#GermanLitMonth25 H. Hesse “The Glass Bead Game”

by Hermann Hesse

Finish date: 22.11.2025
Genre: SciFi utopian novel
Rating: A++++++
#GermanLitMonth25 – #ReadingTheNobels – #SciFiMonth2025

Good News: Hermann Hesse was truly a gifted writer and scholar. I am so impressed how he got all his theories and warnings on paper to shock the world and see the dangers of fascisim that were approaching.  Who is “our” Hesse in the 2020s? 

Bad News: Chapters are 1 hour in length (audio). I don’t know if I could keep reading the paperback version b/c my mind would wander. Why? Each chapter can be summed up in 3 sentences!
Where is the beauty in his book….where? My poor leisure-reading brain is suffering to this interminable, meandering mess of endless verbiage.

Good News: I managed 2 more chapters today. I have to push myself and keep up the reading momentum b/c without a fast moving plot….I fear my interest will diminish. I want to finish this book asap b/c after that I will start reading a biography about Hesse by Gunnar Decker. There must be a lot to learn about Hesse’s books….once I know more about the man.
Gunnar Decker

Good News: In chapter 9-10-11-12 I finally understand what Hesse is trying to say. He wrote it in neutral Switzerland in the 1930s…and was concerned with the rise of fascisim all around him. Hesse’s plea to leaders was NOT to isolate yourselves in thoughts and theories (…as did the scholars in Castilia, a utopian province in Europe created purely to preserve and study knowledge and play the “The Glass Bead Game” ) …but go out into the world of reality and confront the evils at your border!

Personal: If you decide to read this book be warned: Hesse’s challenging writing style may not agree with many reader’s tastes—especially for those expecting a more conventional plot-driven story. To put it bluntly…there is a lot of blah, blah, blah.  Chapters 1-8 are basically biography of the main character Joseph Knecht. Feel free to skim these pages….as long as you don’t give up on the book! Once you reach ch 9…the tone changes completely and is much more interesting.

Note: The book ends with 3 short stories by Hesse previously written (“Three Lives”). If you still have the energy after reading this complex novel…these stories await you! I did not have the energy…I was exhausted.
#NobelPrize 1946.

#Magnificent last chapter 12…2 hr on audiobook! — So glad I finally read Hermann Hesse…an exceptional thinker and writer.