How some straight men in classic literature act: women are smart and beautiful, but they seem so out of reach. 

Anyway, here is my best friend. He is so beautiful. He is the one person I can trust. We might have kissed a few times in this novel, like all good friends do. Did I mention how beautiful he is in this feminine way? It takes my breath away.

“I began to understand that suffering and disappointments and melancholy are there not to vex us or cheapen us or deprive us of our dignity but to mature and transfigure us.” ― Hermann Hesse, Peter Camenzind

peter camenzind would do numbers on tumblr

al things considered — when i post my masterpiece #1291

first posted in facebook march 19, 2024

giovanni segantini -- "un bacio alla fontana" [i.e., a kiss at the fountain] (no date)

"elisabeth stood beside me in front of a large painting by segantini and she was totally engrossed in contemplation" … herman hesse

"i live in rome where people sit by fountains and kiss. the sound of water is the sound of love rushing between them" … simon van booy

"the fountains mingle with the river, and the rivers with the ocean; the winds of heaven mix forever, with a sweet emotion; nothing in the world is single; all things by a law divine in one another's being mingle:— why not i with thine?

see! the mountains kiss high heaven, and the waves clasp one another; no sister flower would be forgiven if it disdained its brother; and the sunlight clasps the earth, and the moonbeams kiss the sea:— what are all these kissings worth, if thou kiss not me?" … percy bysshe shelley

"take these unsightly flowers, these violets, as a symbol of my great love, when a spring comes in which i fail to send you such violets, you will no longer find me among the living" … giovanni segantini

"she lit a burner on the stove and offered me a beer 'i thought you'd never say hello,' she said 'you looked so bashful, dear' then she opened up a book of paintings and handed it to me drawn by an italian painter from the 19th century" … al janik

“Oh, love isn't there to make us happy. I believe it exists to show us how much we can endure.”

— Hermann Hesse, “Peter Camenzind”

“I began to understand that suffering and disappointments and melancholy are there not to vex us or cheapen us or deprive us of our dignity but to mature and transfigure us.” ― Hermann Hesse, Peter Camenzind

Painting: "September" by Anne Magill

“Yo creo que se puede establecer una división entre la juventud y la madurez. La juventud acaba cuando termina el egoísmo; la madurez empieza cuando se vive para los demás”

Hermann Hesse

Escritor poeta, novelista y pintor naturalizado suizo en 1924. Nació en Alemania en 1877.

Fue descendiente de misioneros cristianos en donde la familia tuvo una editorial de textos misioneros dirigida por el abuelo materno. El padre de Hermann trabajó como misionero en la India antes de que el naciera. Hesse tuvo cinco hermanos dos de los cuales murieron prematuramente. 

Tuvo múltiples y violentos conflictos con sus padres, en donde pasó por diferentes instituciones y escuelas. En su juventud, escapó de un seminario evangélico debido a que le impedían estudiar poesía. “Seré poeta o nada” decía. También en esa época pasó por episodios depresivos intentando suicidarse, por lo que fue ingresado en el manicomio y posteriormente en una institución para niños en Basilea Suiza.

Pasó la mayor parte de su vida consagrado a los libros y la poesía, publicando en 1898 algunas obras sin mucho éxito. Se casó en tres ocasiones, adquiriendo la nacionalidad suiza en esta última.

En 1904 Hesse logró su primer éxito literario con Peter Camenzind, se casó y vivió en una casa a orillas del lago Constanza, tuvo hijos pero se separó, viajo a Sri Lanka e Indonesia en donde la cultura de Asia influyó en su novela “Sidharta, un poema hindu”. 

En 1917, presa del acoso y la burla por oponerse a la ideología nazi, y sumados a la muerte de su padre y la enfermedad de su hijo menor, busca ayuda profesional y su encuentra con el psicoanálisis, el cual sublima en su novela “Demian”, bajo el pseudónimo de Emil Sinclair.

A pesar de ser un escritor muy popular en Alemania, era poco conocido en el resto del mundo, durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial poco se publicaba pues no era partidario del nazismo.

En 1946 se le otorga el premio Nobel de Literatura.

La obra de Hesse era poco conocida en América durante la década de los 50, y no fue hasta la época de los 60´s que se popularizó en Estados Unidos, debido a los movimientos de la contracultura hippie, en donde publicaciones como Siddhartha, Viaje al Oriente y Narciso y Goldmundo resonó como ideales de estos movimientos.

Actualmente las obras de Hesse tienen una tirada de 125 millones de ejemplares en todo el mundo y se han traducido a 60 idiomas.

Murió a los 85 años a consecuencia de una hemorragia cerebral mientras dormía en el año de 1962.

Fuentes Wikipedia y dw.com

i have. a lot of books to finish reading but i really really really really really really wanna read peter camenzind right now

Pues eso es lo más demoníaco de la melancolía, que no sólo pone a uno enfermo, sino además le hace corto de vista, desdeñoso para la realidad que le rodea y casi arrogante de su propio dolor. A cada cual le parece llevar a la espalda todos los problemas, todas las tristezas y congojas de este pobre mundo, sin pararse a pensar en que hay otros mil que están afligidos por las mismas causas y que recorren también el laberinto sin salida de sus tribulaciones.

Hermann Hesse, «Peter Camenzind»

Oh, love isn’t there to make us happy. I believe it exists to show us how much we can endure.

Hermann Hesse, Peter Camenzind

Ninon

Aos 14 anos, Ninon Auslander leu o romance “Peter Camenzind” e ficou obcecada com o autor, a quem escreveu durante anos, mesmo depois de casada. Separou-se do primeiro marido, acabou por se encontrar com Hesse em 1926 e foi viver com ele em 1927. Casaram em 1931. Não houve festa, o noivo foi para as termas no dia a seguir à boda e a noiva começou sozinha a lua de mel.

There's this scene in Peter Camenzind when he's still in high school and craves friendship. There, he notices an older boy who looks really mysterious, but he doesn't dare approach him. Anyway, the story goes on, but I stopped and wondered if later, while writing Demian, Hermann Hesse remembered him and created Max Demian out of him. 

Book recs #1!

a book that is close to your heart

there are definitely quite a few but the first one that comes to mind is Peter Camenzind by Hermann Hesse

hermann hesse aged 27 writing his first book in 1904: i am going to write about a protagonist who, after pursuing the fast-paced life of a big-city intellectual with little emotional fulfillment and after a number of failed one-sided infatuations with women, befriends an ostracized disabled man and overcomes his ableist prejudices, eventually moving in with him and raising a poodle together in domestic harmony "feeling almost like a married man", thereby getting over his past loves and also learning to view life through a different lens with the one "to whom he had given all his love and with whom he had shared his whole life", such that when tragedy befalls, "he would gladly exchange every happy day of his life, all his infatuations and great plans, provided he could exchange them for gazing deeply once more into this most sacred experience" because "that's the way it is when you love", ultimately finding peace not among the high-brow city life but back in his rural hometown where he takes back with him all the truly meaningful life lessons he has learned and the memories of his most beloved people, from his first crush on a girl to the man he spent his life with.

Novelas publicadas por Herman Hesse:

"Peter Camenzind" (1904) - Peter Camenzind

"Bajo las ruedas" (1906) - Beneath the Wheel

"Gertrud" (1910) - Gertrude

"Rosshalde" (1914) - Rosshalde

"Demian" (1919) - Demian

"Siddhartha" (1922) - Siddhartha

"El lobo estepario" (1927) - Steppenwolf

"Narciso y Goldmundo" (1930) - Narcissus and Goldmund

"Viaje al Este" (1932) - Journey to the East

"El juego de los abalorios" (1943) - The Glass Bead Game

I began to understand that suffering and disappointments and melancholy are there not to vex us or cheapen us or deprive us of our dignity but to mature and transfigure us. ~Hermann Hesse

(Book: Peter Camenzind)