In Praise of Old Age

The most beautiful texts from Herman Hesse's final years are gathered for the first time in this volume. Having completed much of the work that brought him renown, Hesse dedicates himself here to the last challenge of his long life as a writer: gracefully accepting old age and the proximity of death. Intimate recollections, short poems in prose and verse, portraits, aphorisms, brief philosophical treatises: such is the varied nature of the texts presented here. The first text in this collection was written when he was 43 years old and consists of impressions about spring, the rebirth and renewal of nature, represented by a man in the middle of his life, aware of the transience and impermanence of the world. The regeneration of life that repeats annually is not seen as a cause for sadness, precisely because he himself is no longer at that stage of life, but rather as an opportunity for internal transformation and regeneration.