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

the soul;61 the second element is a crucial biographical event, the death of Johannes
Hesse, the poet's father, on 8 th March 1916. 'Der Strick ist zerrissen, der Vogel ist frei'
(Psalms, 124:7), which also concludes the commemorative 'Zum Gedachtnis', is the
inscription Hesse and his siblings chose for their father's gravestone. Although the
'bird7 makes its way into Hesse's earlier works such as the novel fragment Berthold,
the composition of which dates back to approximately 1907 and, as registered by
Boulby (note 62), into 'Julius Abdereggs erste und zweite Kindheit' (SW 1, 550-575),
written between 1901 and 1902, it is the loss of the father that brings about an
intensification in the use of images and metaphors related to the bird. 62 The symbol
occurs at the end of 'Der schwere Weg', first published in Die neue Rundschau in 1917,
where a bird croaks 'Ewigkeit, Ewigkeit!' (GS III, 326).63 In 'Iris' (1918), the bird's
song evokes the voice of the departed Iris, thereby underscoring the ties between the
bird and the afterlife. 64 The 'bird' also gains prominence in Demian (1917), as noted
by Ziolkowski:
The two central symbols in the second half of the book are likewise religious
but no longer conventional Christian ones. The bird breaking its way out of an
egg, an image of spiritual rebirth that recurs constantly from the first page to
the last, is borrowed by way of Johann Jakob Bachofen from late Roman
cultism. (2007, 45)
The presence of the bird and its associations with the soul and eternity echo
throughout Hesse's later writings. In Siddhartha (1921), the protagonist is compared
to the bird, strangely unable to sing which Kamala keeps in a golden cage. In Narzifl
und Goldmund (1930), where 'Goldmund sprach mit dem goldenen Munde Worte,
61 Karashwili points out that '[Der Vogel weist] bekanntlich als ein dem Himmel verwandtes Wesen auf die
Seele und den Geist hin' (181), and Boulby similarly notes: 'The bird is clearly also to be seen as a traditional
symbol for the soul' (109). In this respect, pronounced similarities link the 'bird' and the 'butterfly', the latter
being an intermediate stage of the former's evolutions in Piktors Verwandlungen. The butterfly too, which Hesse
terms 'Wappentier der Seele' (see above, 5.2) and which the ancient Greeks associated with immortality (See
Chapter 4, fh. 48), is a symbol of the soul.
62 Berthold's dreams turn his trepidation into 'flugelschlagendem Gliick' which, in turn, transforms his soul 'zu
einem Kinde [...], das im Grase spielt, und zu einem Voglein, das in den Lttften jauchzt' (SW 7, 106).
63 As a further trait d'union between the 'bird' and the Immortals, both 'Die Unsterblichen' and the 'bird'
produce sounds and live in environments hardly bearable to human beings. Haller describes Mozart's laughter as
'kalt und unerbittlich' (SW 4, 163) and, as noted in 4.5, the Immortals endure 'eine scheuBlich dunne Eisluft'
(SW 4, 194). In a similar vein, the narrator of 'Der schwere Weg' characterizes the bird's song as '[s]chwer zu
ertragen' and the surrounding scenery with the words: 'und furchtbar war vor allem die Einsamkeit und Leere
dieses Ortes, die schwindelnde Weite der 6den Himmelsraume' (GS III, 326).
64 'Ein Vogel sang vor ihm im Erlengebusch, der hatte eine seltene, siiBe Stimme, wie die Stimme der
gestorbenen Iris' (GS III, 382).
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