Quotes by Hermann Hesse

About Hermann Hesse:

Hermann Karl Hesse was a German-born Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. His best-known works include Steppenwolf, Siddhartha, and The Glass Bead Game, each of which explores an individual's search for authenticity, self-knowledge and spirituality. In 1946, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

You've never lived what you are thinking, and that isn't good. Only the ideas we actually live are of any value.

Hermann Hesse

Love must not entreat,' she added, 'or demand. Love must have the strength to become certain within itself. Then it ceases merely to be attracted and begins to attract.

Hermann Hesse

For the first time in my life I tasted death, and death tasted bitter, for death is birth, is fear and dread of some terrible renewal.

Hermann Hesse

I closed my eyes obediently; I felt a light kiss on my lips, on which there was always a little accumulation of blood that wouldn't decrease. And then I fell asleep

Hermann Hesse

This change did not bring me into the community of the others, did not make me closer to anyone, but actually made me even lonelier. My reformation seemed to point in the direction of Demian, but even this was a distant fate. I did not know myself, f...

Hermann Hesse

Fate and character are different names for the same idea.

Hermann Hesse

I realize that some people will not believe that a child of little more than ten years is capable of having such feelings. My story is not intended for them. I am telling it to those who have a better knowledge of man. The adult who has learned to tr...

Hermann Hesse

An enlightened man had but one duty--to seek the way to himself, to reach inner certainty, to grope his way forward, no matter where it led. The realization shook me profoundly, it was the fruit of this experience. I had often speculated with images ...

Hermann Hesse

An enlightened man had but one duty - to seek the way to himself, to reach inner certainty, to grope his way forward, no matter where it led.

Hermann Hesse

I realize today that nothing in the world is more distasteful to a man than to take the path that leads to himself.

Hermann Hesse

Gratitude is not a virtue I believe in, and to me it seems hypocritical to expect it from a child.

Hermann Hesse

I have no right to call myself one who knows. I was one who seeks, and I still am, but I no longer seek in the stars or in books; I'm beginning to hear the teachings of my blood pulsing within me. My story isn't pleasant, it's not sweet and harmoniou...

Hermann Hesse

One never reaches home,' she said. 'But where paths that have an affinity for each other intersect, the whole world looks like home, for a time.

Hermann Hesse

We who bore the mark might well be considered by the rest of the world as strange, even as insane and dangerous. We had awoken, or were awakening, and we were striving for an ever perfect state of wakefulness, whereas the ambition and quest for happi...

Hermann Hesse

I have been and still am a seeker, but I have ceased to question stars and books; I have begun to listen to the teaching my blood whispers to me.

Hermann Hesse

Every man is more than just himself; he also represents the unique, the very special and always significant and remarkable point at which the world's phenomena intersect, only once in this way, and never again. That is why every man's story is import...

Hermann Hesse

She stood before him and surrendered herself to him and sky, forest, and brook all came toward him in new and resplendent colors, belonged to him, and spoke to him in his own language. And instead of merely winning a woman he embraced the entire worl...

Hermann Hesse

Each of us has to find out for himself what is permitted and what is forbidden.. forbidden for him. It's possible for one never to transgress a single law and still be a bastard. And vice versa.

Hermann Hesse

Gaze into the fire, into the clouds, and as soon as the inner voices begin to speak... surrender to them. Don't ask first whether it's permitted, or would please your teachers or father or some god. You will ruin yourself if you do that.

Hermann Hesse

I wanted only to live in accord with the promptings which came from my true self. Why was that so very difficult?

Hermann Hesse

A vida de todo ser humano é um caminho em direção a si mesmo, a tentativa de um caminho, o seguir de um simples rastro. Homem algum chegou a ser completamente ele mesmo; mas todos aspiram a sê-lo, obscuramente alguns, outros mais claramente, cada...

Hermann Hesse

Author Bio

  • NameHermann Hesse
  • Descriptionnovelist and winner of Nobel Prize in Literature
  • BornJuly 2, 1877
  • DiedAugust 9, 1962
  • CountryGermany; Switzerland
  • ProfessionNovelist; Poet; Writer; Literary; Painter
  • WorksThe Glass Bead Game; Demian; Steppenwolf; Siddhartha
  • AwardsNobel Prize In Literature; Order Of Merit For Arts And Science; ; Peace Prize Of The German Book Trade