Soul of the Age

by Hermann Hesse

  Unfortunately, I have to say goodbye tomorrow to Thomas, his wife, and Erika. They’re continuing on their travels. But we have seen each other often up here in the Engadine and have deepened our friendship and the “faith” you were asking about.

  The scene at our comfortable Grand Hotel is the familiar one at such places: an elite group of rich, well-dressed, and moderately polite guests, comprising different nationalities, who are busy recuperating, eating well, displaying their attire, and, within certain bounds, allowing themselves to feel edified by the alpine splendor. There is no problem with the youngsters, who look like the usual American type: good, nice-looking boys, very knowledgeable about sports, which they follow keenly, generally unintellectual, unless appearances are misleading.

  But the older and elderly people, up to seventy-five, either seem entirely unaffected by the state of the world and the new horrors on the horizon or are utterly determined to close their eyes and ears to it. They can be seen dancing three times a week in the bar, where in any case they spend each evening consuming expensive drinks in large quantities. They dance until midnight, until two o’clock. One sees seventy-year-olds with impressive snow-white heads dancing and drinking for many hours on end. At a late hour, after the pianist has slipped away, an elderly person sits down at the piano, and one of the ladies takes over the percussion instruments. All this cheerful humming and buzzing would be delightful if these people were young or if some exceptional occasion were being celebrated. But these actually rather innocent orgies of the upper orders occur as regularly as eating and sleeping. It’s certainly none of my business. I have no wish to begin preaching about morals, but at times, after having been taken up all day with letters from Germany exuding anxiety and lamentation, or when I have been thinking somewhat more intently than usual about the stories in the newspapers, the ghostly nature of this artificially induced upper-class good cheer leaves me feeling shocked and constrained, and I ask myself whether many of them really understand the bitter state of affairs, for which they are partly responsible, and the fragility of the floor on which they are dancing.

  But I have digressed, and am tired and rather sad. Goodbye, old friend, my regards

  TO TRAUGOTT VOGEL

  October 22, 1950

  I would like to say a quick thank-you and add that my first impression of Der Bogen420 is very favorable. I’m particularly pleased that you have also included Walser.421 His fatherland let him down on every count: it failed to recognize his great talent for language, showed no understanding of his idiosyncratic work and life, and never even gave him the crumbs it doles out to every pensioned ape of a state official. I hope you can get some more Walser for Der Bogen. In any case, it will prove difficult to keep up the standard once the dilettantes and ambitious incompetents begin showing up in droves.

  As for Mühlestein,422 I’m sure you’ll take into account that it was not he but Michelangelo who wrote those extraordinary, anguished poems.

  TO THOMAS MANN

  Montagnola, November 8, 1950

  The mail hasn’t been very pleasant of late. Even my tame, cautiously written article on the fear of war has reawakened the anger and hostility against me in Germany. Still, that caution has enabled me to smuggle the article into the National-Zeitung and the Munich Neue Zeitung as well. They both treated the piece as a feuilleton, and failed to detect the smidgeon of political spice in it. On the other hand, somebody in America growled right away at the Neue Zeitung, which, a few days later, printed a sad and rather shabby reply. But that doesn’t matter; a lot of people saw the article, and many of them got the point.

  And now—amidst this idiotic daily mail—a letter arrives from you, a fine, really delightful letter, which also bears the glad tidings that you have completed Gregorius.423 That is a joyous event, and although you may miss your daily conversations with Gregorius, we congratulate you heartily nonetheless, and look forward to the reappearance of this fabled, legendary creature. A great many people will welcome it. Most readers will be astute enough to appreciate the ironies in this magnificent work, but I’m not so sure they will all recognize the hidden seriousness and piety that lend those ironies such sublime good cheer.

  The only troubling thing in your letter was the news about Frau Erika. Your diagnosis is correct, and I can easily imagine how frustrating it must be in such a deadening atmosphere for so richly talented and energetic a person. I received a lovely letter recently from your daughter; my friendship with her is one of the few good, pure experiences to have come my way in the course of this strange year.424

  We have been very busy; otherwise I would have written to you long ago. And we intend to go to Baden again a week from now. There are other attractions aside from the baths: the Zurich library for Ninon, and some friends close by for both of us. Martin Buber will be in Switzerland by then, and will no doubt visit me in Baden.425

  We shall hold a day of rejoicing when Gregorius arrives in his handsome binding, and I hope we get to see each other before long.

  We’re thinking of you three and wish you all the best.

  TO THE CITY OF BRUNSWICK

  November 1950

  As you know, I felt the award of the Wilhelm Raabe Prize was not just an honor but also a joyous and touching occasion, because of my fond and long-lasting ties to the city of Wilhelm Raabe, where the estimable Ricarda Huch was born, as well as to Raabe himself.

  All of this comes alive again as I contemplate the beautiful honorary scroll, with its splendid Brunswick lion. As a half-Swiss southern German, I have always regarded Lower Saxony as my favorite region in northern Germany, in terms of both the people and the culture. And within that region my favorite city was Brunswick; I also loved Wilhelm Raabe and regarded him as the bearer and representative of those traditions.

  So, for me the echo that my old love has evoked in your venerable city counts among the most valuable experiences life has to offer: the discovery that the love and honor we accord intellectual, suprapersonal values are not lost in a void, never go unanswered, but are reflected back to us.

  I wish to convey my gratitude and heartfelt wishes to the city of Brunswick. After the terrible events it has endured, may it be granted a period of peaceful and productive work.

  TO KARL VOTTELER

  [Baden, December 17, 1950]

  Thanks for your letter. I’m almost completely in agreement with you. I’m also well aware of what has happened to the cultural scene and even life itself in the communist countries. I not only get letters from several hundred people in the East, but have put up a series of émigrés or refugees from Eastern countries in my house, including my wife’s sisters, who had endured the bitter terror of Hitler, Antonescu, and the Russians in Romania and stayed here for a year as my guests, after we had finally succeeded in getting them released.

  Naturally enough, my article on the fear of war was exploited by the Eastern press; they picked out two or three sentences and praised me, to the beat of a tom-tom, for espousing the Soviets. One has to swallow that sort of thing, without taking it all that seriously.

  In the twenties I wrote a political statement in verse, which remained incomplete. It began:

  Better to be killed by the fascists

  Than be a fascist oneself.

  Better to be killed by the

  Communists

  Than be a communist oneself …426

  I’m still of that opinion.

  I wasn’t able to comment in public on the shameless treatment to which I have been subjected by the Eastern press. The East would not have allowed a single word of protest to be aired, let alone printed; the Western press isn’t exactly renowned for its tact and fidelity to the truth.

  Another matter: I would ask you not to send me your text on Bach. I haven’t been able to read any personal material for years, since my daily mail would tax a healthy young person.

  TO MARCEL OCHSENBEIN

  [End of 1950]

  Thanks for your letter, which I enjoyed.
>
  I cannot write you a long letter. I’m old, have too much to do each day; my fingers are crippled with gout, they’re reluctant to tackle the burdensome chore that writing has become for me.

  In reply to your question: As a young man I would definitely not have wanted any religious ceremony or secular ratification; I would have felt that the question of marriage ought to be a matter of individual conscience. But over the years I have noticed that not everybody has a conscience (or willingness to make use of it). And living together affects not just the lovers but also those who suffer from their mistakes and sins. In some cases, the children who arrive need better protection than that afforded by the consciences of their progenitors. I now realize it’s better not to leave the issue of marriage or separation entirely up to the whim of the particular couple.

  I’m enclosing a few trifles to amuse you in the sanatorium.

  TO A STUDENT

  who has read Beneath the Wheel and occasionally has suicidal thoughts

  January 1951

  Thanks for your letter; I was as taken with the cheerful, literary part as with the more serious thoughts. I first sent you a printed letter pertaining to your problem, just so as not to keep you waiting, and should now like to respond as personally as I can.

  You have two questions. First of all: “What should we do?” I have no answer to that. I have been a defender of individuality and personality all my life, and don’t believe in the existence of general laws that would be of any use to the individual. On the contrary, laws and prescriptions were created not for individuals, but for the many, the herds, peoples, and collectives. For real personalities, life is certainly tougher, but it is also more beautiful. Personalities like that cannot bask in the shelter of the herd, but take pleasure in their own imaginations; if they survive their adolescent years, they have to shoulder a great deal of responsibility.

  Your second question: “How come I never hanged myself as a seminarian, even though I sometimes longed to do so.” I cannot explain my inactivity; although I had many reasons for going ahead, my throat simply balked at the rope. Unbeknownst to me, my inner will to live was stronger than my will to die. Even though I felt hemmed in and tormented at boarding school and thought my future looked very doubtful, I was endowed with senses and a soul, was capable of seeing, tasting, and feeling the sheer beauty and delight of all things, of the stars and the seasons, the first green in spring, the first golds and reds in the fall, the taste of an apple, the thought of beautiful girls. Moreover, I wasn’t just a sensuous being, I was also an artist. I could reproduce in my memory the pictures and experiences made available to me by life, could play around with them and attempt to turn them into something new of my own by drawing sketches, humming melodies, writing poems. That artistic joy and curiosity may have been responsible for my choice of life over death.

  That was my particular case. I’m not sure whether yours is identical, or even similar. I don’t know you and can only hope that your soul also harbors talents and forces that will come to your aid.

  As for hanging oneself, the author of that book about transitoriness and vanity didn’t avail himself of that option, but found so much delight and secret joy in discerning and describing the fragility of the phenomenal world that he was able to go on living and writing. He was no longer a youth, and by the time he wrote the book, he had already thought rationally about the idea of suicide, emptied it of its sentimental content, and told himself dispassionately that suicide would always remain an option for him and everybody else. He could always wait and see whether a rope around his neck would ever seem more appealing than the life ahead of him.

  TO ERIKA MANN

  May 1951

  Because of my gout—quella puttana maledetta,427 as an old neighbor once called it—I can only use something like two and a half to three fingers, so this scrawl will just have to suffice.

  I was glad to get your nice letter, but disturbed by the bad tidings, especially concerning you and your condition.428 As for the other atmospheric ills affecting your entire household, although I would give up a lot to see them taken care of, they aren’t exactly unexpected, and are offset, to some extent, by the reception now being accorded The Holy Sinner. The delighted praise one hears from German readers often sounds like a belated form of compensation for earlier iniquities. We had quite a feast here while Ninon was reading the book to me in the evening; those three pairs of ears in your household must have been buzzing.

  Our friend Suhrkamp was here for a week recently, partly to recuperate, partly for some necessary discussions. We talked fondly about your book of reminiscences in memory of Klaus.429

  Otherwise we have been leading a quiet life, often feeling somewhat depressed. My increasing ricketiness and never-ending pains aren’t exactly making me any more pleasant, but we both still greatly enjoy reading, listening to music. And we had a festive occasion recently: Our friend Adolf Busch, traveling to Rome with his quartet, interrupted his journey in Lugano, brought the group here, and spent two hours performing quartets by Mozart and Beethoven.

  We have visitors again. The wife of our house patron430 is here for a week’s rest; she is Ninon’s best friend, and also a friend of mine, since the days when she was the most beautiful girl in Zurich. Her husband is the patron who had the house in Montagnola built for us.

  The response to my article last fall on war psychosis was exactly as you suspected. Some touching responses from people who agreed with me, but they were far outnumbered by the letters of denunciation. That kind of thing hardly affects me anymore, but I am a little hurt by what is happening to the “Glass Bead Game,” once my nice, exclusive little property. The extreme nationalists in West Germany are employing it as a term of abuse in their pamphlets and announcements. But this is just something else to be endured and forgotten.

  My book of letters, which should have appeared around Easter, is coming out late through my own fault, but it will be here by early summer and a copy will also reach you in Pacific Palisades.

  TO OSKAR JANCKE

  Montagnola, early June 1951

  I’m distressed that you have once again placed me in the unpleasant position of having to decline an invitation.431 I have already informed you in some detail about my attitude toward the Academy. That shall have to suffice.

  Meanwhile, another matter has underlined my reservations about the Academy.

  A few months ago, after I was awarded the Raabe Prize, the journal of the Academy published a protest by Herr von Schulenburg. I don’t know what the exact wording was, but I have been able to gauge its import and tone from several letters about the issue which I subsequently received from Germany.

  I believe that the protest was raised on the grounds that the Raabe Prize had been awarded to a Swiss. I understand that objection, which has something to be said for it, even though Herr von Schulenburg, who has lived a number of years in Switzerland, may not be the right person to raise the issue.

  Apparently, he justified his criticism of the award by attributing to me a statement he had actually fabricated. That is repulsive behavior, which the editors of your periodical ought not to have tolerated.

  Moreover, it never seems to have occurred to anybody in the Academy or on the editorial staff of your journal that they should at least have alerted me to the attack. They printed Schulenburg’s libelous words, but I only heard about the matter long afterward, from a third party.

  As for the German prizes I have received, I never used a single penny of the Goethe or Raabe Prize, and gave the money away as presents to people in Germany. Should I be offered another German prize, I shall turn it down, citing your journal.

  You will no doubt understand why this ridiculous Schulenburg affair has further strengthened my prior resolve, which I announced a long time ago, to decline the offer of membership in the Academy.

  Thank you very much for the invitation to the Bürgenstock. But I haven’t attended any official social occasions in years.

  TO
PETER SUHRKAMP

  June 25 [1951]

  My dear friend,

  I have been having an odd time with the volume of letters.432 I found out from the first review, in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, that the letter on the fear of war does appear in the book, even though I told you and Ninon that you should definitely not include it. Ninon denies vehemently that I ever said anything of the sort; she finds it hard to understand why I feel so embarrassed, but now, in Weber’s review and the lines he appended to my reply, this letter has been singled out by the Neue Zürcher Zeitung and used as an argument in favor of armaments. Never again, for as long as I have my wits about me, shall I allow my name on any book I haven’t edited myself. And while somebody in Zurich is using me to promote rearmament, a section of the Swiss press is conducting a small witch hunt against me, unfortunately in Ticino as well, as though I were a communist, or a fellow traveler at least.

  Since winter, since I got back from Baden, my condition has been declining a little every month; life tastes of bile.

  Thanks for letting me know about your move!433 My doctor has finally given his approval for the Engadine, so we shall travel to Sils during the second part of July, stay there until mid-August, and then go to Bremgarten for ten to fourteen days.