SOURCE: Gotz, Ignacio L. “Platonic Parallels in Hesses's Das Glasperlenspiel.” German Quarterly 51, no. 4 (November 1978): 511-19.

[In the following essay, Gotz explores the similarities between Das Glasperlenspiel and Plato's ideas, especially the Republic.]

Like all Western literature, Das Glasperlenspiel is in a sense “a series of footnotes to Plato.”¹ I do not mean this as detraction. But the fact is that the wealth of insights expounded in the Platonic corpus renders it, to quote Whitehead once more, “an inexhaustible source of suggestion.”

Hesse's Das Glasperlenspiel forces us to confront the problems of the one and the many, permanence and flux, twenty-four hundred years after their formulation by Plato. And lest the connection with Plato's formulation be missed, Hesse clearly places the action of the novel in the year 2400 A.D. Indeed, by the very structure of the novel with its recurring cycles of lives, Hesse also wants to convey the point that such problems are truly perennial.

It is my intention in the present essay to seek a fuller understanding of the meaning of Das Glasperlenspiel by exploring some themes not fully developed hitherto. I will dwell briefly on some of the parallels between the novel and Plato's work, and shall suggest some others that might be fruitfully studied.

Many scholarly commentators have remarked how Hesse's novel exemplifies the pursuit of a Platonic idea, not merely through contemplative insight, but in concrete existence as well. In a letter written in 1944, Hesse himself expressed this view clearly: “In Wirklichkeit ist Kastalien, Orden, meditative Gelehrsamkeit etc. weder ein Zukunftstraum noch ein Postulat, sondern eine ewige, platonische, in diversen Graden der Verwirklichung schon oft auf Erden sichtbar gewordene Idee.”² The “narrator” in Das Glasperlenspiel says the same thing. He identifies the Game with the ideal sought since ancient times: “Jeder Bewegung des Geistes gegen das ideale Ziel einer Universitas Litterarum hin, jeder platonischen Akademie, jeder Geselligkeit einer geistigen Elite, jedem Annäherungsversuch zwischen den exakten und freieren Wissenschaften, jedem Versöhnungsversuch zwischen Wissenschaft und Kunst oder Wissenschaft und Religion lag dieselbe ewige Idee zugrunde, welche für uns im Glasperlenspiel Gestalt gewonnen hat” (VI, 85).

In talking about “eine ewige, platonische … Idee,” Hesse is clearly referring to the Platonic eidos, the “Forms” that stand at the pinnacle of Plato's vision of reality, and are the unchangeable, stable, supremely knowable, and eternal paradigms of every changeable reality. (Republic VI. 509ff.).³ The “Universitas Litterarum” that is the Glass Bead Game, is for Hesse an unchangeable reality, one among the many which constitute the entire realm of the Forms.

That Hesse has in mind one such Form is clear from the passages quoted above, but also from the ways in which he describes the ideal in question. Thus, the novel opens with a quotation from Albertus Secundus, purporting to summarize the objective of the book: “Nichts ist doch notwendiger, den Menschen vor Augen zu stellen, als gewisse Dinge, deren Existenz weder beweisbar noch wahrscheinlich ist” (VI, 79). We are also told that such “Dinge” cannot be written about, so that there is no book or treatise to teach the Game to a tyro (VI, 83), a disclaimer similar to Plato's: “There neither is nor ever will be a treatise of mine on the subject [of the Forms]. For it does not admit of exposition like other branches of knowledge” (Letter VII. 341C).

Furthermore, the very structure of the novel as a series of five biographies of the same reincarnated individual person, Josef Knecht, clearly indicates the undying, inexhaustible nature of the eidos. This theme is repeated often in Knecht's poems. As Mileck points out, Hesse thought that “reincarnation could be an excellent symbol of the element of stability existing in the midst of life's flux.”⁴ This structure could not have been more Platonic in its symbolism. For the Forms represent for Plato his understanding and adoption of the Parmenidian claim of the absolute permanence of reality, a claim, however, that Plato sought to juxtapose to the fluid nature of the empirical, Heracleitian dimension he also considered “real.” Thus the contrast between Geist and Leben, contemplation and action, Idea and History, symbolized in the novel by the contrast between Castalia and “the world,” Knecht and Plinio, the Altmusikmeister and Pater Jakobus, clearly and closely parallel the contrast between knowledge and opinion, the intelligible and the visible, permanence and flux, the worlds of Parmenides and Heracleitus, that Plato sought to synthesize and in some ways bring together in his own life and work.

Therefore, from the point of view of the nature of its central idea, as well as from its structure, the novel can be seen to be more Platonic than has otherwise been recognized.

The parallel between Das Glasperlenspiel and Plato's ideas, especially as expounded in the Republic, is not to be found only in the relationship between the general structure of the novel and the Platonic schema of reality and knowledge. Plato constructs also an educational scheme based on the gradation from the fleeting to the permanent described in the Republic. The general premise is that if reality itself ranges from the very fleeting (at the lowest level of the visible) to the absolutely permanent (at the top of the intelligible realm); and if knowledge varies in degrees of certainty from the very questionable knowledge of shadows and imaginings to the absolute certainty of intuitive apprehension, then there must be a way to effect the passage from uncertainty to certitude, from shadows to clarity, from imagination to intuition. Plato offers the Parable of the Cave as an example “to illustrate the degree in which our nature may be enlightened” (Republic VII. 514). But besides this, he provides a detailed description of the ways in which the process could be institutionalized, as it were, so as to provide the passage from the darkness of ignorance to the light of perfect knowledge. The development of such a program constitutes Plato's educational scheme.

Now the schooling stages through which the young Josef Knecht progresses, parallel the Platonic stages with uncanny similarity. Plato does not say much about the young child, ages one through seven, but the presumption is that he would stay at home, for the most part. Between the ages of seven and ten he would learn the three R's and the practical rudiments of arithmetic. He would then proceed, at about ten years of age, to the first formal school setting, where he would begin to occupy himself with literature. It is at this stage that we encounter Josef Knecht for the first time. He is at the Latin School of Berolfingen (VI, 120), and he is described as a “Lateiner” (VI, 127).

By age thirteen, Plato would have the young initiate concentrate on the study of music. Although music has been practiced up to this point, the emphasis has not been on study. Josef Knecht, too, has been involved with music. In fact, it is because of his excellence in music that he stands out and is recommended to the hierarchy of the “pädagogische Provinz.” And it is at this young age, too, that he moves on to Eschholz, the junior elite school, where he stays until age seventeen.

Between the ages of seventeen and twenty, Plato would have had the young scholar take time off, as it were, and engage in the military service customary in his time. Young Knecht had this experience of the “outside” world at a later age, during his sojourn at the monastery of Mariafels. At this time, however, there is a break in his studies, marked by a brief stay at Monteport, where he is the guest of his old mentor, the Altmusikmeister (VI, 148-60). Back at Eschholz he receives the news that he has been assigned to further his studies at Waldzell.

Normally, we are told, students stay at Waldzell for a period of five to eight years. This period marks their formal initiation into the complexities of the intellectual life. For most, it is also the most immediate preparation for entry into “the Order.” This period corresponds very closely to the period Plato would place following the ephebeia. This is a time for abstract studies, for synthesis of the knowledge acquired formerly, for deepening inquiry, understanding, and commitment.

This stage culminates for some in entry into the Order. Many, the majority, in fact, of those finishing this period of study, would then go back into “the world” as teachers in schools and universities. A few, however, “der kleine Rest” (VI, 136), would stay at the vicus lusorum and would be allowed to pursue their intellectual interests without restraint of any kind. Here were assembled the best intellects of the world, free to explore every subject, to spend as much time as needed in research, to spare no effort in the furtherance of knowledge. As Boulby remarks, we find here “mutatis mutandis the world of the ‘eternal student’ hypostatized as an institution.”⁵ Such, too, was Plato's Academy, the place where the best intellects of the ancient world sought inspiration and insight through a life lived in common (Letter VII. 341C).

It should be obvious that this entire process, from beginning to end, both in the novel and in the Republic, requires the careful selection of suitable individuals and the continuous guidance of their progress. Friedländer suggests that such a school as the Academy would require “the conscious selection of qualified students.”⁶ In fact, Plato specifies the places along the way at which selection of the best would take place. The same is true of the novel. Knecht's entrance into the elite school is clearly identified as a “call,” “die Berufung,” and is made effective through the selection of Knecht by the Altmusikmeister following the repeated recommendations from the young boy's teachers.

Moreover, in so far as the process is one of gradual awakening, there is clear need for guidance (VI, 129-30). Ziolkowski maintains that “Knecht's ‘awakening,’ a gradual process that takes place over a period of some thirty years, is the central theme of the novel.”⁷ Knecht receives guidance from several main characters in the novel, from Elder Brother, from Pater Jakobus, and principally from the Altmusikmeister. Plato, along similar lines, suggests in the Parable of the Cave that there is need of a guide to help effect the “turning around” of the mind so that it will zero in on the truly real (Republic VII. 514 and 518). And in Letter VII he specifically maintains that “guidance through these stages … only after great toil produces knowledge of the well-constituted object in the well-constituted individual” (Letter VII. 343E).

The main function of the Academy was to be the instruction of the Guardians (Friedländer, I, 92). The main function of Waldzell was, similarly, the training of “players”: “Gignit autem artificiosam lusorum gentem Cella Silvestris … Waldzell aber bringt das kunstreiche Völkchen der Glasperlenspieler hervor” (VI, 155). There is a close parallel between Guardian and Magister. Let me provide a brief account of Plato's conception of the Guardian before comparing him with the Magister.

Plato conceived the Guardian in very exalted terms. In him was supposed to take place existentially the synthesis of the Parmenidian and the Heracleitian worlds he had envisaged and expounded. He was not to be satisfied with the contemplation of the Forms, however pleasurable and intellectually satisfying such contemplation might be. On the contrary, says Plato, once they have been guided in the awakening process, once they have been led to the vision of the Forms, once they have looked upon them long enough, the Guardians must be led down again, and into the darkness itself, the better to lead the people from whose ranks they were selected, to the light of true reality (Republic VII. 519-21). In the same way as the reality of the intelligible and the visible is synthesized and preserved in the Platonic schema, so too must it be synthesized existentially in the cyclic process of ascent and descent that marks the life of the Guardian.

That this was no mere theoretical premise for Plato can be gathered from the example of his own life. Twice, in 367 B.C. and in 361 B.C., Plato relinquished the safe and prestigious sanctuary of the Academy and traveled to Syracuse to instruct Dionysus II and to convince him to arrange his reign according to the principles outlined in the Republic. He saw no conflict between his roles as seer and pedagogue, visionary and statesman. On the contrary, he saw in the split between the two a sign of degeneracy and decay.

There was, however, even in Plato's time, a clear tendency to separate the theoretical and the practical, and Plato acknowledges it (Republic VII. 519). Plato is aware that any exaggeration or excess in either of the extremes is likely to upset the delicate balance and harmony, and compromise the perfection of the whole (Republic VIII. 564). In a letter to Tegularius, Knecht expresses the same idea: every achievement, even the glorious synthesis of the Glass Bead Game, “schon den Keim des Verfalls enthält” (VI, 196). In fact, Castalia as we know it in the novel has been in process of decay for generations, absorbed onesidely in the pursuit of Geist to the neglect of Leben, lost in a rarefied wilderness of essences without so much as a cursory look at history and its transient complications.

But if in Castalia the Magistri remain ensconced without descent, Knecht's “defection” represents a return to the ideal. “With Knecht's resignation from the decaying order,” writes Rose, “the original Castalian idea is restored.”⁸ Faced with the “apparent conflict between his duty to the rarefied form of Geist cultivated by the Castalians on the one side and his duty to mankind on the other,”⁹ Knecht chooses to regain the original synthesis and balance between the two realms. His “defection” is but a reaffirmation of the ideal, not only speculatively, but in the concreteness of life. Plato was moved to go to Syracuse in 367 B.C. by a similar feeling, as he says: “I sailed from home … principally through a feeling of shame with regards to myself, lest I might some day appear to myself wholly and solely a mere man of words, one who never of his own will lay his hand to any act” (Letter VII. 328C).

Plato did not succeed in his educational ventures at Syracuse. In fact, he fared badly, and barely escaped unharmed. Yet it cannot be said that such a failure undermined his conception of reality, knowledge, and education. To a very large extent, his scheme was strengthened by his example, very much as Socrates' ideas were fortified by the example of his own life and death. Similarly, for Hesse, the “sacrifice” of Knecht's life does not interfere with or destroy Knecht's educational life. Rather, it fulfills it (Boulby, p. 30). After all, such truths as are being propounded cannot be directly “taught.” “Die Wahrheit wird gelebt, nicht doziert” (VI, 157), the Altmusikmeister tells the young Knecht; “Ob du nun Lehrer, Gelehrter oder Musikant wirst, habe die Ehrfurcht vor dem ‘Sinn,’ aber halte ihn nicht für lehrbar” (VI, 200). Socrates makes the same comment. The “real” meaning of virtue, the meaning, that is, which is neither theoretical nor practical but both, cannot be “taught.” It may, however, be grasped in the life of a true Master. (Meno 99E-100A). Knecht remains true to this counsel. The narrator informs us that, “Er hat beides nie getrennt, und während seines Magistrates hat er nicht nur eine große Zahl guter und bester Glasperlenspieler herangebildet, sondern auch einen großen Teil seiner Schüler durch Beispiel und Vorbild, durch Mahnung, durch seine strenge Art von Geduld, durch die Kraft seines Wesens als Menschen und Charakter zum Besten entwickelt, dessen sie fähig waren” (VI, 330).

It may be objected that the parallelism between Plato's Guardian and Hesse's Magister has been explicitly disavowed by Hesse. According to Schneider, “Hesse does not share Plato's opinion that the ‘philosopher’ should rule in a state,”¹⁰ and Knecht gives the reasons why this would not be a good idea (VI, 465-66). His arguments seem concerned with the possibility of a scholar or sage being a good, able, and efficient ruler. It should be noted, however, that as far as the possibility of such a scheme is concerned, Plato himself shared Knecht's doubts (Statesman 297 and 301; Laws 739). That is why Plato took such great pains to describe the education and preparation of the Guardian. On the whole, therefore, I do not think that Schneider's objection is tenable.

Plato did not have in mind a mere sage. He expected to develop through the rigorous selection and training devised in the Republic, a statesman-sage in whom theoretical and practical considerations would mix without travail. Moreover, he did not maintain that an ordinary society such as “the world” could be ruled by an extraordinary man: society itself would have to be changed, although Plato is not more than facetious when he explains how this change would actually get started (Republic VII. 540).

Regardless of whether or not the Platonic idea is feasible, the fact, it seems to me, is that the Platonic description of the Guardian is paralleled and exemplified in the life and example of Knecht. The parallel deepens if for a moment one considers the ideal of service. From Hesse's point of view, service is the fundamental eidos, the immutable Form that is forever existentialized in the “lives” of Josef Knecht and others like him. This is true “Universitas Litterarum,” the sum of all knowledge. From Die Morgenlandfahrt on, this idea of service preoccupies Hesse. Das Glasperlenspiel represents his definitive exploration of the theme. Service, Knecht discovers, is not purely a spiritual activity; neither is it ideas, Geist, what one must primarily serve. On the contrary, service is an activity encompassing both Geist and Leben, spirit and the world of history (VI, 514). It takes place not merely in the mind, but in the concrete physical and historical activities of the servant. Knecht reveals this in his candid confession to Master Alexander: “Nur hatte ich während meiner Lehrzeit bei Pater Jakobus die Entdeckung gemacht, daß ich nicht nur ein Kastalier, sondern auch ein Mensch sei, daß die Welt, die ganze Welt mich angehe und Anspruch auf mein Mitleben in ihr habe” (VI, 513). This statement is reminiscent of Terence's “I am human; nothing human is alien to me” (Heautontimorumenos I.i. 77). Consequently, it is not in devotion to abstract ideas that the life of service is to transpire. Rather, it is the existentialization of ideas that must be served, ideas as concretely livable by human beings, by the men and women of flesh and blood, as Unamuno would say.

The difference between the abstract service of abstract ideas and the existential service of the human spirit that he embraces, is communicated in a variety of passages. Very significantly, it appears in the distinction between the two meanings of the honorific title Magister Ludi, namely, Master of the Game and Schoolmaster (VI, 331, 470). The implication is that only the latter fulfills the ideal of service, and that only in such a service can one truly become a master. This is also the significance of the fact that in all the “lives” there is always a successor (Schneider, p. 250). He represents the continuation of the ideal, not abstractly, but in concrete earthly existence.

Such is also Plato's profound conception of the Guardian. The Guardian does not exist purely for himself. Plato's intention is not the creation of an intellectual elite whose happiness will be secured in quiet contemplation of the Forms. He is not “concerned to make any one class especially happy, but to ensure the welfare of the commonwealth as a whole” (Republic VII. 520). To achieve this, each segment of society is to perform its proper function knowingly and willingly. In such con-spiration the happiness of each as well as of the whole is to be attained. The ideal, therefore, is one of service as well as mastery: one must master oneself so that no obstacle may prevent the performance of one's function in service of the ideal. This itself is the eidos par excellence. Such a life is just. Such a life is also happy—happy with the kind of happiness the Greeks termed eudaimonia. Only in such a context can one understand how Knecht's death, the descent of the Guardians to the nether regions, and Plato's own ventures to Syrcause, are not a loss but a fulfillment.

There are other parallels between Hesse's Das Glasperlenspiel and Plato's works. Thus, one might compare the use of irony in their works; one might explore in detail the role of mathematics and music (and art) in Castalia and the Republic; or the cultic and mystagogical elements present in the communal life of the Academy and in the celebration of the Game, both of which were influenced by Pythagoras (VI, 85; Friedländer, I, 90-91). One could analyze the relationship between the Altmusikmeister and Knecht (incipiently reproduced in that between Knecht and young Tito) as an example of Plato's pedagogical eros. But the point of the existence of close parallels has been made sufficiently clear already.

I stated at the beginning of this essay my view that Das Glasperlenspiel is a reformulation of the perennial questions of philosophy raised in Plato's work. Like the old man in Knecht's poem, “Ein Traum,” Hesse has written “ältester Fragen neuste jüngste Brechungen” (VI, 552). I think that the parallels discussed above give substance to my claim.

Notes

1. Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1960), p. 63.

2. Hermann Hesse, Gesammelte Schriften (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1957), VII, 641. Subsequent references are to this edition.

3. References to Plato are taken from The Dialogues of Plato, trans. Benjamin Jowett and The Seventh Letter of Plato, trans. J. Harward. Great Books of the Western World, vol. III (Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1952).

4. Joseph Mileck, “Das Glasperlenspiel: Genesis, Manuscripts, and History of Publication,” in Hesse Companion, ed. Anna Otten (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1970), p. 192.

5. Mark Boulby, Hermann Hesse, His Mind and Art (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967), p. 283.

6. Paul Friedländer, Plato (New York: Pantheon Books, 1958), I, 86.

7. Theodore Ziolkowski, The Novels of Hermann Hesse (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965), p. 322.

8. Ernst Rose, Faith from the Abyss (New York: New York University Press, 1965), p. 133.

9. George W. Field, Hermann Hesse (New York: Twayne, 1970), p. 170.

10. Christian J. Schneider, “Hermann Hesse's Glasperlenspiel: Genesis, Structure, Interpretation” in Hesse Companion, p. 253.