماكس دميان الخاص بي في هذا السياق
(less)

3 likes · like · see review

Feb 21, 2013 Paul Gleason rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The brilliance of Hesse's novel is the way in which it crafts a mythic language to map the inner life of Sinclair - the main character - and, really, of us all. In this way, Hesse follows his modernist contemporaries - Joyce, Eliot, Lawrence, Pound, and, especially, Mann.

I focus on Mann because of the way in which Demian serves as a primer for Mann's monumental masterpiece - and one of the fifteen or so greatest books ever written - The Magic Mountain.

As a follower of Jung, Hesse knew archetypal...more

2 likes · like · see review

Jun 01, 2012 sologdin rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: literary

Nutshell: dude goes to school, grover-dills around town with various people, and finally goes off to war, either WWI or a predicted WWII.

Along the way, some amusing readings of biblical events, delivered by Demian, the obscure object of desire in the story, regarding Golgotha (51) and Cain (23-24), the latter of which notes that "the first element of the story, its actual beginning, is the mark." The "Mark of Cain" is a metaphor that stays with the narrator the entire story, though it's not obv...more

3 likes · like · see review

May 13, 2013 Chris rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I don’t know if this is a review or an essay, but a book of this quality deserves many of both. Excuse me while I meander around drunkenly looking for a point. Layman alert!

“Only the ideas that we actually live are of any value,” says Demian at one point in Hermann Hesse’s eponymous novel. While this may or may not be my favorite line from the book, it certainly is the one that stuck out the most to me when I read it. How many of us know people like those critiqued in this line: those with the s...more I don’t know if this is a review or an essay, but a book of this quality deserves many of both. Excuse me while I meander around drunkenly looking for a point. Layman alert!

“Only the ideas that we actually live are of any value,” says Demian at one point in Hermann Hesse’s eponymous novel. While this may or may not be my favorite line from the book, it certainly is the one that stuck out the most to me when I read it. How many of us know people like those critiqued in this line: those with the soaring imaginations and deep philosophical ideas, and yet their lives are nothing like the ones they describe. They do not live their ideas. People with sense (that is, people unburdened with modern education) reject the ideas which people don’t live. This is, in some ways, the central problem of the novel. How does one live true to oneself; find the correct way to view God, the spirit, the self; and integrate it altogether into a seamless whole? How can you live it? Through the story of Emil Sinclair, Hesse weaves these topics together with a sort of “coming of age” story, of a young, pre-WWI German boy, and his strange friendship with the enigmatic Max Demian. The part of the book that struck me the most was the concept of the new god: Abraxas.

Abraxas is an interesting concept, though certainly not an original one. To this, Hesse might have said “exactly.” For Demian, and likewise Emil Sinclair, the Christian God is—quite literally—not enough. He’s a fine God, Demian believes, but he’s incomplete. The problem is that the Christian God is god only of light and goodness, the “luminous world.” Says Demian: “He is all that is good, noble, fatherly, beautiful, elevated, sentimental—true! But the world consists of something else besides. And what is left over is ascribed to the devil, this entire slice of the world, this entire half is suppressed and hushed up.” He is the god of light, but not of darkness. But, as the first chapter makes clear, there are “two realms” to existence: the “luminous” and the darkened. This God is incomplete. How could God be God of only *half* of the universe?

Enter Abraxas: the name for the god of light and darkness, as Sinclair says, “A god who was both god and devil.” Dualism is of course an old view (with Zoroastrianism perhaps being the most famous example of it) and the unity of God is also an old view (Shema Yisrael). In Demian, they are combined together to form a god of complete unity, who embodies the good and the bad, the light and the dark, everything that there is. The consequences of this belief are outlined sporadically in the story, as Sinclair divulges that he does not believe in free will (chance), for Abraxas encompasses everything. To my barbaric and untrained mind, Abraxas seems like a fusion of Ahura Mazda and Ahriman, now the source of all being. Good and evil coexist here in one deity (so perhaps Abraxas is like Calvinism that is actually consistent with itself (Hesse may have deserved a greater prize than Nobel’s for this accomplishment!) ). This old/new religion is presented by the characters in the novel—Sinclair, Pistorius, Demian—as an improvement.

I can't share their optimism, however, for in Abraxas evil is granted a legitimacy that it does not deserve. After all, if evil was a *thing*, something that coexisted next to and with good—for all eternity—than it also has an equal claim upon our loyalty. It is not evil, per se, just the alternate. And the alternate can be chosen and accepted. Calling Ahura Mazda good means simply that we prefer him. This problem of the equality of good and evil (and therefore devaluing good) is addressed in the book, but Pistorius’s answer is (for me) underwhelming. Sinclair wonders aloud why he should not simply murder someone who disagrees with him, and Pistorius can only hedge and weakly answer that such an act can be right under certain circumstances, but that it is a mistake most of the time. Pistorius doesn’t advocate caprice, he takes care not to, but his advice to entertain such feelings as Abraxas “fantasizing” with him ring hollow. Sinclair says that he was “touched deeply” by these words, but I can’t say the same.

The danger here is the elevation of evil to something too legitimate. The ancient idea of *privatio boni* is forgotten and with it is the coherence of the good God. According to this tradition, evil is not regarded as a thing. It is not, contra Demian, a “slice” of the universe that God does not rule over. It has no positive existence. It is a privation of the good. Evil exists in the same way that a hole exists in a shoe—it is a perversion, a distortion of the good. A lack of the good, its shadow. It is not a thing that exists over and against the good. A shoe and a hole in it do not add up to two. If you are sick, there are not two yous: a healthy you and a sick you. There is only you, and the good that is your health has been lessened by the evil that is your illness. God is God over the entire universe (not a slice, the whole pizza), but the universe is sick. This may be true or it may be false, and though it is a Christian idea it is not unique to, nor did it originate with, Christianity. It is, however, I’m convinced, a superior view to Dualism.

The problem with elevating evil to a thing, something equal to good, is that it spells the death for goodness, and for God as well. Abraxas is a composite god, both good and evil and so neither. This God has evil as a part of him, and so while Abraxas might prove to be a nice God, he certainly can’t be a good God. Taking David Bentley Hart slightly out of context, “Such a God could not *be* love, even if he should prove to be ‘loving.’ Nor would he be the good as such, nor being as such. He, like us, would be a synthesis of death and life.” A God too much like us cannot be much of an improvement.

Despite my fundamental disagreement with Demian’s understanding of good and evil, I give the four stars simply because it deserves it. The novel is permeated with spiritual wisdom, and the insights of the characters cannot be ignored. Hesse’s writing is excellent and while Sinclair can go overboard in his agony, his earnestness makes his ideas difficult to resist. And the line I quoted in the beginning is worth the read just for itself—live your ideas, or else they’re not really worth anything. And even though I disagree with the dualism advocated, I can't say it wasn't forcefully, eloquently, and beautifully presented.

Demian is probably a book to read and reread. This review is a hastily assembled and desultory attempt for me to parse out what I think of one part of it. Hesse managed to pack a lot of meat into a slim book, and there’s plenty to go around. I give it a high rating for all of these reasons. Oh, and I happened to like it too.
(less)

2 likes · like · see review

Feb 28, 2012 Teji rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: felicitous-misapplications-bookclub

Like most of Hesse's books, Demian is hard to desribe in one or two sentences. I just found it--unsatisfactory. It is overwrought, which makes it a little tedious to read. Although, it does, in my opinion, have a few thought provoking moments and some wonderful use of language.

Favorite Quotes:
“But every man is more than just himself; he also represents the unique, the very special and always significant and remarkable point at which the world’s phenomenon intersect only once in this way and neve...more

2 likes · like · see review

Mar 22, 2009 Roxy rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, school-reading, favorites, spirituality

I just completed the most incredible book I have ever read. At least right now, only minutes after finished pouring myself into its words for the past two days (in which I read it front to back), that is what I think... That this is the most special, enlightening, beautiful, peaceful, entrancing...almost holy books I have ever, ever read. Right now I feel this odd understanding and contentment in my stomach, heart, and mind. It might sound cheesy, but everything about this book was perfect. I re...more I just completed the most incredible book I have ever read. At least right now, only minutes after finished pouring myself into its words for the past two days (in which I read it front to back), that is what I think... That this is the most special, enlightening, beautiful, peaceful, entrancing...almost holy books I have ever, ever read. Right now I feel this odd understanding and contentment in my stomach, heart, and mind. It might sound cheesy, but everything about this book was perfect. I read it this weekend with my blinds stretched wide, letting the cool breeze of the onset of Spring enter my room along with its sunshine and optimism. I cleaned my room and sat on my made bed for hours straight listening to Andrew Bird's "Ballad of the Red Shoes" and Beirut's "Holland" on repeat as non-purposefully perfectly suitable background noise...or listened to the birds chirp in the courtyard. As you can see, I am writing more about my experience of reading this book than the content of it, perhaps because this story is truly more to be experienced rather than simply glazed over. You may be wondering what I have occuppied my eyes with since my most recently finished book, Trainspotting. Well...I have been reading stories by Thomas Mann, essays by Carl Jung, and in between it all reading The Bell Jar for pleasure (but that, at the moment, is unrelated. I might critique it in connection with these other pieces in its review later.) But about Mann and Jung...they were essential prerequisites to the book, or at least partners. I would say Torless is too, actually, even if it is more Freudian, the plotline is relatable. And all three of these, like Demian, are very German. But Demian is very German without being overbearing and maybe a bit too caught up in itself, like I found Mann to be (though I enjoyed the two stories I have read of his so far thoroughly). The language of Demian is as balanced and modest as everything the story suggests - the quest for one's true self. Hesse was seeing a Jungian psychoanalyst at the time of writing this book, which undoubtedly influenced its stress on symbolism, dreams, the collective unconscious, and mainly - the self. Hesse and Jung's interest in Eastern philosophy (as we see in Siddhartha, which had an extremely similar story as Demian but some very stark differences, which maybe I will discuss when I read it for the second time later this week). I do not know to sum up this book other than to swear that it was remarkable. I read it at a good time, when I have been wishing to spiritually cleanse and thrust myself into a positive, balanced new future, but I believe anyone would appreciate this novel. Perhaps a quote I underlined would do it some justice...

"Humanity - which they loved as we did - was for them something complete that must be maintained and protected. For us, humanity was a distant goal toward which all men were moving, whose image no one knew, whose laws were nowhere written down." (five stars.)(less)

3 likes · like · see review

May 05, 2008 Maggie rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ugh. I forced myself to finish this short book and, in the end, felt it wasn't worth the trouble. I picked it up because I loved Siddhartha so much (though it's been years since I read it and now I wonder if it it will hold up). I found Demian terribly melodramatic and over-wrought and I could never really begin to care much about Sinclair and all his angst-ridden inner turmoil. There were a few interesting and lovely passages -- only a couple of times did I feel a thrill of poetry in the langua...more

7 likes · like · see review

Apr 30, 2012 Schmacko rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Demian is the book that made Hermann Hess famous written in the late 1910s. I didn’t flip over it. There is a severe shortage of character and plot, and way too may pages are devoted to long-winded dissertation about religious and psychological discovery.

Emil Sinclair is a young German boy who has always tried to obey his parents and live in their circle of “light.” In this life, he always knew there was another side. What he comes to realize through this novel – and through his friendship with...more Demian is the book that made Hermann Hess famous written in the late 1910s. I didn’t flip over it. There is a severe shortage of character and plot, and way too may pages are devoted to long-winded dissertation about religious and psychological discovery.

Emil Sinclair is a young German boy who has always tried to obey his parents and live in their circle of “light.” In this life, he always knew there was another side. What he comes to realize through this novel – and through his friendship with a Max Demian – is that by ignoring or denying our darker sides, we all are ignoring half of ourselves. Demian throws in Freudian and Jungian psychology, ESP, new age belief, and a nascent interest in mythology.

I’ll tell you, when Hess tells a story – like how a schoolboy catches Sinclair in a lie and then blackmails him, for example – I really liked it. The pages and pages of religious and psychological searching got old for me. The “why” of their supposed ESP got old, too. I did like Sinclair’s somewhat sexual longing for Demian, but I don’t think this is completely developed – because this is an early 20th century novel, the mere mention was scandalous, but I would’ve liked more. I also appreciate that Sinclair kept searching for answers – it’s just that huge sections of his quest contain detailed descriptions of things like a creepy-ish guy who had both of them lie on their stomachs and stare at a candle, stuff like that…

This book has profoundly affected many people. And maybe the fact that it encouraged soul searching should be lauded. I myself learned a lot about different religions and philosophies in high school and then in college, thanks to excellent teachers and a medically insane stepmother. Maybe I didn’t have the guilty single track of people who love Demian; my dad immediately turned away from Catholicism, and we went from a family who went every Sunday to a family whose crazy stepmom taught us about Buddhism and druidism. Maybe that was my benefit that makes Demian seem like a repressed and long, slow novel of mostly old ideas.
(less)

1 like · like · see review

Oct 02, 2007 Brooke rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: ..

Demian...............how lucky people are who are so inclined to constantly be searching as are the characters in this book! How much they discover, how many emotions they feel, how incredibly inspiring they are. I loved this book because I love passionate people.

15 likes · like · see review

May 03, 2013 Jacopo rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Ho aspettato parecchio prima di stendere una recensione su questo libro, sperando che le mie idee a riguardo si chiarissero e che, a mente fredda, diventasse più semplice tradurre in parole i miei pensieri. Purtroppo ho sperato invano.

Di Hesse, al momento, ho letto solo 'Siddharta' e posso dire che 'Demian' (precedente di qualche anno) presenta alcuni aspetti in comune, a partire dal viaggio di formazione che, tramite le esperienze da esso veicolate, influisce profondamente sull'animo del protag...more

like · see review

Dec 22, 2011 Matt Lundy rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I had high expectations for Demian, mostly due to my adoration of Hesse's other novel, Siddartha. I was ready for a book with no real plot, driven by the development of a single character. Demian delivered these things, but in an ultimately disappointing way.

Like Siddartha, Sinclair, Demian's protagonist, begins the novel in the world of his parents. He is on a path to fulfill their ideal of success, and then for one reason or another, deviates from that path. Where Siddartha is driven by an inn...more I had high expectations for Demian, mostly due to my adoration of Hesse's other novel, Siddartha. I was ready for a book with no real plot, driven by the development of a single character. Demian delivered these things, but in an ultimately disappointing way.

Like Siddartha, Sinclair, Demian's protagonist, begins the novel in the world of his parents. He is on a path to fulfill their ideal of success, and then for one reason or another, deviates from that path. Where Siddartha is driven by an inner urge for knowledge from experience, the act that takes Sinclair down this path is a boast of a crime he has not committed that he tells a group of boys in order to feel `cooler.' He becomes `in debt' to one of the boys, and so enters the world of thievery and darkness, running errands and theft for Kromer in exhange for his silence. Sinclair is finally rescued from this abusive relationship mysteriously (we never find out how) by Demian.

While Siddartha is living in the woods as an ascetic, Sinclair complains about the power that Kromer has over him, and then can only gush and fawn over Demian's `abilities.' When Siddartha meets Buddha, he asks Buddha not what he knows, but how he learned it, and eventually decides to not become of disciple, because to become LIKE Buddha, Siddartha must live as Buddha lived, not do as Buddha says. But Sinclair can only do what Demian says, think about what Demian tells him to, and obsequiously ask if he has succeeded.

Part of me thinks Sinclair may be the result of an intensely inward-focused person who does not HAVE to adapt to the realities surrounding him. Absent from the book is any discussion of how Sinclair supports himself, and I assume he is propped up throughout the book by his parents. This would be acceptable if he made some mention of it. But not once does he mention how he gets food, clothing, shelter, water, money, or work. It is as if he lives in a dream where the worldly concerns of being a human being are innocently absent. He is a mind alone.

I also find him to be a hypocrite. Sinclair spends more than a few pages praising himself for finding an alternate path, taking the `road less traveled by', and diminishing the `poor souls' who follow the `herd' without so much as a glance. And while I can share in this critic of the unexamined life, Sinclair, at the outset of war, unquestionably joins the army (in his defense, he is drafted, but that seems even more like following the herd). For someone who spent so much time examining each and every decision in his life, he seemed to gloss over a fairly important one. And, I think he does this, because Demian joins up without question.

From outside sources I have learned that Hesse was very fond of Freudian psychology at this time of his career. Because I have not spent any amount of time studying such things, I will only offer the following: Sinclair spends many pages describing his sexual urges, and they are even the impetus for many of his actions. Yet throughout the whole book he only kisses two people, Demian's mother, and Demian himself.

When a book is driven so absolutely by one character, to say I do not like that character is to say I do not like the book. And that is so. Sinclair is a passive, weak, uncreative, sycophant who commits the worst crime of all by believing he is independent, thoughtful, and intellectual.

I am trying to find a quotation I thought I remembered reading in this book, but it could also just be an aphorism I have picked up along the way. It is, to an effect, that the people you hate and the things that you hate about them, are actually reflections of traits that you have and dislike about yourself. Perhaps there is some truth to that between Sinclair and I, but damn, I hope not too much.(less)

1 like · like · see review

Nov 30, 2011 Mashael Alamri rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: translated, european-literature

- يقول هرمان هسه :
لمْ أكن أريدُ إلا أن أعيش وفــقَ الدوافع التي تَـنبٌع منْ نفسي الحقيقية , فلم كان ذلك بهذه الصعوبة ؟؟؟؟
,

سبحة بشعة من حجارة رديئة الشكل كلما همَّ “سنكلير” ذو العاشرة من العمر لـ يفرطها ليرتاح زاده الخوفُ حجارةً أخرى في سلسلةٍ منْ الأخطاءِ قادته إليها كذبةٌ صغيرةٌ اخترعها لأنه أراد أن يكونَ بطلاً لمدة دقائق بين أقرانه يحسبها عقله الصغير بأنها نهايةُ العالم وبدايةُ دخوله في “عالم الأشرار”المخيف,أصبحت أغلالاً قضّت مضجعة وربما تلك الذنوب البسيطة قادته ليكون دائما ًمطرقاً يفكر بكل ما...more - يقول هرمان هسه :
لمْ أكن أريدُ إلا أن أعيش وفــقَ الدوافع التي تَـنبٌع منْ نفسي الحقيقية , فلم كان ذلك بهذه الصعوبة ؟؟؟؟
,

سبحة بشعة من حجارة رديئة الشكل كلما همَّ “سنكلير” ذو العاشرة من العمر لـ يفرطها ليرتاح زاده الخوفُ حجارةً أخرى في سلسلةٍ منْ الأخطاءِ قادته إليها كذبةٌ صغيرةٌ اخترعها لأنه أراد أن يكونَ بطلاً لمدة دقائق بين أقرانه يحسبها عقله الصغير بأنها نهايةُ العالم وبدايةُ دخوله في “عالم الأشرار”المخيف,أصبحت أغلالاً قضّت مضجعة وربما تلك الذنوب البسيطة قادته ليكون دائما ًمطرقاً يفكر بكل ما يتعرض حياته وما يشعر به …وكبر “سنكلير” الصغير يوماً !
ربما نفسُه التي تتوقُ للتفكير دائماً أرسلت إشارات كثيرة “لدميان” الذي يكبره بعدة أعوام ليكون صديقه يتقاسمان صراعاتهم الداخلية التي يلفظها “سنكلير” بخوف لتستقر في عقل “دميان” الذي يربت على مخاوفه كأخ كبير يعي طبيعة ما يمر به الأصغر ,الهالة التي تحيط “بدُميان” كان لها تأثير كبير على “سنكلير” لم يستطع أن يتخلَصَ منها أبداً.
تمحيص الأدلة الدينية ومحاولة اكتشاف مدلولاتها, قد تكون البذرة التي تسمى شكْ في النفوس خصوصاً حينما يعتمد الوعاظ على القصص التي ربما تكون فيها أسطورة أو أشياء تستعصي بعض العقول الإيمان بها بدون نقاش ومع الخطوط الحمراء التي تخترعها الأديان في وجه من ينتسبون إليها فالشك هو النتيجة الحتميّة التي تخلق برغم إيمانها إلا انها تبتعد عن مصادر الوعظ التي لا تحترمها, في “دميان” عمد “هيسه” أن يشيرَ لدلالاتٍ دينيةٍ ويعبرَ عن فكرة ” أننا تنفيذٌ لرغباتِ الإله وبأن الخير والشر متواجدين ولهما آلهتهما ” , ومن خلال شخصية “بوستوريوس”الغريبُ الأطوار الذي يسعى لأن يكون قساً لمذهبه الخاص الذي توصل إليه بالتأمل لكنه يخشى أن يعيشه حقيقةً مطلقة .
“هرمان هيسه”مدهش حقاً كل سطر من سطوره مدعاة للتأمل يغوص في نفسك ليجعلك تجابه صراعك الداخلي الذي يحولُ بينكَ وبينكْ ويجعلُ الأيامَ تمضي وأنتَ مأخوذٌ بذلك الشيء الذي يدعوك لأن تغوص منذ أن نبدأ الحدود الغير مرئية التي تفصلُ بين طفولتكَ ونضجكَ تلك المرحلة التي تتموه فيها حتى ذاتك لنكون شيءً يستعصى على الفهم تكون طفلاً تخفي حقيقة بلوغك كـ ِّسر صغير يخصك وحدك, تبقى تعيش بشرود وأنت لا تعلم هل يتوجب عليك فهمك؟أم فهم ما حولك يجزي عن ذلك؟
هل تكفي معرفتك بنفسك لتعي حقيقة هذا العالم ؟ وهل للأهداف دور في ما
يصطبغ به العالم “الشرور أو الخير “؟ كيف تستدعي من يشبهونك لتكون معهم صداقات تساعدك لتتأمل ذاتك الحقيقة , كيف تتعامل مع رغباتك وتجعلها تتفتح تحت الضوء الباهر ؟ وكيف تعي هل هي رغبات حقيقية أم هي مجرد فقاعات ظهرت في غمرة انشغالك بنفسك ؟
كل الشخصيات في هذا العمل تبحث عن حقيقة ما \ في الوجود \الذات ,حتى أصبح نمط الرواية تأمليّ بحت لذلك سأبحث عن أعمال ” هيسه ” الأخرى لأنني أريد أن أعيش الدهشة مرة أخرى !

ملاحظة لي :
هممممم ربما أعود لكتابت الرفيو بطريقة أخرى يوماً ما لأنني أشعر أن ثمة شيء ناقص :)

(less)

6 likes · like · see review

Mar 28, 2008 Sophia rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I appreciate Demian for its insight, for the beautiful way in which it's written, for the forward thinking of its time, and for its resemblance to Hesse's life.

Although conversations often feel unreal, the conversations are incidental. Like Sarte's plays, it's more about conveying the philosophy, so the narrative grants an element of experience to the ideas.
It's what Faust argues with Mephistopheles---the duality between reading about something and experiencing it.
The narrative allows for aspect...more

4 likes · like · see review

Jul 26, 2007 Lena rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

This book was one of my first introductions to the idea of following an unconventional spiritual path. Rereading it recently, I found the story of how Max Demian guided the young Emil Sinclair away from his familiar world and into the pursuit of spiritual fulfillment just as engrossing as I had the first time.

I was also struck by how similar Demian’s message was to so many modern spiritual teachers today. The idea that he and Sinclair were among a select few with the courage to break free of so...more

2 likes · like · see review

Jul 04, 2012 Cam'Ron Asgari'an rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Certain works of art, no matter what form, grip you before you even know it. A painting that rings inside you from across the room, a song you know you'll love forever after only hearing the initial guitar pluck. The books you treasure from the very first sentence.

Demian is certainly one of those books for me. It is the purest example of something concrete which affirms so many mystical notions I've entertained, burned and longed for my entire life. The connection I have with this book has given...more

2 likes · like · see review

Aug 31, 2012 yarinés suárez rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Tout le monde.

Una historia particular sobre el transcurso de una vida de la niñez a la adultez, envuelto por corrientes adversas, 'la luz' y 'la oscuridad', Sinclair decide por trazar su propia ruta en la búsqueda de su verdadero ser.
En partes, sublime.

2 likes · like · see review

Dec 01, 2011 بثينة العيسى rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

الرواية صغيرة، ولكنها وعرة وكما هي عادة هرمان هيسه .. فهي ليست نصاً سهلاً، ولا بيضاً مسلوقاً، ولا شيئا تستطيع أن تقرأه وتستوعبه كاملاً ما لم تمنحه نفسك كاملاً. الرواية رحلة داخلية يخوضها البطل صوب ذاته، وعليه فهي فقيرة بالأحداث والحوارات (نسبياً) .. ومليئة بتلك العبارات التي تضيء وتلتبسُ في غياهب المعنى. الرواية جميلة، تغادرها وأنت تحسّ بأنك .. هممم .. لست الشخص نفسه؟

2 likes · like · see review

Dec 01, 2008 Shivering William rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A tale of the young practicing magician.

Hesse's books tend to draw parallels between everything I'm experiencing and reading . . . Choke, The Mindscape of Alan Moore, Dreams and Wishes, my own story of the Purgatory Pioneer.

It's in times when I'm pressured to get a steady job, insurance, salary, etc., that this book really works his magic. Every person must follow their own path no matter how isolated it makes them. It is only then that you're doing the universe's will.

Like Bradbury, like Steinb...more

4 likes · like · see review

Jun 07, 2013 William Galaini rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: owned

Hermann Hesse is a literary force to be reckoned with, regardless of the language into which his work is translated. History and author's personal views aside, this book can be taken as a coming of age tale for intelligent and inquisitive children. This particular translation is extremely well written and the prose is fluid and warm while being grounded enough not to feel lofty.

'Demian' focuses on the feelings behind being bullied, being small in the large world, and grappling for understanding...more

like · see review

May 28, 2013 Ryan Springer rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I really loved this book. I'd lost my copy of Siddhartha, so I ordered a new one and threw Demian in the shopping cart because it was only three bucks. Prior to that, I was unfamiliar with it at all. I think buying it was one of those weird "there are no coincidences" kind of coincidences. Anyway, it showed up in the mail a few weeks ago. I finally picked it up the other day and after a few pages, I couldn't put it down.

The book's about this kid, Emil Sinclair, who tries to negotiate his way bet...more I really loved this book. I'd lost my copy of Siddhartha, so I ordered a new one and threw Demian in the shopping cart because it was only three bucks. Prior to that, I was unfamiliar with it at all. I think buying it was one of those weird "there are no coincidences" kind of coincidences. Anyway, it showed up in the mail a few weeks ago. I finally picked it up the other day and after a few pages, I couldn't put it down.

The book's about this kid, Emil Sinclair, who tries to negotiate his way between the "bright" and "dark" worlds; the safe happiness of innocence and convention in the former, the growth and excitement of the latter. As he progresses through adolescence, he varies back and forth between the worlds, often depending upon the influence of those with whom he comes in contact. None, however, have quite the same effect on Sinclair as Max Demian.

Eventually, Sinclair integrates all that he learns from Demian--as well as several others--in becoming an actualized self. As Demian comes in and out of Sinclair's life, Sinclair realizes that life isn't about choosing between one side or the other, it's about embracing paradox; becoming whole.

I'm more or less a functional illiterate, and while I like what I like, I'm not terribly well educated or informed about a lot of things, including books and literature. Reading this book made me regret that even more than I usually do. There's an awful lot of peripheral information out there that I've stumbled across that was somewhat illuminating, but in the hands of a good teacher, could make for a hell of an interesting class or two. Hesse had apparently been undergoing psychotherapy around the time he wrote "Demian," and the book is full of the whole light/shadow thing, as well as a fair amount about dreams, symbols, and self-actualization. If you read this, you may want read it after reading Jung's Seven Sermons to the Dead, and along with Bertrand Russell's essay "Mysticism and Logic" and Edward F. Edinger's Ego and Archetype. I say that only because that's what I accidentally did, and it made reading "Demian" pretty cool. For example, and I'll be careful here to avoid spoilers (to be careful, you may want to skip the remainder of this paragraph anyway), but if you read Seven Sermons then when you'll already be familiar with Abraxas (Αβρασαξ) when he pops up.

All in all, I thought this was a very enjoyable book. Although it's short and a quick read, there's an awful lot to chew on if you want to. And it's really a beautiful read in terms of language. There's got to be a better word to describe what I mean here, but I sluffed a lot of English classes so if there is I don't know it. But I guess I'm trying to say that Hesse is really good at using words and putting them together into very nice sentences that combine to make wonderful paragraphs.

I'd note that reading this book also wants to make me re-read Fight Club because the Sinclair/Demian thing reminded me a little bit of Jack/Tyler Durden (though I'm also going to have to re-read Demian once or twice more before I'm entirely convinced about that whole thing...).(less)

like · see review

May 14, 2013 Salomè rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: german

Ho finito di leggere questo romanzo da poche ore, e vorrei poterlo dimenticare per ricominciare a leggerlo di nuovo anche in questo momento. In realtà vorrei semplicemente avere il tempo per farlo, perché "Demian" è uno di quei romanzi - come "Vagabondaggio", e come a questo punto spero tutti gli altri libri di Hesse - che puoi rileggere all' infinito e trovarci sempre qualcosa di nuovo.
"Demian" è un romanzo di formazione, è la storia del giovane Emil Sinclair, nato in una famiglia borghese, ma...more Ho finito di leggere questo romanzo da poche ore, e vorrei poterlo dimenticare per ricominciare a leggerlo di nuovo anche in questo momento. In realtà vorrei semplicemente avere il tempo per farlo, perché "Demian" è uno di quei romanzi - come "Vagabondaggio", e come a questo punto spero tutti gli altri libri di Hesse - che puoi rileggere all' infinito e trovarci sempre qualcosa di nuovo.
"Demian" è un romanzo di formazione, è la storia del giovane Emil Sinclair, nato in una famiglia borghese, ma che fin da bambino si sente diverso, "sospeso" fra due mondi senza riuscire ad appartenere veramente a nessuno: da una parte il "bene", la luce, l' ordine e la chiarezza, identificate con i genitori e le sorelle, dall' altra il "male", violenza, oscurità e disordine, che si trovano tutt'intorno alla casa in cui è cresciuto.
L' incontro con il "male" avviene per la prima volta quando Emil incontra Kromer, il bulletto del paese, che si approfitta dalla sua natura timida e mite per sottoporlo a continui ricatti e prepotenze. Ma quasi contemporaneamente avviene anche l' incontro con Max Demian, un ragazzino misterioso dalla consapevolezza di un adulto che compare in mezzo all' anno scolastico con la fascia da lutto al braccio e un distacco quasi ultraterreno; sarà lui a liberare Emil dal suo oppressore, e questo sancirà un legame indissolubile, più che un debito di gratitudine, fra i due. Ancora il giovane Sinclair non sa che Demian per lui farà ben altro che salvarlo da un compagno prepotente...
Scritto da Hesse nella maturità per rielaborare la sua giovinezza, secondo wikipedia, "Demian" è per questo un romanzo di formazione, profondamente influenzato dalle teorie psicanalitiche di Jung, dal quale Hesse era andato in terapia per riprendersi da un periodaccio - problemi con la moglie, morte del padre, fuga in Svizzera a causa della guerra. A me più che un romanzo di formazione sembra un romanzo quasi filosofico, dove si parla di Dio, del Bene e del Male, dell' equilibrio fra le parti, dell' importanza di credere in se stessi e molto altro, il tutto avvolto in un' aria mistica, quasi magica... insomma, il genere che teoricamente mi dà sui nervi e che mi annoia a morte, ma che in questo caso ho trovato assolutamente perfetto. Anche i punti e le idee di Demian che mi lasciano un po' perplessa sono ugualmente ulteriori stimoli, ulteriori domande - a pensare di più, a cercare di più.
Non so a cosa pensasse effettivamente Hesse quando l' ha scritto, ma questa è la prima volta in cui anche per me è vera quella famosa frase di Salinger: finito il libro, vorresti che l' autore fosse tuo amico per la pelle e poterlo chiamare al telefono tutte le volte che ti gira.(less)

1 like · like · see review

Apr 03, 2013 Ashley rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2013, literature

wasn't amazing, wasn't terrible. 3.5 stars...ish?

The other Hesse books I've read have been way more tranquil in their overall mood. Even when there was conflict, it all just seemed so silent. This just felt dark and brooding. I mean, I feel like I got it, but at the same time I don't think I really appreciated it to the fullest extent possible. Probably have to revisit this at a later date. Maybe the mood was just wrong for where I am in my life right now, whereas the other Hesse books have been...more

like · see review

Jan 10, 2013 Ladnoize rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Hesse'nin Demian'ı; Nietzsche'nin "Ubermensch" fikrinin karakterize edildiği bir başka edebi eser olarak karşımıza çıkıyor. Demian tam anlamıyla çağının değerlerine aykırı, çağın bozulmasından rahatsız, çocuksu ve ortaya yeni 'değerler' koymaya çalışan, fiziki açıdan da güçlü bir "Ubermensch". Ve Hesse böyle bir yaşam önderinden neler öğrenileceğini, onların o yaşam enerjisi dolu rüzgarlarına kapılmanın ne kadar yararlı olabileceğini işaret ediyor. Kitap boyunca baş karakter Sinclair'ın ilk genç...more

like · see review

Jan 02, 2013 Ryan Chang rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those who feel conflicted while young

Recommended to Ryan by: luck and chance.

Shelves: writer-s-help

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. EDIT: IF you can't find the time to read through this, try the end paragraph :).

I choose to write to this book (much like Hesse, for my benefit mostly) because if I don't, I will not be able to interpret it to myself. I do not think that it's possible anyhow to interpret to the mass of people who somehow have gone over this review. In fact, it can't be said that you will read this book like I had or if you will expect much from it but soon might scream for answers (as I am currently). Instead, I...more EDIT: IF you can't find the time to read through this, try the end paragraph :).

I choose to write to this book (much like Hesse, for my benefit mostly) because if I don't, I will not be able to interpret it to myself. I do not think that it's possible anyhow to interpret to the mass of people who somehow have gone over this review. In fact, it can't be said that you will read this book like I had or if you will expect much from it but soon might scream for answers (as I am currently). Instead, I write (aka type) to appease the worrying tensions in my soul for the want of answers that answer ME. That way, I'm assured of what I've had to understand, much in my own kind of way.

To start, there was, largely, Sinclair's somber reflections that fade in quite after for every accommodation of his own childish demeanor at that time: The Illusory Worlds, answers to his own livable world. He feels somehow comparable to the world of light, comparable to similar feelings that innocuous children have before they individualize in their own quirky ways. His, for instance, is the meetup of Demian,in as many circumstances as how I was to find this book upon a shelf on the library. Consequently, he starts to lose a sense of self and soon afterwards, to cleanse himself of his sins, he winds back to certain gods that are much like former works of his life (i.e, a parents' greatness that he had the privilege to observe to). Then, he is to find some greater part of his path to life actualization.

As I read throughout the story, I start looking around me. I start REALIZING that there ARE people around me, and so I might sometimes stop, sometimes think the lot to myself, then continue in a stupor or page-flipping and comprehension-checking.

To sum up, the heart of the issue is that there was no god that was greater to Sinclair than his dear friend Demian. This may seem abstract from the track of thought that was most likely being processed in one's brain when they were reading the second paragraph of this review, but that is where I'm getting to the point: It was not my want to get to some creed, some plan to self-actualization, but that I merely wanted to input the idea that Sinclair was human to begin with and that his life grew by some companionship. Perhaps he knew this, silently acknowledged this to himself. But the end most assuredly satisfies this understanding. The understanding, in turn, shown forth the worth of humankind that had been chained by Sinclair's individualization in the story. It only took a greater part of his life that had found the realization that could not be found easily. But when he was to find this secret out, of a greatness on a legitimate capability,he was able to follow on a quieter path that was best suited to him.

The book alights on revelations of Hesse; I'd like to say that the answers for one ," when they read the book" (I've put spoilers on, so rather "to appease your worries"), on subject of what this self-realization of Hesse's is, is that there is no real underlying meaning if it hasn't struck to your heart; if not, then it is not the right book for you.
(less)

like · see review

Dec 16, 2012 Celia added it · review of another edition

Recommended to Celia by: Toan Trinh

Shelves: fiction

Notable quotes:

But where we have given of our love and respect not from habit but of our own free will, where we have been disciples and friends out of our inmost hearts, it is a bitter and horrible moment when we suddenly recognize that the current within us wants to pull us away from what is dearest to us. Then every thought that rejects the friend and mentor turns in our own hearts like a poisoned barb, then each blow struck in defense flies back into one’s own face, the words “disloyalty” an

...more Notable quotes:

But where we have given of our love and respect not from habit but of our own free will, where we have been disciples and friends out of our inmost hearts, it is a bitter and horrible moment when we suddenly recognize that the current within us wants to pull us away from what is dearest to us. Then every thought that rejects the friend and mentor turns in our own hearts like a poisoned barb, then each blow struck in defense flies back into one’s own face, the words “disloyalty” and “ingratitude” strike the person who feels he was morally sound like catcalls and stigma, and the frightened heart flees timidly back to the charmed valleys of childhood virtues, unable to believe that this break, too, must be made, this bond also broken. (107)

*

At times I was dissatisfied with myself and tortured with desire: I believed I could no longer bear to have her near me without taking her in my arms. She sensed this, too, at once. Once when I had stayed away for several days and returned bewildered she took me aside and said: “You must not give way to desires which you don’t’ believe in. I know what you desire. You should, however, either be capable of renouncing these desires or feel wholly justified in having them. Once you are able to make your request in such a way that you will be quite certain of its fulfillment, then the fulfillment will come. But at present you alternate between desire and renunciation and are afraid all the time. All that must be overcome. Let me tell you a story.

And she told me about a youth who had fallen in love with a planet. He stood by the sea, stretched out his arms and prayed to the planet, dreamed of it, and directed all his thoughts to it. But he knew, or felt he knew, that a star cannot be embraced by a human being. He considered it to be his fate to love a heavenly body without any hope of fulfillment and out of this insight he constructed an entire philosophy of renunciation and silent, faithful suffering that would improve and purify him. Yet all his dreams reached the planet. Once he stood again on the high cliff at night by the sea and gazed at the planet and burned with love for it. And at the height of his longing he leaped into the emptiness toward the planet, but at the instant of leaping “it’s impossible” flashed once more through his mind. There he lay on the shore, shattered. He had not understood how to love. If at the instant of leaping he had had the strength of faith in the fulfillment of his love he would have soared into the heights and been united with the star.

“Love must not entreat,” she added, “or demand. Love must have the strength to become certain within itself. Then it ceased merely to be attracted and begins to attract. Sinclair, your love is attracted to me. Once it begins to attract me, I will come. I will not make a gift of myself, I must be won.”

Another time she told me a different story, concerning a lover whose love was unrequited. He withdrew completely within himself, believe his love would consume him. The world became lost to him, he no longer noticed blue sky and green woods, he no longer heard the brook murmur; his ears had turned deaf to the notes of the harp: nothing mattered any more: he had become poor and wretched. Yet his love increased and he would rather have died or been ruined that renounce possessing this beautiful woman. Then he felt that his passion had consumed everything else within him and become so strong, so magnetic that the beautiful woman must follow. She came to him and he stood with outstretched arms ready to draw her to him. She stood before him and surrendered herself to him and sky, forest, and brook all came toward him in new and resplendent colors, belonged to him, and spoke to him in his own language. And instead of merely winning a woman he embraced the entire world and every star in heaven glowed within him and sparkled with joy in his soul. He had loved and had found himself. But most people love to lose themselves. (129-131)

(less)

like · see review

Dec 11, 2012 Thais rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Emil Sinclair è un ragazzo diverso dagli altri: porta su di sé il segno di Caino. Costantemente lacerato tra il Bene e il Male, tra la Luce e il Buio, vaga nel mondo in cerca della propria identità, dibattendosi tra la pace della sua famiglia e l'orrore del mondo esterno. Ma non si può restare per sempre ancorati al paradiso perduto dell'infanzia, e così Sinclair dovrà affrontare il mondo al di fuori di sé, trovando demoni e guide spirituali, sperimentando la vita dissoluta e quella solitaria.
È...more

like · see review

title link	preview: Demian
avg rating	preview: Demian Goodreads rating: 4.03 (22933 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10239937-demian?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1295221588l/10239937.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10239937-demian?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Demian by Hermann Hesse[/url]

Demian

Friend Reviews

Lists with This Book

Community Reviews

new topic
Discuss This Book

combine
Other Editions (151)

Genres

Readers also enjoyed similar books

About Hermann Hesse

Books by Hermann Hesse

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website

Trivia About Demian: The Story...

Quotes from دميان : قصة شباب إميل ...