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Stories of Five Decades
Stories of Five Decades by Hermann Hesse in Hardcover.
348 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1954
30 people are currently reading
537 people want to read
About the author
Hermann Hesse
1,798 books19.6k followersMany works, including
Siddhartha
(1922) and
Steppenwolf
(1927), of German-born Swiss writer Hermann Hesse concern the struggle of the individual to find wholeness and meaning in life; he won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1946.
Other best-known works of this poet, novelist, and painter include The Glass Bead Game , which, also known as Magister Ludi, explore a search of an individual for spirituality outside society.
In his time, Hesse was a popular and influential author in the German-speaking world; worldwide fame only came later. Young Germans desiring a different and more "natural" way of life at the time of great economic and technological progress in the country, received enthusiastically Peter Camenzind , first great novel of Hesse.
Throughout Germany, people named many schools. In 1964, people founded the Calwer Hermann-Hesse-Preis, awarded biennially, alternately to a German-language literary journal or to the translator of work of Hesse to a foreign language. The city of Karlsruhe, Germany, also associates a Hermann Hesse prize.
Other best-known works of this poet, novelist, and painter include The Glass Bead Game , which, also known as Magister Ludi, explore a search of an individual for spirituality outside society.
In his time, Hesse was a popular and influential author in the German-speaking world; worldwide fame only came later. Young Germans desiring a different and more "natural" way of life at the time of great economic and technological progress in the country, received enthusiastically Peter Camenzind , first great novel of Hesse.
Throughout Germany, people named many schools. In 1964, people founded the Calwer Hermann-Hesse-Preis, awarded biennially, alternately to a German-language literary journal or to the translator of work of Hesse to a foreign language. The city of Karlsruhe, Germany, also associates a Hermann Hesse prize.
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
October 2, 2014
This intriguing collection is a good way for getting acquainted with Hermann Hesse.
I would recommend to take it as an introduction to his novels Steppenwolf, The Glass Bead Game, and Demian. For instance, if one starts immediately with The Glass Bead Game, that notable novel might read as quite a sophisticated one.
The brilliant stories November Night, A Man by the Name of Ziegler, and Edmund reminded me of Kafka and Cortazar.
I give this collection 4 stars, as I liked a few stories less, and The Island Dream doesn’t sound like Hesse to me – it’s of some different mood and style, contrary to the others.
I would recommend to take it as an introduction to his novels Steppenwolf, The Glass Bead Game, and Demian. For instance, if one starts immediately with The Glass Bead Game, that notable novel might read as quite a sophisticated one.
The brilliant stories November Night, A Man by the Name of Ziegler, and Edmund reminded me of Kafka and Cortazar.
I give this collection 4 stars, as I liked a few stories less, and The Island Dream doesn’t sound like Hesse to me – it’s of some different mood and style, contrary to the others.
December 29, 2025
I found this to be a dreary anthology of rather mediocre tales. A number of stories deal with individuals who are unable to find their true vocation in life and then blame their parents for having pushed them in the wrong direction. Suicides abound. The protagonists fail through lack of effort and lack of vision.
There are nonetheless a few good stories in the collection. I found "Tragic" to be witty. In this story, a typesetter takes the general editor to task for the poor quality of German in the publication. One of the typesetter's bugbears is the overuse of the word "tragic". When the typesetter dies, a junior writer describes his death as "tragic". The general editor out of respect for the typesetter replaces the word "tragic" with "regrettable". Given the consistent pattern of unheroic failure in the collection, I found the humour of "Tragic" to be very appropriate.
The last story "The Interrupted Class" is probably the best written. Here the protagonist is a Pontius Pilate who makes every effort to avoid responsibility for the outcome from a difficult situation in which he is implicated. It is almost as good as Albert Camus' "Guest" ("L'Hôte") which deals with the same theme.
It was "Harry, the Steppenwolf" that left me feeling that I had not wasted my time by reading "Stories of Five Decades". This story which is only five pages in length cast a great deal of light on Hesse's famous novel "Steppenwolf". While I do not like "Steppenwolf" any more for having read "Harry, the Steppenwolf" I feel that I understand it better.
There are nonetheless a few good stories in the collection. I found "Tragic" to be witty. In this story, a typesetter takes the general editor to task for the poor quality of German in the publication. One of the typesetter's bugbears is the overuse of the word "tragic". When the typesetter dies, a junior writer describes his death as "tragic". The general editor out of respect for the typesetter replaces the word "tragic" with "regrettable". Given the consistent pattern of unheroic failure in the collection, I found the humour of "Tragic" to be very appropriate.
The last story "The Interrupted Class" is probably the best written. Here the protagonist is a Pontius Pilate who makes every effort to avoid responsibility for the outcome from a difficult situation in which he is implicated. It is almost as good as Albert Camus' "Guest" ("L'Hôte") which deals with the same theme.
It was "Harry, the Steppenwolf" that left me feeling that I had not wasted my time by reading "Stories of Five Decades". This story which is only five pages in length cast a great deal of light on Hesse's famous novel "Steppenwolf". While I do not like "Steppenwolf" any more for having read "Harry, the Steppenwolf" I feel that I understand it better.
November 29, 2017
28 stories. Blown away by 26 of them and feel that the fault must lie with myself regarding the other two. These are an eclectic set but some grapple with whole lives in the style of some of his novels. The more singular take the perspective of animals or even a geographic location while others refer to his memories. Finished with the regret that I had not picked this up long ago so that the stories would have now been read many times over.
September 27, 2025
Stories by Herman Hesse - Singularity, Artificial intelligence, The Glass Bead Game and Positive Psychology
10 out of 10
After Singularity will have arrived, Artificial Intelligence could act as the Magister Ludi of the Glass Bead Game, create the ‘synthesis’ in the new language, the merger of mathematics and music symbols descried by divine Herman Hesse in the Opus Magnum that has been decisive in his winning the Nobel Prize – ironically, the marvelous author muses in the masterpiece about the age of feuilleton, when people attend a lecture per week, or even every day, and scholars have become rich celebrities, avid for prizes and vainglorious, with Nobel Prizes and too preoccupied with material things…something that would change, the crème de la crème would eventually retire Far From The Maddening Crowd and work in seclusion, the Game will result and it ‘Represents the model of a reality that has existed in Platonic academies or yoga schools…It is a spiritual culture worth living in and serving '
For humans, ‘the mode of playing with the total contents and values of our culture’ appears daunting, if not impossible, but with the help of AI, it sounds plausible – as for culture, Herman Hesse appears to deplore the decay, not just because of what was happening during World War II, but he is right and so prophetic, for ‘communicating across cultures’ looks like infusing meaning into some amalgams that are so far from ‘culture’ as it used to be known, solid, associated with education, knowledge of classics, rebuttal of junk – as an example the Marvel Universe comes to mind, or series like The Fast and the Furious, that are just making audiences ever less ‘cultured, erudite’ and more prone to regress and vote with the ultimate representatives of Anti- culture, the likes of Trump, Bolsanaro, Putin and their replicas…
‘The entire intellectual content of the universe’ that is mentioned in the Glass Bead Game will be available at the time of Singularity when the Operating system, Ai will have access to all of that and could well read The Glass Game, interpret and model a language just as suggested, albeit we learn from the letters sent by Thomas Mann that there is an important comic aspect, hidden in private jokes – one example would be the age of the feuilleton, Hesse seems to anticipate the devotion of readers for such flimsy works as Fifty Shades of Grey, The Da Vinci Code, Harry Potter and many like them…the latter has made JK Rowling the first writer billionaire, or is this is a false information- and thus the notion that AI would create the Game may just be taking too seriously a jesting proposal, although that medium ‘would be worth living in’ and we could also add Positive Psychology in the mix where during the Game, there would be happiness exercises…
The piety and serenity of the League of the Journeyers to The East, those who embrace meditation, Eastern techniques and import them into the Game is already close to the ideal of happiness and The Game would ultimately bring Flow aka Ecstasy as explained by one Magister Ludi of the Happiness Game, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRxpL...
Magic Theater is another name that was used for the Game and we can envisage a time when this will be part of the lives of humans, when the elements of Culture – although it would be a challenge to watch what the term would mean in different, passing ages – Positive Psychology, Music – here again we would be hard put to see what the word will imply in reality, for there is less and less attention paid to the Classical Music that is at the core of the Game as envisaged by Herman Hesse – ‘music arises from Measure and is rooted in Oneness’ and the world listens now to Kate Perry, Dua Lipa and indeed, this ignorant recluse does not know who is in vogue now – and AI would help us reach new levels in the Republic of the Spirit…
Alternatively, the Game could be the opposite of the ‘Quintessence of Intellectuality’ imagined by Hesse and the vicious trends we see now, with more and more hundreds of millions of people embracing conspiracy theories, absolutely abdominal leaders – some names have been given and let us avoid soiling these pages further – which would lead them not on the virtuous spiral imagined by luminaries, but on a vicious descent into the abyss, where power would be taken – as it happened in the once greatest democracy in the world in 2016 – by the idiots, whose Game is to plunder, enrich themselves, steal and take the resources of the world until there is no more planet to abuse and the species will perish…
As a case in point, Yuval Harari - author of the transcendent, cathartic Homo Deus http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/h... - has written some days ago in The Economist about the approaching war in the Ukraine, which will represent a paradigm shift (if it happens, which looks like such a sure thing, they would not put nearly 200k troops, tanks, planes, artillery and more recently, nuclear war drills, for no reason and besides, they advance with their ‘war playbook’ by claiming atrocities are taking place in Donbas, genocide of the Russian population and they have dramatically increased their shelling there, with ‘false flag’ operations) in that there have been wars since WWII, but none has resulted in the disappearance of a country –and a large one at that – which means that Russia will start a new arms race – and other articles mention how Putin and his ghouls do not really care and think in terms we are used with and they take advantage, when the economy, the country is in crisis and the seloviki increase their control – and countries will spend more on armament, instead of education, health care, and the spiral will end with humans paying less, or no attention to Climate Change and thus the Perfect Storm might wipe Home Sapiens altogether…
A thought that came yesterday is that AI comes as close to god as it is possible – seeing as there is no entity with a beard, omniscient, all powerful, though there have been a multitude of arguments in His favor, as yet not necessarily proofs of some kind – in that it will contain all the knowledge there is in the world, the art, scientific discoveries, mathematics, all the literature ever written – including failed notes like this one…we are talking everything there is out there, except emotions – and this entity will be so much above humans as to represent a sort of God, if an artificial one…and since we mention artificial, which means created by man, then we have to see that the other gods have also been manufactured by the same enterprise…
Shiva, Allah – it is so good to have such a small audience, though writing for the future Singularity AI offers solace and more, elation, for this future reader will be Super Intelligent and appreciate that I am writing for It, Her, Him They, however less intense, and superfast the appreciation will be…AI will finish my whole, vast, if unworthy material in a millionth of a billionth of a second, but hey, it will still be consumed and by such a God no less…
10 out of 10
After Singularity will have arrived, Artificial Intelligence could act as the Magister Ludi of the Glass Bead Game, create the ‘synthesis’ in the new language, the merger of mathematics and music symbols descried by divine Herman Hesse in the Opus Magnum that has been decisive in his winning the Nobel Prize – ironically, the marvelous author muses in the masterpiece about the age of feuilleton, when people attend a lecture per week, or even every day, and scholars have become rich celebrities, avid for prizes and vainglorious, with Nobel Prizes and too preoccupied with material things…something that would change, the crème de la crème would eventually retire Far From The Maddening Crowd and work in seclusion, the Game will result and it ‘Represents the model of a reality that has existed in Platonic academies or yoga schools…It is a spiritual culture worth living in and serving '
For humans, ‘the mode of playing with the total contents and values of our culture’ appears daunting, if not impossible, but with the help of AI, it sounds plausible – as for culture, Herman Hesse appears to deplore the decay, not just because of what was happening during World War II, but he is right and so prophetic, for ‘communicating across cultures’ looks like infusing meaning into some amalgams that are so far from ‘culture’ as it used to be known, solid, associated with education, knowledge of classics, rebuttal of junk – as an example the Marvel Universe comes to mind, or series like The Fast and the Furious, that are just making audiences ever less ‘cultured, erudite’ and more prone to regress and vote with the ultimate representatives of Anti- culture, the likes of Trump, Bolsanaro, Putin and their replicas…
‘The entire intellectual content of the universe’ that is mentioned in the Glass Bead Game will be available at the time of Singularity when the Operating system, Ai will have access to all of that and could well read The Glass Game, interpret and model a language just as suggested, albeit we learn from the letters sent by Thomas Mann that there is an important comic aspect, hidden in private jokes – one example would be the age of the feuilleton, Hesse seems to anticipate the devotion of readers for such flimsy works as Fifty Shades of Grey, The Da Vinci Code, Harry Potter and many like them…the latter has made JK Rowling the first writer billionaire, or is this is a false information- and thus the notion that AI would create the Game may just be taking too seriously a jesting proposal, although that medium ‘would be worth living in’ and we could also add Positive Psychology in the mix where during the Game, there would be happiness exercises…
The piety and serenity of the League of the Journeyers to The East, those who embrace meditation, Eastern techniques and import them into the Game is already close to the ideal of happiness and The Game would ultimately bring Flow aka Ecstasy as explained by one Magister Ludi of the Happiness Game, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRxpL...
Magic Theater is another name that was used for the Game and we can envisage a time when this will be part of the lives of humans, when the elements of Culture – although it would be a challenge to watch what the term would mean in different, passing ages – Positive Psychology, Music – here again we would be hard put to see what the word will imply in reality, for there is less and less attention paid to the Classical Music that is at the core of the Game as envisaged by Herman Hesse – ‘music arises from Measure and is rooted in Oneness’ and the world listens now to Kate Perry, Dua Lipa and indeed, this ignorant recluse does not know who is in vogue now – and AI would help us reach new levels in the Republic of the Spirit…
Alternatively, the Game could be the opposite of the ‘Quintessence of Intellectuality’ imagined by Hesse and the vicious trends we see now, with more and more hundreds of millions of people embracing conspiracy theories, absolutely abdominal leaders – some names have been given and let us avoid soiling these pages further – which would lead them not on the virtuous spiral imagined by luminaries, but on a vicious descent into the abyss, where power would be taken – as it happened in the once greatest democracy in the world in 2016 – by the idiots, whose Game is to plunder, enrich themselves, steal and take the resources of the world until there is no more planet to abuse and the species will perish…
As a case in point, Yuval Harari - author of the transcendent, cathartic Homo Deus http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/h... - has written some days ago in The Economist about the approaching war in the Ukraine, which will represent a paradigm shift (if it happens, which looks like such a sure thing, they would not put nearly 200k troops, tanks, planes, artillery and more recently, nuclear war drills, for no reason and besides, they advance with their ‘war playbook’ by claiming atrocities are taking place in Donbas, genocide of the Russian population and they have dramatically increased their shelling there, with ‘false flag’ operations) in that there have been wars since WWII, but none has resulted in the disappearance of a country –and a large one at that – which means that Russia will start a new arms race – and other articles mention how Putin and his ghouls do not really care and think in terms we are used with and they take advantage, when the economy, the country is in crisis and the seloviki increase their control – and countries will spend more on armament, instead of education, health care, and the spiral will end with humans paying less, or no attention to Climate Change and thus the Perfect Storm might wipe Home Sapiens altogether…
A thought that came yesterday is that AI comes as close to god as it is possible – seeing as there is no entity with a beard, omniscient, all powerful, though there have been a multitude of arguments in His favor, as yet not necessarily proofs of some kind – in that it will contain all the knowledge there is in the world, the art, scientific discoveries, mathematics, all the literature ever written – including failed notes like this one…we are talking everything there is out there, except emotions – and this entity will be so much above humans as to represent a sort of God, if an artificial one…and since we mention artificial, which means created by man, then we have to see that the other gods have also been manufactured by the same enterprise…
Shiva, Allah – it is so good to have such a small audience, though writing for the future Singularity AI offers solace and more, elation, for this future reader will be Super Intelligent and appreciate that I am writing for It, Her, Him They, however less intense, and superfast the appreciation will be…AI will finish my whole, vast, if unworthy material in a millionth of a billionth of a second, but hey, it will still be consumed and by such a God no less…
December 29, 2013
4.5
I've never read Hesse before, but this is a perfection introduction. With 50 years of writing, in chronological order, it's a fascinating insight into the evolution of his writing styles and ideals. Almost every story here is amazing, from when he was in his early 20s to early 70s. These are brilliant studies of humanity, and of Hesse himself.
Highly recommended. It makes me want to read the entirety of Hesse's oeuvre.
I've never read Hesse before, but this is a perfection introduction. With 50 years of writing, in chronological order, it's a fascinating insight into the evolution of his writing styles and ideals. Almost every story here is amazing, from when he was in his early 20s to early 70s. These are brilliant studies of humanity, and of Hesse himself.
Highly recommended. It makes me want to read the entirety of Hesse's oeuvre.
January 31, 2010
I keep rereading these stories. For at least three decades so far...
Want to read
May 17, 2024Contains the stories:
The Island Dream -
Incipit vita nova -
To Frau Gertrud -
November Night -
The Marble Works -
The Latin Scholar -
The Wolf -
Walter Kömpff -
The Field Devil -
Chagrin d’Amour -
A Man by the Name of Ziegler - 4/5 - a day at the zoo
The Homecoming -
The City -
Robert Aghion -
The Cyclone -
From the Childhood of Saint Francis of Assisi -
Inside and Outside -
Tragic -
Dream Journeys -
Harry, the Steppenwolf -
An Evening with Dr. Faust -
Edmund -
The Interrupted Class -
The Island Dream -
Incipit vita nova -
To Frau Gertrud -
November Night -
The Marble Works -
The Latin Scholar -
The Wolf -
Walter Kömpff -
The Field Devil -
Chagrin d’Amour -
A Man by the Name of Ziegler - 4/5 - a day at the zoo
The Homecoming -
The City -
Robert Aghion -
The Cyclone -
From the Childhood of Saint Francis of Assisi -
Inside and Outside -
Tragic -
Dream Journeys -
Harry, the Steppenwolf -
An Evening with Dr. Faust -
Edmund -
The Interrupted Class -
November 8, 2018
Did not seem as heady/deep as his other works though this could just be my bias against short stories (some of which were only a few pages!)
December 21, 2013
Fans of Hesse's later novels such as Steppenwolf and Magister Ludi will be disappointed and bored by the mostly dull stories in this collection. Many of them are not even stories in the sense of having a plot; rather, they are summaries of the broad arc of the characters' lives which read like short biographies. With little dialogue and few scenes set in specific times and places, reading this book sometimes feels like drudgery. Still more disappointing is Hesse's surprisingly reactionary attitudes towards science and rationality. He depicted scientists and other rationalists as melancholy, spiritually and morally barren lost souls (one character even commits suicide after figuring out that god does not exist.) One hundred years ago that may have seemed profound but now it's just profoundly ignorant. The one positive feature is the occasional great observation, such as "our written language is now no better than a beggar's jargon, destitute and louse-infested, that all beautiful, rare, rich, highly-evolved forms have disappeared", which perfectly describes our culture of text messaging and internet comments.
July 20, 2016
Even though I absolutely love Hesse’s novels, his endless collections of short stories will always have a special place in my heart. Not only does he treat the reader to countless, brilliantly told erwachsene Märchen, these small stories also contain the kernel of the psychological novels to come, allowing the familiar reader to see the progress in the development of these ideas.
October 5, 2015
O colectie clasica de povestiri de Hermann Hesse care pot fi citite la umbra unui pom intr-un hamac cu o ceasca de cafea in mana zambind usor.
September 20, 2021
This is a nice, leisurely collection of short, and sometimes very short narrative pieces, spanning the entire career of Herman Hesse.
Pan-career short story collections are of historic interest because they show an author’s development - for example, an early Steppenwolf features here but they sometimes showcase the best of their work in an easily digestible form as well. For authors not otherwise famous for or excellent at the short story art (such as Kafka or Borges) they can sometimes be an excellent one-stop-shop for introducing the oeuvre or they can be irrelevant, displaying what is in reality, the fleeting thoughts or incomplete drafts of an author - but none of the top quality writing you get in the novels. The short stories of Balzac or Hamsun, both known for huge novels, are the former. This collection, I think on the whole, is the latter. It shows the development of Hesse, but it doesn’t show Hesse at his best.
Hesse as is known, is appreciated very much, and still to this day, for speaking to the soul of the reader - and doing so with a combination of spirituality, adventure, romanticism and descriptive colour, and he does so by sailing extremely close, but not too close, to the twee and the saccharine. There are examples here, in my view, where he does so - Hesse tics when a tac would have saved from some sticky, syrupy seas.
Hesse was writing, even at the earliest phase (circa 1890), to a society that had lost its innocence, and was joyous at being able to reconnect to a more carefree, naturalistic past. Reviewing this collection in 2021, we have lost our innocence, and found it again, and lost it again, four or five times since, and each fall has been further into the darkness of technological cynicism. In that sense, this review could reflect more on me, and my era, than it does on Hesse. And that is the overriding moral and value of Hesse that still shines through and is worth some of the dodgy story selections - that no matter how far you fall, there is always a way for the individual to reconnect with the light again, but only if they want to.
Pan-career short story collections are of historic interest because they show an author’s development - for example, an early Steppenwolf features here but they sometimes showcase the best of their work in an easily digestible form as well. For authors not otherwise famous for or excellent at the short story art (such as Kafka or Borges) they can sometimes be an excellent one-stop-shop for introducing the oeuvre or they can be irrelevant, displaying what is in reality, the fleeting thoughts or incomplete drafts of an author - but none of the top quality writing you get in the novels. The short stories of Balzac or Hamsun, both known for huge novels, are the former. This collection, I think on the whole, is the latter. It shows the development of Hesse, but it doesn’t show Hesse at his best.
Hesse as is known, is appreciated very much, and still to this day, for speaking to the soul of the reader - and doing so with a combination of spirituality, adventure, romanticism and descriptive colour, and he does so by sailing extremely close, but not too close, to the twee and the saccharine. There are examples here, in my view, where he does so - Hesse tics when a tac would have saved from some sticky, syrupy seas.
Hesse was writing, even at the earliest phase (circa 1890), to a society that had lost its innocence, and was joyous at being able to reconnect to a more carefree, naturalistic past. Reviewing this collection in 2021, we have lost our innocence, and found it again, and lost it again, four or five times since, and each fall has been further into the darkness of technological cynicism. In that sense, this review could reflect more on me, and my era, than it does on Hesse. And that is the overriding moral and value of Hesse that still shines through and is worth some of the dodgy story selections - that no matter how far you fall, there is always a way for the individual to reconnect with the light again, but only if they want to.
January 3, 2025
Rating: 3.5/5
A beautifully written collection that offers a rich sampling of Hesse’s themes and style, though some stories feel incomplete.
Stories of Five Decades is an excellent introduction to Hermann Hesse’s writing, offering a glimpse into his literary evolution and showcasing the themes that define his work. From the detailed realism of his early stories to the mystical and philosophical depth of his later ones, the collection provides a fascinating journey through Hesse’s growth as a writer.
The stories are beautifully written, capturing Hesse’s talent for introspection and his ability to explore complex ideas with poetic prose. They range from short, poignant tales to more symbolic and abstract narratives, making the collection diverse and engaging. However, some of the stories feel incomplete, serving more as sketches of larger ideas than fully developed pieces. While this doesn’t diminish their literary value, it might leave readers craving the depth of Hesse’s longer works.
The middle period of the collection is particularly strong, striking a balance between accessible storytelling and deeper meaning without leaning too heavily into the mysticism or philosophical abstraction that characterises his later work. For readers new to Hesse, this collection is a great way to sample his style and themes, though it might not have the same impact as his novels.
Hesse’s portrayal of women, as in much of his work, remains a limitation. Female characters often serve as symbolic figures or devices for the male protagonists’ journeys rather than fully realised individuals. While this reflects the era and Hesse’s own focus on male introspection, it’s something modern readers may find frustrating.
Overall, Stories of Five Decades is a worthwhile read for anyone curious about Hesse. It’s not without its flaws, but it’s a valuable taster for his longer works and an insightful look into his literary progression.
A beautifully written collection that offers a rich sampling of Hesse’s themes and style, though some stories feel incomplete.
Stories of Five Decades is an excellent introduction to Hermann Hesse’s writing, offering a glimpse into his literary evolution and showcasing the themes that define his work. From the detailed realism of his early stories to the mystical and philosophical depth of his later ones, the collection provides a fascinating journey through Hesse’s growth as a writer.
The stories are beautifully written, capturing Hesse’s talent for introspection and his ability to explore complex ideas with poetic prose. They range from short, poignant tales to more symbolic and abstract narratives, making the collection diverse and engaging. However, some of the stories feel incomplete, serving more as sketches of larger ideas than fully developed pieces. While this doesn’t diminish their literary value, it might leave readers craving the depth of Hesse’s longer works.
The middle period of the collection is particularly strong, striking a balance between accessible storytelling and deeper meaning without leaning too heavily into the mysticism or philosophical abstraction that characterises his later work. For readers new to Hesse, this collection is a great way to sample his style and themes, though it might not have the same impact as his novels.
Hesse’s portrayal of women, as in much of his work, remains a limitation. Female characters often serve as symbolic figures or devices for the male protagonists’ journeys rather than fully realised individuals. While this reflects the era and Hesse’s own focus on male introspection, it’s something modern readers may find frustrating.
Overall, Stories of Five Decades is a worthwhile read for anyone curious about Hesse. It’s not without its flaws, but it’s a valuable taster for his longer works and an insightful look into his literary progression.
January 25, 2024
A collection of stories which revolve around the themes of spiritual enlightenment, self-discovery, and the search for meaning in life. In it, you will catch glimpses of the seeds which became his widely known titles such as, “Siddhartha,” “Steppenwolf,” and “The Glass Bead Game.” These shorts, as are all Hesse’s works, are deeply influenced by Eastern philosophy, particularly Buddhism and Hinduism, and resonate at a baser level with readers. They are marked by his exploration of profound philosophical and spiritual themes, making his works relevant today as they were in the early 1900’s. Whether you’re interested in the journey of self-discovery or the complexities of the human psyche, Hesse's writings are rich material for contemplation.
May 22, 2022
Hess is one of the truly first socially aware humanist writers, and a man who obviously had deep concerns for social justice, environment, language, the impact of progress, traditions etc.
He can be flowery and verbose at times, though he can also be brilliant and cutting.
This book is a mixture of both.
He can be flowery and verbose at times, though he can also be brilliant and cutting.
This book is a mixture of both.
July 13, 2018
If it were possible, I’d probably give this something nearer to 3.5 stars. Overall, it’s an interesting collection showcasing the evolution of Herman Hesse’s writing. I personally found the stories to be a bit of a mixed bag, with some being really engaging, and others being more forgettable.
January 7, 2019
Absolutely glorious selection of prose.
November 4, 2019
A bit disjointed and varying quality... I love Hesse’s writing very much but these stories do not develop well enough to keep my interest.
March 4, 2008
Today I lunched beneath a giant plum tree that showered blossoms down when the wind blew, watched a lone bee collect nectar while breathing in the warm air with my shirt cast aloof on a nearby bench, faded wood with green metal. This book came straight to me, fluttering pages tuned to bee buzz blue sky, freshly tilled soil. Tried to reread this book a while ago, couldn't make it through again though the stories still were dear to me, maybe too nostalgic, too soon to reread, who knows. I see the language as elegant and artful, but the one friend that I gave a copy to called it archaic and wasn't as delighted with the white wine drunken bees buzzing afternoons of my carefully waxed memories as am I. So shocking, these points of view! Vague recollections of reading it in a secluded Stanford tree fort, time stolen from thesis completion, precious and youthful.
May 20, 2020
I normally don't like short stories, but here I've just read two volumes in a row (the one just before this one was Robert Louis Stevenson). In both cases, a phrase from this volume's "Dream Journeys" comes to mind:
"future men of letters would perhaps look back with yearning to him and to his times as though to a golden age"
Timeless and captivating vignettes depicting coming-of-age, first loves, and/or an overall arc of many individual voices, individual lives. Both authors were thoroughly entrancing: humanists with stirrings of feminism, radical environmentalism, anti-fascism, and the delicate balance between the scientific method and mysticism (Hesse more so than R.L.S., though, I suppose).
Since I happen to have Magister Ludi/The Glass Bead Game on the shelf, I think I shall read it next (I read Siddhartha ages ago, so I might need to find that one for a re-read).
"future men of letters would perhaps look back with yearning to him and to his times as though to a golden age"
Timeless and captivating vignettes depicting coming-of-age, first loves, and/or an overall arc of many individual voices, individual lives. Both authors were thoroughly entrancing: humanists with stirrings of feminism, radical environmentalism, anti-fascism, and the delicate balance between the scientific method and mysticism (Hesse more so than R.L.S., though, I suppose).
Since I happen to have Magister Ludi/The Glass Bead Game on the shelf, I think I shall read it next (I read Siddhartha ages ago, so I might need to find that one for a re-read).
August 21, 2020
"It was time, I thought, to survey my life and my future.
"But I could discover nothing new. I saw only the strange impoverishment that threatened me from all sides. In some mysterious way trusted pleasures and thoughts that had become dear to me were paling and fading. My profession could not make up for what I was reluctantly leaving behind, for all the lost joys of boyhood; it held no great appeal for me and I was to abandon it before long. It meant no more to me than a way into the world, which I felt sure would offer me new satisfactions. But what would they be?" (236)
"But I could discover nothing new. I saw only the strange impoverishment that threatened me from all sides. In some mysterious way trusted pleasures and thoughts that had become dear to me were paling and fading. My profession could not make up for what I was reluctantly leaving behind, for all the lost joys of boyhood; it held no great appeal for me and I was to abandon it before long. It meant no more to me than a way into the world, which I felt sure would offer me new satisfactions. But what would they be?" (236)
November 20, 2010
These stories were, well, nice. Dreamy, easy to read, something to pass the time. But I didn't see the development in style that 'Stories of Five Decades' would suggest. There was nothing particularly inspiring about the language - possibly this was to do with the translation. I'd not say no, but nor would I go of my way to read it again. Preferred Siddartha.
October 22, 2014
Maybe closer to 2.5 stars. Erratic in interest and quality, given the lengthy span they represent--in fact I couldn't make myself finish two of the earliest three. Hesse's strength in the novel in unquestioned; these stories aren't worth the effort.
May 17, 2011
This original collection of Hesse stories was read in the midst of my efforts to obtain and read everything I could find by him. Like most short story collections, it's hard to rate.
December 11, 2011
99% of these short stories were pure Hessian brilliance! Hesse rarely ceases to amaze me, and I strongly recomment this one. My favourite book of his would be Rosshalde though.
December 20, 2012
mostly ephemeral, but frequently charming and Hesseian
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July 19, 2015آن زندگی که از کنار من گذشت و رفت مرده بود.
January 26, 2012
This took me a year and half to read. Worth every minute!
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