The Journey to the East (1932)

Promising start and as with Hesse's other works, some great prose. The reveal works dramatically as well as literally, but I can't say the end satisfied me. Yes it may be the inevitable conclusion, but it was a bit thick, i feel, hence 3 stars rather than the 4 that JttE was heading towards.

At just 93 short pages (in my edition), it is worth re4ading if you have liked any of Hesse's other books, and if you haven't, it's a good primer. ( )

Hesse is usually one of my favored writers, but this one left me cold and unimpressed. I went through it quickly, having felt that the other books told his ideas better. It's not a bad book, though. ( )

Found the original receipt from when I bought this in the book when I took it off the shelf for something to read on a long plane ride. Bought it back in the summer of 2000! 8 years between purchase and read.What a beautiful book. A short metaphor for youth and idealism turning to disillusion turning to wisdom. Just beautiful. Hesse has always been one of my favorites, and now it is cemented. Will re-read this again soon. ( )

Hermann Hesse is interesting as a person. He battled inner demons: like his father he suffered from depression, apparently as early as the first grade (!), and attempted suicide as a teen. He had unhappy marriages and of his wives had a psychotic breakdown. On the other hand, he searched for a higher truth and explored Buddhism and Hinduism, undoubtedly influenced by his parents having served in a missionary in India, and was well ahead of his time in embracing Eastern philosophy.

And this is what “Journey to the East” references. The narrator “H.H.” is a member of a League of famous historical characters who go on a pilgrimage to the East in search of truth. Along the way a character who seems to be simply a servant disappears, causing the entire expedition to break down. As it turns out later, the servant is actually President of the League and his disappearance was a test of the others’ faith.

A somewhat mediocre story and just this quote, on history:
“I imagine that every historian is similarly affected when he begins to record the events of some period and wishes to portray them sincerely. Where is the center of events, the common standpoint around which they revolve and which gives them cohesion? In order that something like cohesion, something like causality, that some kind of meaning might ensue and that it can in some way be narrated, the historian must invent units, a hero, a nation, an idea, and he must allow to happen to this invented unit what has in reality happened to the nameless.
It is so difficult to relate connectedly a number of events which have really taken place and have been attested, it is in my case much more difficult, for everything becomes questionable as soon as I consider it closely, everything slips away and dissolves, just as our community, the strongest in the world, has been able to dissolve. There is no unit, no center, no point around which the wheel revolves.
…
And now that I want to hold fast to and describe this most important thing, or at least something of it, everything is only a mass of separate fragmentary pictures which has been reflected in something, and this something is myself, and this self, this mirror, whenever I have gazed into it, has proved to be nothing but the uppermost surface of a glass plane.” ( )

Substance: Almost non-existent. A man on a mysterious journey with a secret League fails to recognize that a popular servant of his group is actually the President (more like the High King). Possibly a Christian allegory, but just as easily Pagan.
Style: Sophomoric philosophical rambling with a supposed core of wisdom, but basically a boring monologue of pretentious simplicity. Akin to the sort of New Age mysticism of the Seventies. CSM blurb says it "resembles Kafka", which is true. ( )