Alone with our thoughts
August 31st 2009 00:33
Hermann Hesse
The hero of Herman Hesse's The Glass Bead Game, which won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946, is Joseph Knecht, the brilliant young teacher and leader. The main themes of the book — conflicts between looking within and without, between elitism and secularism, between the need to concentrate on research and the need to teach the lessons of that research — are built around the character of Knecht.
The second great character in the book for me is the man Knecht succeeded in the role as Master of the Glass Bead Game, a man grown old when the book begins and who, during the journey of the story, retires from teaching and from the world. Slowly, he retires within himself, and the end of the novel sees him as a beatific presence, sitting contentedly in the sunshine outside his cottage, apparently welcoming the presence of visitors but no longer saying anything to anyone.
Through this example Hesse appears to have provided his own subtle answer to the questions which so vexed Joseph Knecht, and which become more valid as the world gets smaller and closer through the conforming influences of technology, trade and intellectual suasion.
In the several decades since I first read this wonderful book, I have constantly thought of the old man sitting in the sunshine, listening to the birds and conversing with no-one except himself. Has he found all the answers? Or has he discovered a blissful reality where it is no longer imperative for questions to have answers?
In a hustled and bustled world, it seems odd to live only with your own thoughts, but the older I get, the more natural it seems.
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The scary thing is that I had forgotten what it was like when I was young.
Anyway, I'm glad we have been us sorted this out. In summary, the world is can be viewed on three levels: there is the young person's way of seeing things, the old person's way of seeing things, and Norm's way of seeing things.
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