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

works, and the motif (the mirroring process on the water) is also linked with another
recurrent symbol in Hesse, laughter. In the opening page of 'Der Inseltraum', one of
the sections of Hesse's first collection of poems, Eine Stunde hinter Mitternacht (1899),
the narrator catches a glimpse of his 'smiling' eyes on a flat watery surface: 'Nun
lachten sie [meine Augen] hell und grofi mich aus dem glatten Spiegel an' (ESM, SW
1,172). In Unterm Rad (1905-1906), the crystal-clear waters of the river form a smiling
surface: 'Niemals hatte der Flufi einen so reinen, griinblauen, lachenden Spiegel
gehabt, noch ein so blendend weifies, brausendes Wehr' (SW 2, 252). The reflection
on the river assumes a similar function, yet a much deeper and wider significance
(see below in this section), in Siddhartha (1922):
Der Flufi lachte, er lachte hell und klar den alten Fahrmann aus. Siddhartha
blieb stehen, er beugte sich iibers Wasser, um noch besser zu horen, und im
still ziehenden Wasser sah er sein Gesicht gespiegelt. (Sid, SW 3, 458)
In Narzifl und Goldmund (1930), where the mirror motif is ubiquitous, the
reflection on a watery surface is connected with another element, the motif of the
'double' which, Boulby notes, makes its way into Hesse's fiction since Hermann
Lauscher (1901).45 In the watery mirror of a fountain, for instance, Goldmund's
reflected image instantly changes into the face of the woman he wants to seduce: 'An
einem Brunnenbecken blieb er stehen und suchte sein Spiegelbild. Das Bild pafite
briiderlich zum Bild der blonden Frau, nur war es gar sehr verwildert' (SW 4, 468) ,46
The combination of motifs (mirror and double) resurfaces in the last chapter of the
novel, where an old, withered Goldmund stares at his own reflection in a 'kleine[m]
Spiegel' (SW 4, 523) hung on wall where he is surprised to see a good-looking man
smiling back at him: 'Er [Goldmund] lachte leise vor sich hin und sah das Spiegelbild
mitlachen: einen schonen Kerl hatte er da von der Reise mit nach Hause gebracht!'
(ibid.). It is possible to trace the joint motif of the double and the mirror back to
45 'It is in this form, the mirrored or painted face, that the motif of the double, introduced into Hermann
Lauscher, recurs most often in Hesse's later works' (Boulby, 145). Further reference to the 'double' in Hermann
Lauscher see the discussion in Chapter 1, section 6.
46 Cf. Goldmund's reflection in a well a few chapters earlier where he discovers the transformation his contours
have undergone: 'Im dunklen Brunnenspiegel sah er sein eigenes Bild und dachte, dafi dieser Goldmund, der ihn
aus dem Wasser anblickte, langst nicht mehr der Goldmund des Klosters oder der Goldmund Lydias sei' (SW 4,
398-99).
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