Product Description

Hans Giebernath lives among the dull and respectable townsfolk of a sleepy Black Forest village. When he is discovered to be an exceptionally gifted student, the entire community presses him onto a path of serious scholarship. Hans dutifully follows the regimen of study and endless examinations, his success rewarded only with more crushing assignments. When Hans befriends a rebellious young poet, he begins to imagine other possibilities outside the narrowly circumscribed world of the academy. Finally sent home after a nervous breakdown, Hans is revived by nature and romance, and vows never to return to the gray conformity of the academic system.

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minor early work by Hesse        Rating:

Hesse wrote a very short autobiography in his later years, which can be found on the web. In this minute memoir, Hesse lists the works which he feels best represent him. "Beneath the Wheel" is not among them. My perception of this second novel of Hesse's is that the artistic merits of this work are limited by a personal desire on the part of the author to assign blame. While there is no doubt validity to Hesse's expose of various authority figures as being willing to sacrifice genius on the altar of bourgeois philistinism, it reduces the scope of the story down to a very narrow and particular, rather than universal, application to humanity.

We can certainly sympathize with young Hans, who was robbed of his boyhood and adolescence by the insensitive ambitions of family and mentors. But there is a one-sided-ness to the portrayal. From the start, it is evident that Hans is to be a sacrificial victim, whose destruction paves the way for a condemnation of the establishment types who brought it about.

Somehow, though, Hans' portrayal strikes some incongruous notes for me. Beside being a whiz at languages, Hans seemed to be a pretty normal, although quite intelligent, kid. He loved fishing, the outdoors, keeping pets, and constructing little mechanisms such as the water wheel in his garden. But he is seduced away from all these pleasures by the mephistophelian temptation, instilled by his instructors, to become an academic star.

Somehow it doesn't ring true for me that a boy with such a love of nature would allow himself to become an inwardly pathetic, thin-armed, head-achy glory-seeker. Hesse felt he had been thwarted and impeded by the authoritarian academic system which destroyed Hans in his novel. But Hesse was not a grind who reveled in the brain-taxing philological studies of Hans, but was a nascent poet who made good his escape from the clutches of his repressive masters. Perhaps Hans had his counterpart in real life, but it seems likely that his character was a concoction designed to elicit maximum sympathy, and thus, maximum condemnation for the system and its practitioners.

It is not a poorly written or mediocre novel, but the subjectivity of its highly interior viewpoint begins to feel monotonous. More dialogue and more insight into other characters' point of view might have contributed more interest. As it stands, it reads more like an expose of a very particular situation than a universal work of art. The theme of the outstanding genius who is not properly nourished by society is one most of us can only identify with vicariously. Here, that theme is presented more or less in a vacuum, without enough inclusion of supplementary or corroboratory themes to flesh it out and make it really take on life.

Novel pick - simple, ironic, and touching.        Rating:

Luis Mejia - Hesse's Beneath The Wheel can be classified onto his classic "youth" tales. Actually, out of this context I am not too experienced with the rest of his works, although there is something about the nature of the human spirit; which can only be described with certainty and growing beauty on it's formation, on adolescence, that Hesse's captures in a way you can feel so close as to your own father. This first novel - which wasn't his cup of tea as a writer - tells the story, almost in a philosophic perspective, of how an educated formation of a young kid, who by the times the story is set and it's cultural contexture (the Germany of early 20th century) is taught to be a sort of "spokeman" for his very own town, to the cumulative expectatives of others, by the honor of him being the only one to assist to a famous exam and even more famous institute. but through the experience this boy passes through crude and serious adult experiences, turning around numb headeaches, frustating insecurity, the lack of a clear goal, his thoughts of going through a wrong path only to go different from what the boy calls "the rest", and soon in this spiral he goes all the way back to dissapointment, finally falling without any type of emotional support; or rather unravelling it.

On this institute (which was somewhat accurate due to Hesse once being expelled from this academy) the group of classmates is well explained, the death of one of the children; but specially his acknowledgement of friend Herman Heilner; a flamboyant poet boy who has such a strong spirit the proper academy has encounters with him. The story is dramatic by Hans going out due to his physical pains; and by this archaic failure, he soons discovers (progressively and secretively) the whole town and relatives had worn him out, and his treatment was just like a living death. The results: to fall into the dark side and end in tragedy. Apart from the severe education critic Hesse exposes with such delicate spirit, he describes most greatly the nature of the adolescent condition with such a warm and factual nature...I can't explain it very well, all I can say is that you must read it specially when you're a teen and specially to understand it; it will open spiritual doors. At the end of almost each of his stories, there's always that sense of essay and the message drowning the story, although this is something very peculiar about Hesse. It is short, to the point and sincere; a very important read.

delightful story.. strange critiques        Rating:

after reading and greatly enjoying two of hermann hesse's other works ("siddhartha" and "narcissus and goldmund"), i read this book.. and i loved it! 5 stars, easy :)

along with numerous others, both the top-ranked positive and negative reviews (and wikipedia?) portray this book primarily as an indictment of educational systems. even the back cover reads ->

"based on his [hesse's] own experience, his second novel attacks an educational system that fosters intellect and ambition at the expense of emotion, soul, and instinct"

what?

i didn't experience this at all. narratively, most of the book is about hans' education, in grammar school and then in boarding school. true. and it certainly isn't an endorsement for late-nineteenth century german education. but if that's all it is, why would you read it anyway?

hesse exquisitely whisks us through (both!!!!!!!!) the ups and downs of education, and everything in between with his intensely vivid - and amazing! - style

after his educational tour concludes, hans works for exactly one week in a blacksmith shop.. and then?? that's it. you'll have to read the book :)

"BTW" is an excellent adventure through the interplay of pleasure, memory and the agony of aging. does everything that was once new and exciting eventually become "old news" and lifeless? this is the question hans asks us through (h) hesse's unbelievable talents as a writer - lyrically transporting us through life's highest highs, and its lowest lows - with pathos only a child can hold ("old news" for the rest of us).. and, while reading this book, i was a child again. thank you hermann (h)

if there is an indictment in this book (and it does seem so), it is either with our human memory, or our civilization at large. eg, p150 ->

"the precocious boy experienced an unreal second childhood during this period of illness. his sensibility, robbed of its real childhood, now fled with sudden yearning back to those already dimming years and wandered spellbound through a forest of memories whose vividness was perhaps of an almost pathological nature. he relived these memories with no less intensity and passion than he had experienced them in reality before. his betrayed and violated childhood erupted like a long pent-up spring"

this book challenges me to experience - and appreciate! - life's pleasures and torments with the perception of a child.. without the dulling burden of personal (or cultural) memory

1906 is not far from 2008        Rating:

For anyone being crushed and canned within the (mostly) incompetant and self-serving system of American Educational Faculty personnel, this book is a fair warning to any prospective college student (of any age) as to what they are really signing up for. I would suggest it as required reading prior to completing applications for any US institution of "higher learning". I completed a BA, MBA, and PhD...and found two professors in all that time who even vaguely gave an idle damn about the students they were supposedly educating. I have since found that comparative discussions with peers have proven my experience to be anything but unique...indeed, my observations have met commonplace agreement, and therefore are all the more disappointing as a result. Hesse called it fairly and true way in advance of current times.

Classic 100 year old novel        Rating:

Hesse's second novel, published in 1906. The story fosters an attack on educational systems that foster intellect, purposefulness, and ambition to the detriment of emotion, instinct, and soul. The duality of human nature (a familiar theme in Hesse) is represented by complimentary figures of Hans and Hermann, the latter escaping through art and a rejection of the system, while the former is crushed beneath the wheel. Hans' progress towards oblivion unfolds with many surprises, and the sensuous beauty of nautre plays its part even at tragic moments, as in the finale, when Hans is infatuated with the village girl, Emma, and when he goes off on a summer afternoon's drunken spree.

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