What is Hesse's The Glass Bead Game novel about?

The final novel of Hermann Hesse, for which he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946, 'The Glass Bead Game' is a fascinating tale of the complexity of modern life as well as a classic of modern literature. read more

The Glass Bead Game (German: Das Glasperlenspiel) is the last full-length novel of the German author Hermann Hesse. It was begun in 1931 and published in Switzerland in 1943 after being rejected for publication in Germany due to Hesse's anti-Fascist views. A few years later, in 1946, Hesse went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. read more

The Glass Bead Game is set in a distant, possibly post-apocalyptic future and tells the life story of Joseph Knecht, who at the beginning is a young initiate in Castalia, a monastic order of secular scholars. read more

The Glass Bead Game is Hermann Hesse’s last and most difficult novel. Like his earlier novels, Demian and Steppenwolf in particular, The Glass Bead Game focuses on a process of spiritual individuation that takes place in the form of dialogical interactions. The Glass Bead Game, however, is much more than just another Bildungsroman. read more