Siddhartha

The quest for meaning beyond the material, carnal, and physical daily life that humans lead has been a theme in philosophy and literature since the earliest times. Socrates decried “the unexamined life,” and the belief that there is something more to our existence has been the driving force behind religion, art, the use of hallucinogenic drugs, discussion, and debate throughout human history. Hermann Hesse brought to this theme his interest in Eastern religions, specifically Buddhism and Hinduism, and created in his book a character whose search for enlightenment reflects that of the historical Buddha and his own. The book became very popular in the 1960s amongst intellectuals and spiritual seekers in the Western world, where the Counterculture and Hippie movements embraced writers and texts that offered an alternative way of life or reality.

The story contains a structure common to the Hero’s Journey type of plot, as well as that of the Quest. Siddhartha determinedly pursues his spiritual goals while moving along a physical path, undergoing a long and eventful journey. He keeps moving, through groups of people, towns, forests, alongside the river, away from and back to his friend Govinda, the ferryman, and even his parents, as he comes to appreciate them at the end of his journey. He recognizes and venerates the paths as necessary and inevitable: “Then he had felt in his heart: ‘A path lies before you which you are called to follow. The gods await you’” (65). His body’s movement and spiritual development follow the same trajectory, although there are times when Siddhartha is slowed down, for example when he feels his soul stagnate in Sansara: “Slowly…did the world and inertia creep into Siddhartha’s soul […] made it heavy, made it tired” (60). He needs to move on, learn, experience new sensations and reflections, and keep searching, until finally, beside the river, he is calm and fulfilled.

Siddhartha is not the only character in the book seeking enlightenment. Others include his family of Brahmins, his friend Govinda, his lover Kamala, and his guide Vasudeva. What Hesse shows the reader is that there are various ways to achieve this goal, but the most effective is that of Siddhartha, who comes to his own conclusions after a lifetime of varied experience and intense reflection. This is in contrast to Govinda, who, by merely listening to and following narrow and prescriptive doctrines, remains dissatisfied until the revelation transmitted to him by Siddhartha.

Siddhartha rejects the authority, teachings and laws of the Brahmins, the Samanas and Buddha Gotama himself, instead building his own belief system. His beliefs are gathered through his multitude of relationships, emotions, and the revelations offered to him by elements like the river. As he tells Govinda, “Wisdom is not communicable. The wisdom which a wise man tries to communicate always sounds foolish” (109). He rejects words and thoughts as vehicles for teaching and learning, and he prefers to rely on what he learns from the natural world: “every wind, every cloud, every bird, every beetle is equally divine and can teach just as well as the esteemed river” (113).

Paradoxically, Siddhartha explains that in his search for meaning beyond concrete and physical daily existence, it is his interaction with the elements of that very physical world that allow him to find spiritual meaning. Likewise, he integrates himself into the life of ordinary people and is thus bestowed with a greater understanding of them, of humanity, and ultimately of the nature of existence: “It seems to me that everything that exists is good—death as well as life, sin as well as holiness, wisdom as well as folly” (111). To reach Nirvana, it is necessary to accept Sansara, or suffering, as Siddhartha explains to Govinda. This is the major difference between the teachings of the historical Buddha, represented by Gotama Buddha in the book, and what Siddhartha claims: “Never is a man wholly Sansara or wholly Nirvana: never is a man wholly a saint or a sinner” (110). Govinda, meanwhile, still struggles to understand. Finally, his quest is achieved through the conventional method of a revelation from his guru, Siddhartha. The book ends with Govinda’s sudden enlightenment at the end of his quest. This contrasts sharply with Siddhartha’s long and gradual progress toward understanding, which it takes the whole book to reveal.