Best Hermann Hesse Quotes
Hermann Hesse Quotes About Life, Love, Demian, Nature, Tress & Happiness! Hermann Hesse was a well-known painter, author, and poet of German descent. He was born in Germany on July 2, 1877. From Goppingen, he went on to study at Maulbronn Abbey’s Evangelical Theological Seminary. In 1892, he enrolled in the Cannstatt Gymnasium and graduated in 1893 with a diploma from the One Year Examination.
In 1896, the poem titled “Madonna” by Hesse was printed in the Viennese journal. The same year, in the fall, his first collection of poems, titled “Romantic Songs,” was published for the first time. His breakthrough novel, ‘Peter Camenzind,’ was released in 1904 and gained acclaim. In 1906, he published ‘Beneath the Wheel,’ his second novel. Another of his stories, titled ‘Gertrude,’ was released in 1910.
His work ‘Steppenwolf,’ which represented the terrible crisis in Hesse’s spiritual universe in the 1920s, was a worldwide triumph. ‘Siddhartha’ was a novel about a man named Siddhartha’s path toward spiritual awakening. The novel pushed Hesse to international acclaim and made him an overnight sensation. It has been translated into some languages. His most recent book, ‘The Glass Bead Game,’ was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature because it depicts the complexities of contemporary life.
After the publication of his final major novel, ‘The Glass Bead Game,’ he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1946. On August 9, 1962, he passed away. Romantic nostalgia was prevalent in his ideas and works, and writings, which portrayed the spiritual turmoil that he felt was becoming more commonplace in the modern-day due to a loss of connection with one’s inner self.
Best Hermann Hesse Quotes
1. “Some of us think holding on makes us strong; but sometimes it is letting go.” – Hermann Hesse
2. “Words do not express thoughts very well. They always become a little different immediately after they are expressed, a little distorted, a little foolish.” – Hermann Hesse
3. “It is not our purpose to become each other; it is to recognize each other, to learn to see the other and honor him for what he is.” – Hermann Hesse
4. “What could I say to you that would be of value, except that perhaps you seek too much, that as a result of your seeking you cannot find.” – Hermann Hesse
5. “I have always believed, and I still believe, that whatever good or bad fortune may come our way we can always give it meaning and transform it into something of value.” – Hermann Hesse
6. “Learn what is to be taken seriously and laugh at the rest.” – Hermann Hesse
7. “If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is part of yourself. What isn’t part of ourselves doesn’t disturb us.” – Hermann Hesse
8. “There is no reality except the one contained within us. That is why so many people live such an unreal life. They take the images outside of them for reality and never allow the world within to assert itself.” – Hermann Hesse
9. “Gaze into the fire, into the clouds, and as soon as the inner voices begin to speak… surrender to them. Don’t ask first whether it’s permitted, or would please your teachers or father or some god. You will ruin yourself if you do that.” – Hermann Hesse
10. “I have always been a great dreamer. In dreams I have always been more active than in my real life, and these shadows sapped me of my health and energy.” – Hermann Hesse
11. “Oh, love isn’t there to make us happy. I believe it exists to show us how much we can endure.” – Hermann Hesse
12. “But it matters little that you suffer, so long as you feel alive with a sense of the close bond that connects all living things, so long as love does not die!” – Hermann Hesse
13. “If what matters in a person’s existence is to accept the inevitable consciously, to taste the good and bad to the full and to make for oneself a more individual, unaccidental and inward destiny alongside one’s external fate, then my life has been neither empty nor worthless.” – Hermann Hesse
14. “All suicides have the responsibility of fighting against the temptation of suicide. Every one of them knows very well in some corner of his soul that suicide, though a way out, is rather a mean and shabby one, and that it is nobler and finer to be conquered by life than to fall by one’s own hand.” – Hermann Hesse
15. “In each individual the spirit is made flesh, in each one the whole of creation suffers, in each one a Savior is crucified.” – Hermann Hesse
16. “The mind is international and supra-national … it ought to serve not war and annihilation, but peace and reconciliation.” – Hermann Hesse
17. “The only reality is the one we have inside us. What makes most people’s lives so artificial and unworthy is that they falsely regard outside images as reality and they never allow their own inner world to speak.” – Hermann Hesse
18. “Our mind is capable of passing beyond the dividing line we have drawn for it. Beyond the pairs of opposites of which the world consists, other, new insights begin.” – Hermann Hesse
19. “I wanted only to try to live in accord with the promptings which came from my true self. Why was that so very difficult?” – Hermann Hesse
20. “My real self wanders elsewhere, far away, wanders on and on invisibly and has nothing to do with my life.” – Hermann Hesse
21. “What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday and our present thoughts build our life tomorrow. Our life is the creation of our mind.” – Hermann Hesse
22. “Without words, without writing and without books there would be no history, there could be no concept of humanity.” – Hermann Hesse
23. “People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest.” – Hermann Hesse
24. “Everything becomes a little different as soon as it is spoken out loud.” – Hermann Hesse
25. “You are only afraid if you are not in harmony with yourself. People are afraid because they have never owned up to themselves.” – Hermann Hesse
26. “Happiness is a how, not a what: a talent, not an object.” – Hermann Hesse
27. “One never reaches home, but wherever friendly paths intersect the whole world looks like home for a time.” – Hermann Hesse
28. “You have to try the impossible to achieve the possible.” – Hermann Hesse
29. “Within you, there is a stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at any time and be yourself.” – Hermann Hesse
30. “But it’s a poor fellow who can’t take his pleasure without asking other people’s permission.” – Hermann Hesse
