HERMANN HESSE AND THE DIALECTICS OF TIME Salvatore C. P. ...

Karalaschwili refers to as the 'Zeitmodellierung 7 of a work of literature. 17 'Haller', as
Lange suggests, 'is portrayed in keeping with Hesse's own sense of history' (1970,
59).
In Chapter 1 (section 6) we stressed that Hesse's artistry is largely concerned
with the inner development of the main characters and that Hesse sets the portrayal
of the identity between the reality of the world and the inner sphere of their psyche
as one of his main poetic goals. The time dimension in Hesse's fiction is therefore
anchored to the psychological development of a character; as a consequence, most of
his stories are not set against any definite historical background and rarely include
precise time indications:
Die Welt seines Romans ist fast vollig abgegrenzt von der aufieren
Wirklichkeit und dem objektiven Zeitlauf. Epoche und historische Zeit sind
darin nur nominal, als ein ganz allgemeiner Hintergrund vorhanden.
(Karalaschwili, 224)
The pronounced atemporal tone of certain, especially later, works of Hesse has been
underscored by scholars such as Boulby, who regards Siddhartha as '[a]lmost timeless
and unhistorical' (134) and by Hesse himself who, in his letter to Rudolf Pannwitz of
1955, describes Das Glassperlenspiel as 'the vision of an individual but transtemporal
biography' (GB 4, 436). Loose and sparing time indications are coupled with a
longing, expressed by Hesse's characters, for the abolition of time: Siddhartha
portrays the protagonist's attempt to transcend time; Haller's yearning for eternity is
couched in his veneration for 'die Unsterblichen'; dissolution in the eternity of death
is a liberation for Klein. 18 One of Hesse's constant creative aspirations is to overcome
time boundaries and its constraints:
Dagegen habe ich mein Leben lang viele Wege versucht, auf denen man die
Zeit iiberwinden und im Zeitlosen leben kann (diese Wege habe ich teils in
spielerischer, teils in ernster Form haufig auch dargestellt). (Die Einheit hinter
den Gegensatzen, 202)
17 'Der Charakter der Zeitmodellierung im Roman hangt von der Weltkonzeption des Verfassers und von jenen
kUnstlerischen Aufgaben ab, die er sich im SchaffensprozeB stellt' (Karalaschwili, 223).
18 More controversial is Knecht's drowning in Glasperlensiel.
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