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

Adulthood is set against childhood's simple, though profound, need for answers. In
the short story, the king is also contrasted with his spiritual guides, the Brahmins,
whose philosophical quarrels appear as 'childish7 trivialities when compared with
the king's powers of insight:
Und alle Brahmanen neigten sich vor dem Verklarten und erkannten, dafi sie
da nur Kinderspiel getrieben hatten, wahrend hier in dieser koniglichen
Gestalt Gott selbst, der Inbegriff aller Cotter, eingekehrt sei. (SW 9, 30)
Childhood is a crucial period for Hesse and a recurrent theme in his work (see 4.3).
Qualities such as spontaneity and innocence, which he associates with childhood, are
ironically contrasted with the infantile behaviour and concerns of adults who, like
Siddhartha's 'Kindermenschen', have lost touch with the depths and 'magic' of their
infancy. However, as illustrated by 'Ein Stiickchen Theologie' (see 1.3), Hesse does
not advocate an eternal infancy which he considers the first and lowest stage in
mankind's progression towards the third phase of 'Menschwerdung'. 40 'Kindlich'
possesses a wide range of connotations (the dreamlike spontaneity of the child, the
naivety of the simpleton, the childlike ingenuity of the wise) which are set against
'adult', which becomes a synonym for 'overly sophisticated', 'elaborated', and
'intellectual'.
The binary opposition of 'intellectual' and 'ingenuous' (or 'naive') is pivotal
for Hesse and is a constant feature of his novels. Those characters who embody
opposite tendencies and move on a purely intellectual plane are contrasted with a
third type, who are infused with the attributes of 'Kindlichkeit'. Kuhn's and Muoth's
complex, problematic personalities, reflected in their approach to music, are
complemented by Teiser's childlike and joyful attitude towards life and music. The
simple boatman Vasudeva bridges the gap between Gotama and Siddhartha who, on
40 This emerges, for example, from the fragment 'Erinnerung an Asien' (1914), which voices Hesse's impression
of eine Not und Schwache des Abendlandes' (KF, 111; my emphasis) compared 'mit der geschirmten,
gepflegten, vertrauensvollen Religiosita'tdes Asiaten' (KF, 111)(see 1.2). Western civilisation is, however, in
sharp contrast not only to the wise simplicity of the East, seen as the 'Wiege des Lebens' (KF, 110) but also to
those populations who have not 'grown up', remaining in a primeval state of infancy, and regarded as weaker
siblings by Hesse: 'Auch sie erwarben sofort meine Liebe, aber es war die Liebe des Erwachsenen zu jiingeren,
schwachen Geschwistern' (KF, 109; my emphasis).
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