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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52036.Siddhartha?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="Siddhartha" border="0" src="http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170384393m/52036.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52036.Siddhartha?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">Siddhartha</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1113469.Hermann_Hesse">Hermann Hesse</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/32295784?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 4 of 5 stars So I finally finished reading Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha today. Perhaps a little late in life, but I read it nonetheless. I picked up the book last year, read the first fifty pages, was completely mesmerized and deluded at the same time, and put it away for another day. I found it a few days ago, collecting dust in my little bookshelf and I knew it was time to finish the story. So I read the book in its entirety today. It was enchanting and maddening at the same time.
 
 At first I didn’t sympathize with Siddhartha’s alienation, although it’s a feeling I’ve felt at many times in my life. I didn’t comprehend it, because I judged it. His moral qualms and disparities seemed to be self-inflicted for it came from self-absorption; a folly that we all fall into at one point in life or another. Slowly the lack of sympathy turned into empathy as I began to understand his emotional turmoil; his quest to find meaning in what appears to be a meaningless existence.
 
 I empathized with Siddhartha’s disdain for the materialistic world with the merchant, because it was something I could relate to. As much as I love shopping, I sometimes feel a kind of detachment from the consumer culture that has creeped over the world. Consumerism has become a ritualistic and more dangerously, a therapeutic experience for all of us. Buying things out of necessity is necessary of course, but beyond that, constantly splurging tends to make things lose their value and more importantly, their meaning. I’m grateful that Hesse created a fictional character who goes through this same fascination and contempt with material things. Or maybe there is something to all this consumerism and I’ve missed the point. But right now it seems like missing the point is well worth it.
 
 I think it would be very easy to write off Govinda as the pious and blind follower of religion. Maybe that was Hesse’s intention in creating this character. It must be. Govinda finds salvation in Siddhartha and not on his own when he follows the teachings of Gotoma. This makes Govinda’s religious journey seem inferior. But Govinda’s path is simply a different one. It is no lesser than Siddhartha’s. I think it’s terribly deprivating to classify the world as those who are religious and those who are not. There’s so much richness in the people who sustain one or the other and all those in the middle. All this gets lost in such stark contrasts. For this personal reason, I wish Hesse had given Govinda at least some enlightenment in his wanderings with Gotoma.
 
 While my emotions remained in flux everytime I turned the page, my heart leapt when I reached the end of the novel. What Siddhartha seeked and found is..simplicity. Siddhartha’s epiphany exemplified a quote by William Hazlitt which I absolutely love:
 
 “Simplicity of character is the natural result of profound thought.”
 
 There’s something about finding beauty in the spare; finding something special in the smaller things. It’s regressive, I know. Like growing young. But that childish curiousity is important. Living with eyes and hearts open. And for a novel that ends in finding salvation in simplicity.. well, to me that novel is nothing short of wonderful.
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/1505592?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

Ammu's review
rating:

status: Read in August, 2008

** spoiler alert ** So I finally finished reading Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha today. Perhaps a little late in life, but I read it nonetheless. I picked up the book last year, read the first fifty pages, was completely mesmerized and deluded at the same time, and put it away for another day. I found it a few days ago, collecting dust in my little bookshelf and I knew it was time to finish the story. So I read the book in its entirety today. It was enchanting and maddening at the same time.

At first I didn’t sympathize with Siddhartha’s alienation, although it’s a feeling I’ve felt at many times in my life. I didn’t comprehend it, because I judged it. His moral qualms and disparities seemed to be self-inflicted for it came from self-absorption; a folly that we all fall into at one point in life or another. Slowly the lack of sympathy turned into empathy as I began to understand his emotional turmoil; his quest to find meaning in what appears to be a meaningless existence.

I empathized with S...more So I finally finished reading Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha today. Perhaps a little late in life, but I read it nonetheless. I picked up the book last year, read the first fifty pages, was completely mesmerized and deluded at the same time, and put it away for another day. I found it a few days ago, collecting dust in my little bookshelf and I knew it was time to finish the story. So I read the book in its entirety today. It was enchanting and maddening at the same time.

At first I didn’t sympathize with Siddhartha’s alienation, although it’s a feeling I’ve felt at many times in my life. I didn’t comprehend it, because I judged it. His moral qualms and disparities seemed to be self-inflicted for it came from self-absorption; a folly that we all fall into at one point in life or another. Slowly the lack of sympathy turned into empathy as I began to understand his emotional turmoil; his quest to find meaning in what appears to be a meaningless existence.

I empathized with Siddhartha’s disdain for the materialistic world with the merchant, because it was something I could relate to. As much as I love shopping, I sometimes feel a kind of detachment from the consumer culture that has creeped over the world. Consumerism has become a ritualistic and more dangerously, a therapeutic experience for all of us. Buying things out of necessity is necessary of course, but beyond that, constantly splurging tends to make things lose their value and more importantly, their meaning. I’m grateful that Hesse created a fictional character who goes through this same fascination and contempt with material things. Or maybe there is something to all this consumerism and I’ve missed the point. But right now it seems like missing the point is well worth it.

I think it would be very easy to write off Govinda as the pious and blind follower of religion. Maybe that was Hesse’s intention in creating this character. It must be. Govinda finds salvation in Siddhartha and not on his own when he follows the teachings of Gotoma. This makes Govinda’s religious journey seem inferior. But Govinda’s path is simply a different one. It is no lesser than Siddhartha’s. I think it’s terribly deprivating to classify the world as those who are religious and those who are not. There’s so much richness in the people who sustain one or the other and all those in the middle. All this gets lost in such stark contrasts. For this personal reason, I wish Hesse had given Govinda at least some enlightenment in his wanderings with Gotoma.

While my emotions remained in flux everytime I turned the page, my heart leapt when I reached the end of the novel. What Siddhartha seeked and found is..simplicity. Siddhartha’s epiphany exemplified a quote by William Hazlitt which I absolutely love:

“Simplicity of character is the natural result of profound thought.”

There’s something about finding beauty in the spare; finding something special in the smaller things. It’s regressive, I know. Like growing young. But that childish curiousity is important. Living with eyes and hearts open. And for a novel that ends in finding salvation in simplicity.. well, to me that novel is nothing short of wonderful....less

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