Herman Hesse – Demian – Comment

 

Returning to a novel once read over fifty years ago is a delightful experience. We were a small group of students that many viewed as geeks and weirds. We loved reading and discussing the works of Herman Hesse. Certainly not surprising reading Demian so many years later, that it reads as a brand-new book. Nationally Herman Hesse was all the rage in the seventies. Five decades later, I believe the reasons for his new-found popularity during this decade are clear: we were the remnants of the sixties, experimenting with music and drugs, searching for spiritual meaning during a time of doubt and war. Hesse’s work gave us meaning, and a place in a chaotic world.  

 Our narrator is Sinclair describing his youth and his journey from the innocence and purity of a safe and religious family life into the “other” existence of cruel reality. This spiritual journey takes him to adulthood. Where early on we meet Demian. 

 At the age of ten, wanting to make an impression on his classmates, he concocts a story about stealing apples from a local orchid. The bully of the village calls him out, telling young Sinclair that he knows the owner of the apple farm, and is offering two marks for any information on the thieves. This blackmail is severe enough where the young lad turns his back on his values, stealing and lying, making his life unbearable. The blackmail goes on for some months until a new student (Demian) arrives in the school, befriends Sinclair, manages to stop the blackmail, and reveals a whole new view of the world.  

 Demian tells Sinclair a different interpretation of the Cain and Abel story in the Old Testament. In short, Cain acting on his instincts and being totally himself, killing his brother is an act of being truly human. God marks Cain as the human that stands apart from the herd. Cain is the hero of the story for he is the clan of true knowledge, knowledge of the self. Sinclair is upset about this interpretation, though it seems to resonate because of his awareness of the ‘other’ world reality.  

 All of Hesse’s books are an inward journey towards an understanding of the interior self – the true self, the higher self. Interestingly, Hesse was a patient of Carl Jung for some time. In the case of the novel, the Socratic adage “know thy self” and the interpretation of dreams to comprehend the unconscious is paramount in the tale. The striving for absolute ‘authenticity’ as an individual is one of the goals of this path. One can argue that both these goals are the foundation of western philosophy.  

 Throughout the story, the experiences of Sinclair and his discussions with Demian, truly echo of Gnosticism. The notion of Abraxis, the female god that encompasses good and evil. Sinclair’s musing also takes him to the terrain of the Gnostic Sophia, the archetype of Wisdom. This is exemplified in Frau Eve, Demian's mother, who really is at the center of Sinclair’s realizations of Self and worldly existence.  

 Though a translation of the original German, Hesse’s poetic prose shines in the text. It is always an immense pleasure to read a novella of this certain beauty and spirituality.  

 Demian is even more magical and spiritually visceral after fifty years.