Name: Siddhartha
Rating: 3.962765957446809 (752 reviews)
ISBN: 9781533607003

Ben Holden-Crowther

Hermann Hesse

This is the classic book: "Siddhartha", written by Hermann Hesse and published in 1922.

Siddhartha

A book—rare in our arid age—that takes root in the heart and grows there for a lifetime. Here the spirituality of the East and the West have met in a novel that enfigures deep human wisdom with a rich and colorful imagination. Written in a prose of almost biblical simplicity and beauty, it is the story of a soul's long quest in search of he ultimate answer to the enigma of man's role on this earth. As a youth, the young Indian Siddhartha meets the Buddha but cannot be content with a disciple's role: he must work out his own destiny and solve his own doubt—a tortuous road that carries him through the sensuality of a love affair with the beautiful courtesan Kamala, the temptation of success and riches, the heartache of struggle with his own son, to final renunciation and self-knowledge. The name "Siddhartha" is one often given to the Buddha himself—perhaps a clue to Hesse's aims in contrasting the traditional legendary figure with his own conception, as a European (Hesse was Swiss), of a spiritual explorer.

SONYA

One of those books that makes u think, but not in a way that blows your mind. It’s the kind of story that explores the whole “search for meaning” vibe, following Siddharta’s journey to find enlightenment. But if you’re into deep, spiritual stuff and don’t mind a slower pace, it’s worth a read. 🤍

Karel Marccenaro

Maria

not explaining, but my favorite book. i felt seen and not alone whith siddharta, i hold this book near to my heart

Blends elements of psychoanalysis and Asian religions to probe an Indian aristocrat's efforts to renounce sensual and material pleasures and discover ultimate spiritual truths.

An Indian Poem

Lindy

This was constantly referred to me as something along the lines of That Buddhism Novel but really it's so Christian it's not even funny.

read this in a gasping gulp, so well written & so profound. here to learn & love, truly 🪻

farro

egle trovato

Siddhartha, a young man, leaves his family for a contemplative life, then, restless, discards it for one of the flesh. He conceives a son, but bored and sickened by lust and greed, moves on again.

Traci Wilbanks

A short book that says so much. 
I will definitely read it again in a few years

Wederom een groots boek van Herman Hesse. Het boek is vrij kort maar met veel inhoud. Het is ook moeilijk om te beschrijven wat het boek nu zegt, want het zegt heel veel. Het boek gaat ook over jezelf vinden en loslaten van dingen. Dit is zeker een aanrader

Bart Veldhuijsen 

José Saramago

um poema indiano

Siddharta

Erik Wallace

Jacob Medure

This book is one of the books I feel like everyone should read. Similar to Pualo Coelho's Alchemist, but much more profound, this book artistically tells the story of enlightenment. The punchline here is that many lessons in life are only derived through experience, despite what you may have learned without experience. After reading, I feel as though that just may be the key to life, to live it.

heleen de boever

um poema indiano : romance

Faith Ho 

"But one cannot love words. Therefore teachings are if no use to me; they have no hardness, no softness, no colours, no corners, no smell, no taste - they have nothing but words. Perhaps that is what prevents you from finding peace, perhaps there are too many words [...]"

Slightly ironic, given this is a book. But - not really ironic. A man's journey to nirvana and the spiritual insights he has along the way. And yet it isn't an epic; he doesn't travel very far, there aren't exciting extreme circumstances - rather it is a careful process of psychological and spiritual development. 

There're probably debates over its literary or intellectual merits, but what I can say, and why the quote isn't really ironic is: it touched something in me. Perhaps that's why I read, to experience, for a ephemeral moment, of something beyond "my reality". A thirst for finding that "something" that Siddhartha starts off with, and eventually finds; but that perhaps the rest of us will spend our lives, and may never achieve. This book leaves much for me to think about, but also the contradictory point that thinking is not the way to things; knowing not just with intellect (here I admit I am often tired of thinking; because my thoughts eat themselves up, a negation, exaggerate and yet extinguish everything)- "finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal."

"And if time is not real, then the dividing line that seems to lie between the world and eternity, between suffering and bliss, between good and evil, is also an illusion [...] his future is already there [...] to leave [the world] as it is, to love it, and to be glad to belong to it."

Siddhartha

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