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BOOK REVIEW: SIDDHARTHA–An Indian Tale by Hermann Hesse

March 14, 2020Uncategorizedamazing reads, amazon, brahmin, buddha, ferryman, germany, gertrude, goldmund, govinda, hermann hesse, kamala, kamaswami, kamlesh tripathi, kapilavasthu, lesson, moral, narcissus, nobel laureate, parable, samana, shravancharitymission, siddhartha an indian tale, steppenwolf, vasudevashravancharitymission

Khidki (Window)

–Read India Initiative—

This is only an attempt to create interest in reading. We may not get the time to read all the books in our lifetime. But such reviews, talk and synopsis will at least convey what the book is all about.

Hermann Hesse is a Nobel Laureate. The copy of the book that I read, is published, by Amazing Reads—an Imprint of India Book Distributors Ltd. The discounted price of this book in Amazon is Rs 79. The subject book is a novella of 127pages.

I have always believed, and I still believe, that whatever good or bad fortune may come our way, we can always give it meaning and transform it into something of value. It is always possible—says the author in the book.

Before I move forward let me give you brief about the author. Herman Hesse was born in Calw, Germany on July 2, 1877 to Johannes and Marie Hesse. They came from different European cultures and were involved in missionary work in India. On account of the parental influence Hesse too, was encouraged to follow the same path, but his love for poetry drove him to spend his early years publishing poems and writing prose.

In 1904, Hesse published his first novel Peter Camenzind, which was well received and gave him his first breakthrough. He followed this book by another one titled, ‘Beneath the Wheel. In 1904, along with the release of his first novel, Hermann also found marital bliss with Maria Bernoulli and they went on to have three children. He continued to write novellas and short stories and, in 1910, he published Gertrude, (meaning a female, derived from Germanic roots that meant “spear” and strength). Hermann Hesse, while facing a personal crisis at home, protested German fighting in the First World War that brought him a lot of criticism.

Mirroring his own travels and experiences, Hesse wrote Siddhartha in 1922 and many more books like Steppenwolf in 1927 and Narcissus and Goldmund in 1930. His last novel, The Glass Bead Game, which was published in 1943 took the longest time to complete, following which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in 1946—a laurel he could not receive personally owing to his deteriorating health condition, which led to his demise on August 9, 1962.

Hermann Hesse was deeply influenced by the boundless nature of Indian philosophy—and that inspired him to write Siddhartha one of the most widely read novels of the twentieth century.

Siddhartha, was born into an affluent and privileged Brahmin family, and was loved by one and all. Finding himself dissatisfied with the life he is expected to lead, he forsakes his place among the Brahmins and sets out on a spiritual journey to discover nirvana—a higher state of being. This pursuit leads him through a journey of suffering, self-denial, allurement of wealth and temptations of sensuality; eventually giving up the material world at the bank of a river, where he meets a ferryman who guides him towards his ultimate destiny and shows him how achieving nirvana cannot be taught but persevered by one’s own will. Here, at the river, he stops searching and submits to the oneness of all.

The story is set up in the ancient Indian kingdom of Kapilavastu. Siddhartha decides to leave behind his home in the hope of gaining spiritual illumination by becoming an ascetic wandering beggar of the Samanas. Joined by his best friend, Govinda, Siddhartha fasts, becomes homeless, renounces all personal possessions, and intensely meditates, eventually seeking, enlightenment.

Later, both Siddhartha and Govinda acknowledge the elegance of the Buddha’s teachings. Govinda, hastily joins the Buddha’s order, but Siddhartha does not follow suit, claiming that the Buddha’s philosophy, though supremely wise, does not account for the necessarily distinct experiences of each person. He argues that every individual seeks an absolutely unique, personal meaning of life that cannot be presented to him by a teacher. He thus resolves to carry on his quest alone.

Siddhartha crosses a river where a generous ferryman, whom Siddhartha is unable to pay, merrily predicts that Siddhartha will return to the river someday to compensate him in some way. Venturing onward toward city life, Siddhartha discovers Kamala, the most beautiful woman he has ever seen. Kamala, a courtesan, notes Siddhartha’s handsome appearance and fast wit, telling him that he must become wealthy to win her affections so that she may teach him the art of love. Although Siddhartha despises materialistic pursuits as a Samana, he agrees now to Kamala’s suggestions. She directs him to the employment of one Kamaswami, a local businessman, and insists that he have Kamaswami treat him as an equal rather than an underling. Siddhartha, easily succeeds in that, providing a voice of patience and tranquility, which he had learned from his days as an ascetic, against Kamaswami’s fits of passion. Siddhartha gradually becomes a rich man and Kamala’s lover, though in his middle years he realizes that the luxurious lifestyle he has chosen is merely an illusion that lacks spiritual fulfillment. Leaving the fast-paced bustle of the city, Siddhartha returns to the river fed up with life and disillusioned, contemplating suicide before falling into a meditative sleep, and is saved only by an internal experience of the holy word, Om. The very next morning, by sheer coincidence, Siddhartha briefly reconnects with Govinda, who is passing through the area as a wandering Buddhist.

Siddhartha decides to live the rest of his life in the presence of the spiritually inspirational river. He thus reunites with the ferryman, named Vasudeva, with whom he begins a humbler way of life. Although, Vasudeva is a simple man, he understands and relates that the river has many voices and significant messages to convey provided someone wants to listen to it.

Some years later, Kamala, now a Buddhist convert, is traveling to see the Buddha at his deathbed. She is accompanied by her reluctant young son, and is bitten by a venomous snake, near Siddhartha’s river. Siddhartha recognizes her even after years and realizes that the boy is his own child. After Kamala’s death, Siddhartha attempts to console and raise the furiously resistant boy, until one day the child flees altogether. Although Siddhartha is desperate to find his runaway son, Vasudeva urges him to let the boy find his own path, much like Siddhartha did himself in his youth. Listening to the river with Vasudeva, Siddhartha realizes that time is an illusion and that all his feelings and experiences, even those that of suffering, are part of a great and ultimately jubilant fellowship of all things connected in the cyclical unity of nature. After Siddhartha’s moment of illumination, Vasudeva claims that his work is done and he must depart into the woods, leaving Siddhartha peacefully fulfilled and alone once more.

Towards the end of his life, Govinda hears about an enlightened ferryman and travels to Siddhartha, not initially recognizing him as his old childhood friend. Govinda asks the now-elderly Siddhartha to relate his wisdom and Siddhartha replies that for every true statement there is an opposite one that is also true; that language and the confines of time lead people to adhere to one fixed belief that does not account for the fullness of the truth. Because nature works in a self-sustaining cycle, every entity carries in it the potential for its opposite and so the world must always be considered complete. Siddhartha simply urges people to identify and love the world in its completeness. He then requests Govinda to kiss his forehead, and when he does, Govinda experiences the visions of timelessness that Siddhartha himself saw with Vasudeva by the river. Govinda bows to his wise friend and Siddhartha smiles radiantly, having found enlightenment. The book ends there.

This indeed is the true picture of life. We run after innumerous things yet we don’t find peace and enlightenment.

It’s a very fast paced book. I did not like the construct of its sentences nor the punctuation yet the book carries a great message and a great story worth going through for which I would give it seven out of ten.

By Kamlesh Tripathi

https://kamleshsujata.wordpress.com

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LITERARY CORNER: HAMLET by William Shakespeare

April 10, 2019book corner, book launch, book review, Book review and excerpts, book review, book synopsis, book stall, book synopsis, book talk, book talk,, fiction, literary corner, novel, play, story, storytelling, Uncategorizedclaudis, denmark, elsinore, fortinbras, gertrude, ghost, guildenstern, hamlet, kamlesh tripathi, king, laertes, norway, ophelia, poland, polonius, prince, queen, rosencrantz, shravancharitymission, stratfor-upon-avon, william shakespeare, wittenberg, yorickshravancharitymission

Hamlet is Shakespeare’s longest play and is considered among the most powerful and influential works of world literature, with a story capable of being retold and adapted by others. It was one of Shakespeare’s most popular works during his lifetime and still ranks among his most performed, topping the performance list of the Royal Shakespeare Company and its predecessors in Stratford-upon-Avon since 1879. It has even inspired many other writers from Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe and Charles Dickens to James Joyce and Iris Murdoch—and has been described as “the world’s most filmed story after Cinderella. Hindi film “Haider” released in 2014 is a modern day adaptation of Shakespere’s tragedy Hamlet.

The play is divided into four acts.

Act I.

Prince Hamlet of Denmark happens to be the main protagonist of this play. He is the son of the recently deceased or killed King Hamlet, so essentially there are two characters by the name of Hamlet in this play. Then you have King Claudius, who is Hamlet’s uncle and his father’s brother and also the successor. After the death of King Hamlet, Claudius hastily marries his widow. Her name is Gertrude, who is also Hamlet’s mother, and occupies the throne himself. The play goes on to say that the country of Denmark has a long-standing feud with the neighbouring Norway, in which King Hamlet had once killed King Fortinbras of Norway in a battle some years ago.

Although, Denmark defeated Norway and the Norwegian throne fell to King Fortinbras’s infirm brother, Denmark does fear a retaliation led by the dead Norwegian king’s son, Prince Fortinbras, as imminent. Then the scene changes to a cold night on the ramparts of Elsinore, the Danish royal castle, where the sentries Bernardo and Marcellus discuss a ghost resembling the late King Hamlet which they have recently seen, and bring Prince Hamlet’s friend Horatio as a witness. After the ghost appears again, the three vow to tell Prince Hamlet what they have witnessed. As the court gathers the next day, while King Claudius and Queen Gertrude discuss affairs of the state with their elderly adviser Polonius, where Hamlet looks on glumly. During the court, Claudius grants permission for Polonius’s son Laertes to return to school in France and also sends envoys to inform the King of Norway about Fortinbras. Claudius scolds Hamlet for continuing to grieve over his father and refuses him permission to return to his schooling in Wittenberg. After the court adjourns, Hamlet despairs on his father’s death and his mother’s hasty remarriage. Learning of the ghost from Horatio, Hamlet resolves to see it himself.

As Polonius’s son Laertes prepares to depart for a visit to France, Polonius decides to give him a contradictory advice that culminates in the famous ironic maxim, “to thine own self be true.” (Meaning he must think of his own benefit first). Meanwhile Polonius’s daughter, Ophelia, admits her interest in Hamlet, but Laertes warns her against seeking the prince’s attention, and Polonius orders her to reject his advances. That night on the rampart, the ghost reappears in Hamlet’s, presence telling the prince that he was murdered by Claudius, his own brother and demands that Hamlet avenge him. Hamlet agrees, and the ghost vanishes. The prince confides in Horatio and the sentries that from now on he plans to put an ‘antic disposition’ on, or act as though he has gone mad, and forces them to swear to keep his plans for revenge a secret. But privately, however, he remains uncertain of the ghost’s reliability.

Act II

Ophelia rushes to her father, telling him that Hamlet arrived at her door the prior night half-undressed and behaving erratically. Polonius blames love for Hamlet’s madness and resolves to inform Claudius and Gertrude. But as he enters to do so, he finds the king and queen finish welcoming Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two student acquaintances of Hamlet, at Elsinore the royal palace. The royal couple requests that the students investigate the cause of Hamlet’s mood and behaviour. In the meanwhile some additional news requires that Polonius waits further to be heard. When messengers from Norway inform Claudius that the King of Norway has rebuked Prince Fortinbras for attempting to refight his father’s battles. The forces that Fortinbras had drafted to march against Denmark will instead be sent against Poland, though they will pass through the Danish territory to get there.

Polonius tells Claudius and Gertrude his theory regarding Hamlet’s behaviour and speaks to Hamlet in a hall of the castle to try to uncover more information. Hamlet feigns madness but subtly insults Polonius all along. When Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arrive, Hamlet greets his “friends” warmly but quickly discerns that they are spies. Hamlet becomes bitter, admitting that he is upset at his situation but refuses to give the true reason why. Instead he comments on “what a piece of work” humanity is. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern tell Hamlet that they have brought along a troupe of actors that they met while traveling to Elsinore. Hamlet, after welcoming the actors and dismissing his friends-turned-spies, asks them to deliver a soliloquy about the death of King Priam and Queen Hecuba at the climax of the Trojan War. Impressed by their delivery of speech, he plots to stage, “The Murder of Gonzago,” a play featuring a death in the style of his father’s murder (that reminds of the last song of Rishi Kapoor’s film Karz) to determine the truth of the ghost’s story, as well as Claudius’s guilt or innocence, by studying Claudius’s reaction.

Act III

Polonius forces Ophelia to return Hamlet’s love letters and tokens of affection to the prince while he and Claudius watch from afar to evaluate Hamlet’s reaction. Hamlet is walking alone in the hall as the king and Polonius await Ophelia’s entrance, musing whether, “to be or not to be.” (The famous phrase that means to act or not to act). When Ophelia enters and tries to return Hamlet’s things, Hamlet accuses her of immodesty and cries, “get thee to a nunnery,” (give her to the whore house) though it is unclear whether this, too, is a show of madness or genuine distress. His reaction convinces Claudius that Hamlet is not mad for love. Shortly thereafter, the court assembles to watch the play that Hamlet has commissioned. In which after seeing the protagonist King being murdered by his rival by pouring poison in his ear, Claudius abruptly rises and runs away from the room. For Hamlet, this indeed is a positive proof of his uncle’s guilt.

After which Gertrude his mother summons Hamlet to her room to demand an explanation. Meanwhile, Claudius talks to himself about the impossibility of repenting, since he still has possession of his ill-gotten goods that is his brother’s crown and his wife. He sinks to his knees in frustration. Meanwhile, Hamlet, on his way to visit his mother, sneaks up behind Claudius but does not kill him, reasoning that killing Claudius while he is praying will send him straight to heaven while his father’s ghost is still stuck in purgatory. In the queen’s bedchamber, Hamlet and Gertrude fight bitterly. Where Polonius, spies on the conversation from behind a tapestry, calls for help as Gertrude, believing Hamlet wants to kill her, also calls out for help herself.

Hamlet, believing it is Claudius behind the tapestry, stabs wildly, but in the process he kills Polonius. He pulls aside the curtain and discovers his mistake. In a rage, Hamlet unsparingly insults his mother for her apparent ignorance of Claudius’s villainy. But just then the King Hamlet’s ghost enters and reprimands Prince Hamlet for his inaction and harsh words. Unable to see or hear the ghost herself, Gertrude takes Hamlet’s conversation with the ghost as a further evidence of his madness. After begging the queen to stop sleeping with Claudius, Hamlet leaves, dragging Polonius’s corpse away.

Act IV

Hamlet jokes with Claudius about where he has hidden Polonius’s body, and the king, fearing for his life, sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to accompany Hamlet to England with a sealed letter to the English king requesting that Hamlet be executed immediately.

Shocked by grief at Polonius’s death, Ophelia wanders aimlessly around Elsinore. Meanwhile Laertes returns from France, enraged by his father’s death and his sister’s madness. Claudius convinces Laertes that Hamlet is solely responsible for the killing, but a letter soon arrives indicating that Hamlet has returned to Denmark, foiling Claudius’s plan. Claudius switches tactics, proposing a fencing match—a sword fight between Laertes and Hamlet to settle their differences. Laertes will be given a poison-tipped sword, and Claudius will offer Hamlet poisoned wine as a congratulation if that fails. Gertrude interrupts to report that Ophelia has drowned, though it is unclear whether it was a suicide or an accident exacerbated by her madness.

In the meanwhile Horatio receives a letter from Hamlet, explaining that the prince escaped by negotiating with pirates who attempted to attack his England-bound ship, and the friends reunite offstage. Two grave-diggers discuss Ophelia’s apparent suicide while digging her grave. Hamlet arrives with Horatio and banters with one of the grave-diggers, who unearths the skull of a court jester from Hamlet’s childhood that he loved. His name was Yorick. Hamlet picks up the skull, saying “alas, poor Yorick” as he thinks of death. Meanwhile, Ophelia’s funeral procession approaches, led by Laertes. Hamlet and Horatio initially hide, but when Hamlet realizes that Ophelia is the one being buried, he reveals himself, proclaiming his love for her. Laertes and Hamlet fight by Ophelia’s graveside, but the brawl is soon broken up.

Back at Elsinore, Hamlet explains to Horatio that he had discovered Claudius’s letter in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s belongings and that he had replaced it with a forged copy indicating that his former friends should be killed instead. A foppish courtier, by the name of Osric, interrupts the conversation to deliver the fencing challenge to Hamlet. Hamlet, despite Horatio’s pleas, accepts it. Hamlet does well at first, leading the match by two hits to none, when Gertrude raises a toast to him using the poisoned glass of wine Claudius had set aside for Hamlet. Claudius tries to stop her but is too late in doing so. She drinks, and Laertes realizes the plot will now be revealed. He slashes Hamlet with his poisoned blade. In the ensuing scuffle, they switch weapons, when Hamlet wounds Laertes with his own poisoned sword.

In the meantime Gertrude collapses exclaiming she has been poisoned, she dies. Further, in his dying moments, Laertes reconciles with Hamlet and reveals Claudius’s plan. Enraged Hamlet rushes at Claudius and kills him. Soon the poison takes effect on Hamlet. Who upon hearing that Fortinbras is marching through the area, names the Norwegian prince as his successor. Horatio, distraught at the thought of being the last survivor and living whilst Hamlet does not, says he will commit suicide by drinking the dregs of Gertrude’s poisoned wine, but Hamlet begs him to live on and tell his story. Hamlet dies in Horatio’s arms, proclaiming “the rest is silence.” Meanwhile, Fortinbras, who was ostensibly marching towards Poland with his army, arrives at the palace, along with an English ambassador bringing news of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s deaths. Horatio promises to recount the full story of what happened, and Fortinbras, seeing the entire Danish royal family dead, takes the crown for himself and orders a military funeral to honour Hamlet.

In the final analysis a demon such as Claudius is sufficient to destroy the entire clan.

Synopsis by Kamlesh Tripathi