This is a kids book. Just one step further than something like

>>9654494
>I am so disappointed in you /lit/ that I see this discussed here so often.

Outside of high schoolers and crossposters---which admittedly make up a large percentage of this board---it isn't really, and that's primarily because the rest of the board share your assessment of the book. Hesse's other works, like Steppenwolf or Narcissus and Goldmund, are the well-liked ones on here.

>>9654494
>implying high school girls read out of their own volition in current year

>>9654494
I had to read Siddartha in my first year of college. Was this """American education""" at work?

>>9654500
Yes. I am glad I didn't start with Siddhartha because maybe then I would have been put off so much that I wouldn't have given his other better work a read.

>>9654494
What are you on about retard? Siddhartha has easily the best prose I've ever found in a book, everything flows in a rythm and is very poetic. Tell me one single book that has better prose. Spoiler: you cant

>>9654735
which translation did you read

That's a natural reaction, but go back to in a few years and you will find that it's much deeper than you think

>>9654494
Agreed. It's not even interesting like a mythological fantasy. Just crapload of sentimental mysticism.

>>9654500
Glass Bead also of c

I recently read it and really enjoyed it. I picked up your pic's edition for 50 cents and read it in a day. Maybe you hate eastern thought in general man.

"Wisdom cannot be imparted. Wisdom that a wise man attempts to impart always sounds like foolishness to someone else ... Knowledge can be communicated, but not wisdom. One can find it, live it, do wonders through it, but one cannot communicate and teach it."

What's a good book to go to after Siddartha?

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HERMAN HESSE IS THE POOR MAN'S THOMAS MANN.

THERE I'VE SAID

>>9654785
HERMANN IS THE POOR MANN'S THOMAS

>>9654777
Steppenwolf
>and nice digits

>>9654777
Eastern Thought is fucking lame

> tfw can't prevent your cherished son from making the same mistakes you did

>>9654785
>OUT
>KEEP

>>9654500
ANy time someone mentions Buddhism some retard comes in and says something like "I read Siddhartha and it helped me see the beauty in the Buddha's teachings" and then gets mad when you tell them that the book isn't even about that fucking Siddhartha.

>>9654839
right to left, anon-kun

>>9654879
>translating but preserving flipped word order
bizarre

>>9654757
This, you wont recognize even half of what the book touches on unless you're actively engaged in some meditative practice.

>>9654494
I actually took my copy out of my shelf to give you some undeniably godlike quote, but I ended up finishing the entire chapter I randomly opened, enjoying every sentence. I seriously hope translations don't fuck his prose up somehow, but spontaneously, I wouldnt see much problems except for gimmicks like
"Mit verzerrtem Gesichte starrte er ins Wasser,
sah sein Gesicht gespiegelt und spie danach"
either way, your opinion is shit/bait imo

>>9654981
Ich habs auch auf Deutsch gelesen, Wichskind.

Prose while unique for his time to even be used still nothing truly exceptional.

>>9655003
please give examples of other works making it look not exceptional so we have a chance of understanting your point

>>9655006
not lui but Epic of Gilgamesh perhaps.

>>9654804
Thanks I'll pick that up.

>>9654807
Then don't read books about it if you're just going to hate it.

>>9654494
it's just a homosexual romp that has no climax. really disappointing that ol' sid never got that blowie.

>>9654841
I actually thought the book was about THAT Siddartha until I started reading. I think the very gentle critique of Buddha was brilliant.

>>9654785
Reccommend me a book of his.

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>>9655117
>it's just a homosexual romp that has no climax
you're retarded

>>9654800
> NOT "HERMANN!? HES(i)S THE POOR MANN'S THOMAS!"

YOU HAD ONE JOB

>>9656337
you guys are so fucking plebbit

>>9655305
quit whining, fagmo

>>9654494
You're on point, I completely agree. Narcissus and Goldmund is actually good, I'm glad I didn't give up on Hesse and gave that book a try.

>>9655142
Yeah, it's very cool in that respect although the critique, in my eyes, isn't so much of a critique as a statement on the limitations of any philosophy/way of life that is transmitted by words (all of them). If I understood Hesse properly, he's saying that the Buddha and Siddartha reached the same enlightenment consisting of the same principles through a way unique to the self that each is. Buddhist philosophy does teach a road to enlightenment and tenants of enlightenment, but they are using terms deriving from the Buddha's self. His road is not the same as everyone's. But for most people, it doesn't matter. They're, for lack of a better word, followers. Siddartha was too clever, independent thinking to follow the path of another. He had to find it himself, although the destination was the same. The followers of Buddhism will never reach enlightenment like Buddha did, but they'll be able to come variably close and live a far more fulfilling life than they would without his teachings.

>>9656416
sounds meh.

>>9656416
Fairman reached enlightment as well.

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You fucking rubes.

The main lesson of this book isn't some vacuous "find enlightenment" bullshit. It's about how if a tree is the stretch towards heaven, its roots must reach down to hell. You can't teach someone wisdom because it's both an understanding of good wmd evil, not just some purely positive font of clarity.

Brilliant prose with a very human lesson to be learned.

The book will become a lot deeper to anyone who is actually following a path of initiation, be it through the western mystery teachings, eastern mysticism, or anything else (the meditative experiences are what matters).

>>9657504
>Brilliant prose with a very human lesson to be learned.
Unless you are reading a pretencious translation I can't understand how you would say this.
Read in german and while interesting and different was nothing great and once you got past the first impressions it was really rather bland.

>>9657504
>It's about how if a tree is the stretch towards heaven, its roots must reach down to hell.
Wow, man, that's, like, some deep shit, yo.

>>9654494
>I am so disappointed in you /lit/ that I see this discussed here so often.

you should go the nearest river and do a little Om, my friend

>>9658802
Its a quote from Jung, seen it before in reference to the Kabbalah.

>>9659052
Why aren't Jung and Freud discussed here more often.
Psychologie also seems like a pretentious field that lit would love to talk about imo.

>>9654494
There's a difference between a kid's book and being written so even kids may take something from it.

>>9654494
It's entry level for a reason
Serviceable, a good place to start, some english translations have a good balance between prose and conveying meaning
It's not pushing any literature movements, it's just a good book motherfucker

>>9654494
I was going to make a Hesse thread today. I'm disappointed to see such a negative thread. Sounds like you need some help finding yourself desu ;)

>>9659292

Pretentious how?

>>9659403
>Sounds like you need some help finding yourself desu
I like his other work, Sidhartha is shit compared to them though.
>;)
I have a feeling you are the same faggot going around using these :^)

>>9654494
All eastern philosophy sucks ass. It all just boils down to 'empty yourself of desires and you will find happiness'
Well yeah, no shit. What else ya got?

>>9659412
Well, I guess I agree that Sidhartha is slightly worse than his others, but not by much. It was his first book I read and I liked it enough to read all his other stuff at least.

>>9659419
>What else ya got?
Now put it into practice. Oh, you don't have the willpower? That explains it.

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>>9659419
>being this pleb
>what is The Art Of War
>implying you can't just strawman the fuck out of western philosophy, or indeed, any philosophy, by reducing it like that

>>9659419
>hi I'm twelve

>>9657504
this is the only quality post in this thread

cbfh gh sae466irai6rz47o

>>9660044
Nick Land pls

>>9655142
>Reccommend me a book of his

Magic Mountain obviously

>>9654841
Sounds like a dumb, pointless strawman to me

>>9654735
Is this only in the German? Or is there a really good translation?

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>>9657504
What translation did you read exactly? While I enjoyed the book a lot I found the prose to be pretty awful. i read the translation in the OP

>>9654494
My mom made my dad throw out his copy because she thought evil spirits were attached to it. He complied because he was trying to piece together the tatters of his marriage. I remembered the scene my mom made when she used Siddhartha as a pawn to blame my dad for being a bad influence in the house and checked out a copy from my high school's library. The book made more sense than most of the Bible to me, but I didn't give the Bible up. I just kind of appreciated both for a long while, but Siddhartha was the first novel that helped me consider the world of meaningful human experience outside of American Christianity, and I appreciate it for that. Maybe it's a little simplistic, but I suspect it stands up well. My only suspicion is that actual Buddhist texts might be more compelling, but this novel is a great adaptation for western sensibilities, and if its audience skews young, so be it. It was one of the most worthwhile reads of my life.

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>>9661740
Quality post I agree with you wholeheartedly. The book really helped me understand Buddhism in a way I didn't before and definitely made me consider some things about myself I may have not realized without reading it. I honestly don't understand the hate it's getting from this board as I thought it was "patrician" whatever that means. I think you're right on target by saying it skews young too but that's really its entire appeal to me; it's really accessible.The prose is super easy and the plot isn't as complex as many other books but this means it can be presented to pretty much anyone. And I think really the fact that it is so accessible is great because it speaks for issues which pretty much anyone can experience.

>>9654777
I like a lot of buddhist (roughly speaking) literature, but I didn't like Siddharta at all.
And that quote seems really lame, like something a high school kid might consider deep. I'm still not sure if your post is bait or not.

>>9654777
The wisdom of insecurity by Allan Watts

>>9661729
lol that fuckin pic
>>9661950
anything by Watts is playfully enlightening

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>>9654740
>translation

Is the Dover Thrift edition a good translation? I like it alright, but the prose isn't all that special. I get more out of reading the Bhagavad Gita, honestly.

We aren't reading it for philosophy

>>9654740
Hesse wrote in English you know

>>9654896
it's not a translation, it's the original image

>>9654757
This guy knows what's up. Siddharta is a book for people who are trying to rediscover what was lost.

>>9654981
Translate german parts

>>9663453
>With a torn face he stared into the water,
>saw his face mirrored and spat at it.

I don't know if torn face makes sense but "torn facial expression is better"

>>9663467
Uhm... ok. Thank you!

>>9663484
isn't that what you asked for?

>>9663487
Yes, it just doesn't seem a great quote, but thank none the less for the translation

>>9662716
He did some other books, but not Siddharta.

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>>9654494
>it's less than 500 pages, so that means its bad
>it uses a vocabulary that was actually very high considering the literacy rate back then, so that means i'm too good for it
>it covers eastern thought which my circle jerk academia philosophy/lit degree didn't cover because it subverts decades/centuries of my college's curriculum, or at least it feels like it because despite not examining it beyond an unclicked google search headline, i've already decided that i'm above it
>it's easily accessible to many people, so that automatically means it is bad
>the life lessons are easy to understand and relate to a lot of people, so I wouldn't look smart to the few friends I have by talking about it
>during the sex scene I pictured Kamala to look like Mia Khalifa, who doesn't do anal so I immediately had a negative association with this Kamala character
>i have made it very clear that i feel like this fairly surface level world famous work of art is below me, yet I'll unironically refer to it as "pretentious"

I hope for your own sake that you're trolling, because otherwise you are a colossal fucking faggot.

>>9661711
How is that a fucking strawman? It's a serious objection: reading this book will not make you an expert on Buddhism for all kinds of reasons, and one of them is that it isn't a book about fucking Buddhism, the main character isn't the fucking Buddha, and he explicitly does the opposite of what the actual fucking Buddha-character in the book says. God damn it, you people are fucking stupid.
I read the fucking book and I enjoyed it plenty, just like I enjoyed Dharma Bums. I also have the self-awareness to know that this doesn't make me the fucking Buddha or a great meditator. Jesus fucking Christ, I hope you're just a troll.
I'm not saying it's a bad book, I'm saying that a lot of Western 'Buddhists' are fucking retarded and can't tell the difference between a book by a German novelist-cum-Orientalist who shares the name of the Buddha and an account of the life of the Buddha by a Buddhist scholar. Fuck off and kill yourself.

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>>9654804
>>9654500
>Steppenwolf

I was all in on the self-analytical and depressive stuff but halfway or three quarters of the way through it became the weirdest fucking shit about dancing to jazz with a fucking tranny.

God fucking damn that shit threw me.

>>9663519
in the german version, hesse plays with the similarity of
'ver/zerr/tem (distorted)' - '/starr/te (gazed)'
in the first and
'ge/spie/gelt (mirrored)' - '/spie/ (spewed)'
in the second line, which was one of the rare occasions where i could imagine the original prose might lose something of its appeal.

>>9659407
For some reason most of 4chan hates psychology nowadays.

>>9663782
Mia does anal you pseudo

>>9665587
Isn't Dosto /lit/'s favorite author tho?

>>9665446
Well I'm just at the anarchist club now and can see that happening the protag seems to have no spine for people who he sees as having life figured out.

>>9666211
why would you read spoilers to a novel you are currently reading?

>>9665587
Because most of 4chan has no idea what is good and bad in the world.

>>9661717
Noy the same Anon but I read it in Spanish and the prose was powerful.

>>9663782
this guy knows whats up

>>9654494
Why are you shitting on Treasure Island? It's a masterwork.

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>>9668793

>>9654841
The real Siddhartha (Gautama) is a character in the book... Protagonist Siddhartha illustrates the concept of the Bodhisattva.

I don't think most people here read the book. And if they did they weren't paying attention.

>>9658727
"Du wirst müde werden, Siddhartha."
"Ich werde müde werden."
"Du wirst einschlafen, Siddhartha."
"Ich werde nicht einschlafen."
"Du wirst sterben, Siddhartha."
"Ich werde sterben."

You'd have to be a pleb of the highest order to not see how good this prose is, that's a fact. Come back in five years and chuckle over your ignorant younger self.