Glass Bead Poems and Lives

The Glass Bead Game (post below) continues to fascinate.

There is no reason why the reader cannot follow the progress of the hero Knecht as he works his way through his task.

The poems he writes during his early studies, all 13 of them, are to be found in the tail end of the book, as also are the 3 stories - which he writes later - under the heading The Lives.

The poem titles are fascinating in themselves: A Dream, The Last Glass Bead Game Player, The Glass Bead Game, A Toccata by Bach, and Stages . . .

The Lives are previous lives the student imagines he may have lived. These are The Rainmaker, The Father Confessor, and The Indian Life.

A meditation to be taken slowly.  A dedication to the journeyers to the east.

German speakers tell me they have tried and failed with this book. Others veer away from it.

No such problems with the English version.

You can believe that!

Other innovative novels by the same author include:

Demian

Steppenwolf

Siddhartha

Narcissus and Goldmund


The back cover blurb of my copy of Glass Bead Game, the book shown in the post below,  reads thus:

In the remote Kingdom of Castalia, the scholars of the twenty-third century play the Glass Bead Game. The elaborately coded game is a fusion of all human knowledge - of maths, music, philosophy, science and art. Intrigued as a school boy, Joseph Knecht becomes consumed with mastering the game as an adult. As Knecht fulfills his life-long quest he must contend with unexpected dilemmas and a longing for a life beyond the ivory tower.


'Sublime'   - Thomas Mann

I think that's the right word.