Chapter 23 postscript

Hesse's later work is his last novel.Although the work appears in the form of a novel, it is not a novel in the ordinary sense of the word. It uses a series of symbols and metaphors to weave a philosophical utopian vision and fabricates a fable that took place in the future world after the twentieth century.However, the author's intention is not to be mysterious, just as the German female writer Luisa Lindsell said: "Hesse's turn to utopia during Hitler's time was not an evasive attitude, but to use language as a weapon to make people free. Hesse himself has some simple and humble confessions about this, citing two paragraphs As follows: "This comical man wants to do something useful, not detrimental to humanity, something good to be hoped for, . His own little words, for his deeds are exactly the same as those pulsatillas, primroses, and other gorgeous flowers that bloom in all the meadows of the world today. They grow in the world, which may be suffocated by poisonous gas tomorrow, and still are today. Carefully conceive your own petals and calyx, no matter it is five petals, four petals or seven petals, no matter it is smooth edged or zigzag, always conscientiously dress yourself up as beautiful as possible." (see " Letter to my son Martin") "One is to build a spiritual space that resists poisoning to protect my survival, and the other is to express the spiritual thought of rebelling against barbaric forces, and do my best to strengthen the strength of friends who resist and hold their ground in Germany. "(See "Letter to Rodolph Panwitz")

The author conceived the book from 1931 to the publication of the book in 1943, which took twelve years. Significantly, his creation and Hitler's atrocities were almost synchronized. In the end, Hesse won the victory, and the Third Reich died in 1945 after 12 years of existence. Literary Award. In the early days after the First World War, Hesse expressed his latest ideas in a series of articles, especially on Dostoevsky: to establish an The new moral consciousness must observe all extreme opposites with a unified perspective.In fact, as early as the First World War was in full swing, Hesse saw that the concept of "patriotism" was actually the soil of chauvinism, and he was accused of treason for opposing the war. He wrote an article expressing this important thought: " I would like to be a patriot, but first of all, I am a 'man'. If I can't have both, then I will always choose a 'man'." After the 1930s, with Hitler's retrograde intensification, Hesse's ideas gradually matured, Finally condensed into a symbolic book.The author said through the mouth of the protagonist Knecht: "After the blood was shed, people yearned for reason, and Castalia came into being", and the glass bead game with the purpose of synthesizing all the knowledge in the world is this Castalian. The supreme fruit of the spiritual kingdom.

Before coming out, Hesse published "Journey to the East" which is called "spiritual autobiography" in 1927. After a long period of meditation, this Westerner who tried to learn from the East realized that the root cause of modern society lies in human nature. , not in material civilization, so the creed of the Eastern travelers in the book is a world or universal thought that transcends conventional ideas: "Our goal is not limited to one country, nor has any geographical restrictions, but to seek The hometown of the soul and youth, they are ubiquitous, but they are nowhere, they are the unity of all ages." The protagonist of "Journey to the East" joins a book with the purpose of "seeking truth from the East" in order to explore the true meaning of life. After participating in many "journeys to explore the truth" organized by the alliance, he realized that the meaning of life is "he must prosper, and I must decay".The dedication on the title page is unusual: "To Travelers from the East". The kinship between Journey to the East and the two works is self-evident.

In 1932, Hesse wrote a draft of the motto before the book; in 1933, he wrote a draft of the introduction; Most of the poems written by the protagonist of the novel when he was a student; In 1936, "The Confession of the Elders", which later became the second appendix; In 1937, he published "Indian Biography", which later became the third appendix; in 1938, he began to write the biography of the master of the glass bead game, and finished writing "Inspiration" and "Walzell" in that year; In nine years, he completed "Research Time" and "Two Religious Groups"; in 1940, he finished Obedience, "The Master of the Glass Bead Game"; in 1941, he wrote the most important poem in the book, "Stage", And complete the remaining chapters; in 1942, the concluding chapter was written.

In 1943, Switzerland published the first edition in two volumes.In 1945, the publisher of Hesse's works, Peter Suerkap, survived the Nazi concentration camp by chance, and immediately started publishing after he obtained the first publishing license issued by the Allies in post-war Germany. In 1946 , finally came out in Germany. Regarding the process of writing the book, we would like to explain another situation.Hesse originally planned to write a series of biographies of Knecht in different countries and different historical periods, but he failed. The fourth biography was abandoned halfway. This is how it is described in the novel, and so is the fact.The situation is in line with Jung's famous saying: "Goethe did not create Faust, but Faust created Goethe," and no one in the world can escape the limitations of his own history.

In order to create a flawless ideal hero, Hesse can only weave utopia and display his romantic means in the virtual future world, so the non-existent master of the glass bead game stands out, while the heroes who were originally juxtaposed with him all retreat. On one side, it became an appendix. It is not an easy-to-read book, but like Hesse's other relatively easy-to-understand works, it has long been popular not only in Germany, but also in the world. The translator has read at least a hundred of various reviews from different eras.In 1977, to commemorate the centenary of Hesse's birth, the Hesse International Symposium was held in Calw, a small town in southern Germany where the writer was born. Mann Hesse’s Worldwide Influence” was out of control, and the seminar became a regular event. As of 1997, it had been held eight times, and “Hesse’s Worldwide Influence” had to be The second volume was published in 1979, and the third volume was published in 1991. Unfortunately, Favre died in 1994, otherwise more sequels would have come out.The translator has read these three "Influence" and the anthology of the second and seventh international symposiums, and realized that the reason for Hesse's enduring prosperity is the writer's strong spiritual strength.The strength of Hesse's works comes from the author's creative ability to integrate different cultures of the East and the West, and also from his desire and belief that he never stops looking up at a high place to become a "human being".Here is a brief introduction to the content involving special value in various texts. Although there are few examples, you can also "see the leopard in the tube, and you can see it from time to time".

Thomas Mann wrote in the preface to an English edition of Hesse's collections: "I envy his sense of philosophical transcendence above all German politics" because "his spiritual homeland is specially assigned to the temple of Eastern wisdom. "; In the late 1960s, the United States set off the Hesse wave. In addition to opposing the Vietnam War and other political reasons, it was also inseparable from the admiration and propaganda of the American writer Henry Miller. Young people follow "Saint Hesse", just as Robert Junker described in the preface to Hesse's collection of essays "The Politics of Conscience" edited by Volker Michaels: "It is rare for an individual to break free from his own rank The American counterculture discovered Hesse and launched a movement that saw him as a pioneer, one that contemplated humanity through a millennium of transitions according to another goal, and recommended that people go to Experiment with a brand-new way of life. This is a fantasy and future politics that goes far beyond daily politics”; Canadian scholar George Wallace Field spoke highly of Hesse’s reception in Canada The pioneering work of Xia Ruichun, the first Chinese scholar who unearthed a large number of Chinese thoughts in Hesse's works: "This important achievement has given Hesse's works a new prospect, making it far beyond the trajectory of German Romanticism, and raising the Its tone and local limitations." German critic and publisher Siegfried Unselt wrote: "It is precisely because Hesse's works do not provide answers, do not list prescriptions, and precisely because they describe It is the development process that makes his works still have practical significance. Because his protagonists are always ready to set off to new areas of life, to conduct new explorations, and to achieve eternal new goals. Because even our current The society is also in a state of departure, and is still looking for new goals", "I hope this 'call of life' (in Chinese) will always be endless for you."

Hesse loved oriental culture all his life, especially the ancient Chinese thought. From 1911 until his death, Hesse never stopped discussing China for more than 50 years, just as he stated in an open letter to readers: "I strive To explore what is common to all beliefs and all human piety and good deeds. What is beyond all national differences, what can be believed and respected by all races and every individual.” is the ultimate goal of this kind of inquiry. An important work, the writer strives to melt the world's cultures in one furnace, in order to seek ways to integrate different cultures, among which the content related to China is the most, and the whole book is written about China from the beginning to the end. "Sages", "Lu's Old Autumn" and ancient Chinese music, etc., the text goes a step further, even planning himself to become a "Chinese elder", teaching Chinese, Chinese calligraphy and so on to the protagonist, and finally, even the peak of the glass bead game Positioned in the "China House Completion Celebration".However, Thomas Mann asked: "Can't you see that the spirit of world fraternity shown in his publisher and editor's work has a special German flavor?" Another German scholar Kirchhoff said To put it bluntly: "He has become a Chinese without ceasing to be a Westerner, well, even a Schwarzman."

Yes, it may not be too difficult to just count and list the more obvious Chinese things in the book. The translator has written several articles on this, but it is difficult to fully summarize the re-creation of the author after he has mastered different cultures. It is difficult, even if it is only to dissect the content related to China.The translator of this book is limited by his knowledge and ability. Although he has tried many times, he has not succeeded, so here he can only talk about his personal knowledge.One is the religious and passionate spiritual pursuit presented at the beginning of the book (title, dedication, aphorism) and the end of the book (the death of Knecht); the other is that Hesse uses his original "bipolar" perspective to describe the protagonist's life The concept of "communication and harmony" shown in the course.

The dedication and motto before the book closely echoes the death scene at the end of the book. "Death" is the practice of the spirit of the dedication: "He must prosper, and I must decay".The protagonist finally arrives at his destination: "the homeland and youth of the soul", "a step closer to the possibility of being and rebirth" as the saying goes.Hesse's religious spiritual pursuit expressed by "death" has caused countless misunderstandings. The author once gave a special reply to a friend: "A Platonic dream is not an eternal and effective ideal goal, but only A possibility of pitting oneself against the known world."

(See "Letter to Robert Fassi") This passage immediately reminds me of another similar passage, which is Martin Buber's argument in "On Taoism": "This eternal Tao is The negation of all representational existence, it is also called nothing. Birth is not the beginning, death is not the end, the existence of time and space is infinite and without end. Life and death are just the entrance and exit of "nothing sees its form is the gate of heaven", "nothing There is nothing in the door, and the sage hides it." It turns out that Plato, an ancient foreigner, and Zhuangzi, an ancient Chinese, had almost the same spiritual pursuit thousands of years ago, and what Hesse did was just like what he said about himself. As in the relationship between Schlegel and Novalis, the Romantic forebears: "My aim is not to improve the world or to advance ideas, but to carry forward what they seek." The protagonist of the novel was touched and inspired by the harmonious and perfect state of western classical music when he was a child. Since then, he has embarked on a road of seeking self-improvement. After the inner experience, the common central idea is found again and again in the relative concentration, so it is "awakened" again and again, embarking on a new stage, and finally facing death fearlessly for the growth of a new person.The ending of the novel is open, and the unity of opposites between teacher and student expresses Hesse's thought that opposites depend on each other. The Hesseian "bipolarity" viewpoint is an important basic element throughout the protagonist's life.We Chinese can see Hesse's point of view at a glance: "A correct and true truth must be allowed to be reversed. Whatever is true, its opposite must also be true. Because every truth stands at a certain extreme A fleeting observation of the world on earth, and where there is no pole there is an opposite pole” (from Chinese Taoist natural philosophy and Tai Chi imagery).The facts are not always the case. A former Soviet scholar, Karalesvili, believed: "The chain of life development formed by the mutual transformation of opposites is endless. This is Hesse's creed, which reflects Hegel's A basic idea of ​​the novel", and Hegel is also one of the pioneers admired by the protagonist of the novel.If it is said that Hegel's dialectical philosophy in the 19th century may have benefited somewhat from the ancient Chinese ideological works he had read, then another ancient German whom the protagonist admired very much since his youth, the early Christian monk Johann Albrecht T'Bengel (1687-1752) certainly did not read any Chinese books, but his view of synthesizing different ideas to make them complement each other seems to have similarities with the way of harmony of traditional Chinese culture.Hesse said through the mouth of the protagonist: "What Bengel is trying to achieve is not just the parallel research of various disciplines and fields, but to seek an organic relationship. He has set out to find a common denominator. And this is one of the most basic ideas of the glass bead game." Writing here, I can't help but think of a famous saying by Goethe: "There is nothing worth thinking about that has not been thought about; what we have to do is to try to rethink it. Just thinking." It is the product of Hesse's rethinking of the dreams of the ancients in the West and the East. He merged all kinds of seemingly opposite cultures into one mass, created the dreams of modern people, gave new life to old things, and made all kinds of people in the world Thoughts, especially ancient Chinese thoughts, have been continued and revived in contemporary Western culture, as if a magic bridge between East and West has been built.Undoubtedly, it is Hesse's special contribution to German literature, and even world literature. translator