Demian Quotes

“We who bore the mark might well be considered by the rest of the world as strange, even as insane and dangerous. We had awoken, or were awakening, and we were striving for an ever perfect state of wakefulness, whereas the ambition and quest for happiness of the others consisted of linking their opinions, ideals, and duties, their life and happiness, ever more closely with those of the herd. They, too, strove; they, too showed signs of strength and greatness. But as we saw it, whereas we marked men represented Nature's determination to create something new, individual, and forward-looking, the others lived in the determination to stay the same. For them mankind--which they loved as much as we did--was a fully formed entity that had to be preserved and protected. For us mankind was a distant future toward which we were all journeying, whose aspect no one knew, whose laws weren't written down anywhere.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“For the first time in my life I tasted death, and death tasted bitter, for death is birth, is fear and dread of some terrible renewal.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“An enlightened man had but one duty - to seek the way to himself, to reach inner certainty, to grope his way forward, no matter where it led.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“I realize that some people will not believe that a child of little more than ten years is capable of having such feelings. My story is not intended for them. I am telling it to those who have a better knowledge of man. The adult who has learned to translate a part of his feelings into thoughts notices the absence of these thoughts in a child, and therefore comes to believe that the child lacks these experiences, too. Yet rarely in my life have I felt and suffered as deeply as at that time.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“At one time I had given much thought to why men were so very rarely capable of living for an ideal. Now I saw that many, no, all men were capable of dying for one.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“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.”
― Hermann Hesse

“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 phenomena intersect, only once in this way and never again.

That is why every man's story is important, eternal, sacred; that is why every man, as long as he lives and fulfills the will of nature, is wondrous, and worthy of every consideration. In each individual, the spirit has become flesh, in each man the creation suffers, within each one a redeemer is nailed to the cross.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“Novelists when they write novels tend to take an almost godlike attitude toward their subject, pretending to a total comprehension of the story, a man's life, which they can therefore recount as God Himself might, nothing standing between them and the naked truth, the entire story meaningful in every detail. I am as little able to do this as the novelist is, even though my story is more important to me than any novelist's is to him - for this is my story; it is the story of a man, not of an invented, or possible, or idealized, or otherwise absent figure, but of a unique being of flesh and blood, Yet, what a real living human being is made of seems to be less understood today than at any time before, and men - each one of whom represents a unique and valuable experiment on the part of nature - are therefore shot wholesale nowadays. If we were not something more than unique human beings, if each one of us could really be done away with once and for all by a single bullet, storytelling would lose all purpose. 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 phenomena intersect, only once in this way and never again. That is why every man's story is important, eternal, sacred; that is why every man, as long as he lives and fulfills the will of nature, is wondrous, and worthy of every consideration. In each individual the spirit has become flesh, in each man the creation suffers, within each one a redeemer is nailed to the cross.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“ "The things we see," said Pistorius gently, "are the things which are already in us. There is no reality beyond what we have inside us. That is why most people live such unreal lives; they take pictures outside themselves for the real ones and fail to express their own world. One can of course live contentedly enough in that situation. But once you know about the other you no longer have the choice of following the majority way. The way of the majority, Sinclair, is easy, ours is hard....But now we must go." ”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“I saw Demian's face and remarked that it was not a boy's face but a man's and then I saw, or rather became aware, that it was not really the face of a man either; it had something different about it, almost a feminine element. And for the time being his face seemed neither masculine nor childish, neither old nor young but a hundred years old, almost timeless and bearing the mark of other periods of history than our own.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“... E por que têm medo? Só se tem medo quando não se está de acordo consigo mesmo. Têm medo porque jamais se atreveram a perseguir seus próprios impulsos interiores. Uma comunidade formada por indivíduos atemorizados com o desconhecido que levam dentro de si.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“The surrender to Nature's irrational, strangely confused formations produces in us a feeling of inner harmony with the force responsible for these phenomena. We soon fall prey to the temptation of thinking of them as being our own moods, our own creations, and see the boundaries separating us from Nature begin to quiver and dissolve. We become acquainted with that state of mind in which we are unable to decide whether the images on our retina are the result of impressions coming from without or from within. Nowhere as in this exercise can we discover so easily and so simply to what extent we are creative, to what extent our soul partakes of the constant creation of the world. For it is the same indivisible divinity that is active through us and in Nature, and if the outside world were to be destroyed, a single one of us would be capable of rebuilding it: mountain and stream, tree and leaf, root and flower, yes, every natural form is latent within us, originates in the soul whose essence is eternity, whose essence we cannot know but which often intimates itself to us as the power to love and create.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“All I wanted was to try and realize whatever was in me. Why was that so difficult?”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“Não há porque te compares com os demais, e se a natureza te criou para morcego, não deves aspirar ser avestruz. às vezes te consideras por demais esquisito e te reprovas por seguires caminhos diversos dos da maioria. Deixa-te disso. Contempla o fogo, as nuvens e quando surgirem presságios e as vozes soarem em tua alma abandona-te a elas sem perguntares se isso convém.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“Besides-neither of us knows why you happen to be drinking wine at this moment.
That which is within you and directs your life knows already. It's good to realize that within us there is someone
who knows everything, wills everything, does everything better than we ourselves.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian / Siddhartha

“جادو و «افسون» پیشینه ای اصیل در فلسفه و اندیشه های ژرف دارد”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“Even as a child I had had at intervals a fondness for observing strange forms in nature, not so much examining them as surrendering myself to their magic, their oblique message. Long tree-roots, coloured veins in rock, patches of oil floating on water, flaws in glass—all such things had a certain fascination for me, above all, water and fire, smoke, clouds, dust and expecially the swirling specks of colour which swam before my closed eyes.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“But where we have given of our love and respect not from habit but of our own free will, where we have been children and friends from our inmost heart, it is a bitter and terrible moment when we suddenly recognize that our natural tendency is bound to lead us away from the people we love.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“I had often toyed with pictures of the future, dreamed of rôles which might be assigned to me—as a poet, maybe, or prophet or painter or kindred vocation. All that was futile. I was not there to write poetry, to preach or paint; neither I nor any other man was there for that purpose. They were only incidental things. There was only one true vocation for everybody—to find the way to himself. He might end as poet, lunatic, prophet or criminal—that was not his affair; ultimately it was of no account. His affair was to discover his own destiny, not something of his own choosing, and live it out wholly and resolutely within himself.”
― Hermann Hesse

“I still believed firmly in chance at that time.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“That is the way the leaves fall round an autumn  tree; it is unaware of it, rain runs down it, it is subjected to sun or frost and life slowly retreats. It does not die. It waits.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“Only the ideas that we really live have any value. You have known that your 'permitted' world was only half of the world and you have tried to subjugate the second half after the manner of the priests and teachers. It will not be to your benefit! It benefits no one once he has begun to think!”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“However, one can study someone very closely and then one can often know almost exactly what he thinks or feels and thenone can also anticipate what he will do the next moment. It's simple enough, only people don't know it.”
― Herman Hesse, Demian

“However, one can study someone very closely and then one can often know almost exactly what he thinks or feels and then one can also anticipate what he will do the next moment. It's simple enough, only people don't know it.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian

“«Piccolo Sinclair, sta’ attento. Io dovrò andarmene. Un giorno avrai forse bisogno di me, di nuovo contro Kromer o altro. Se mi chiamerai, non verrò più così volgarmente a cavallo o col treno. Allora dovrai ascoltare te stesso, e ti accorgerai che dentro ci sarò io. »

...

La medicazione fu dolorosa. Tutto ciò che mi avvenne dopo quel giorno fu doloroso. Ma talvolta, quando trovo la chiave mi sprofondo dentro di me, dove le visioni del destino dormono nello specchio buio, basta che mi chini sopra questo specchio per vedere la mia propria immagine che è in tutto uguale a lui, a lui, mio amico e guida.

Demian, Hermann Hesse”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“But whereas we, in our conception, represented the will of nature to renew itself, to individualize and march forward, the others lived in the desire for the perpetuation of things as they are. For them humanity—which they loved as we did—was something complete that must be maintained and protected. For us humanity was a distant goal towards which we were marching, whose image no one yet know, whose laws were nowhere written down.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“She rose to her feet and preceded me into the garden twilight. Tall and queenly, the woman of mystery strolled among the silent trees and above her head the myriad stars glowed tenderly.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend

“Desde criança, sempre me agradava contemplar as formas estranhas da natureza, não como observador que investiga, mas abandonando-me apenas ao seu encanto peculiar, à sua profunda e complexa linguagem.”
― Hermann Hesse

“My conscious self lived within the familiar and sanctioned world, it denied the new world that dawned within me.”
― Hermann Hesse

“We always define the limits of our personality too narrowly. In general, we count as part of our personality only that which we can recognize as being an individual trait or as diverging from the norm. But we consist of everything the world consists of, each of us, and just as our body contains the genealogical table of evolution as far back as the fish and even much further, so we bear everything in our soul that once was alive in the soul
of men. Every god and devil that ever existed, be it among the Greeks, Chinese, or Zulus, are within us, exist as latent possibilities, as wishes, as alternatives. If the human race
were to vanish from the face of the earth save for one halfway talented child that had received no education, this child would rediscover the entire course of evolution,
it would be capable of producing everything once more, gods and demons, paradises, commandments, the Old and
New Testament.”
― Hermann Hesse, Demian: Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend