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To such men the desperate and horrible thought has come that perhaps the whole of human life is but a bad joke, a violent and ill-fated abortion of the primal mother, a savage and dismal catastophe of nature.

Hermann Hesse

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Hermann Hesse
Age: 85 †
Born: 1877
Born: July 2
Died: 1962
Died: August 9
Illustrator
Literary
Novelist
Painter
Philosopher
Poet
Resistance Fighter
Writer
Hermann Karl Hesse
Humans
Horrible
Dismal
Come
Violent
Primal
Whole
Jokes
Savage
Men
Perhaps
Savages
Life
Mother
Abortion
Nature
Joke
Thought
Ill
Human
Desperate
Fated

More quotes by Hermann Hesse

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It is not our purpose to become each other it is to recognize each other, to learn to see the other and honor him for what he is: each the other's opposite and complement.
Hermann Hesse
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The truth is lived, not taught.
Hermann Hesse
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There are always a few such people who demand the utmost of life and yet cannot come to terms with its stupidity and crudeness.
Hermann Hesse
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There is truth, my boy. But the doctrine you desire, absolute, perfect dogma that alone provides wisdom, does not exist. Nor should you long for a perfect doctrine, my friend. Rather, you should long for the perfection of yourself. The deity is within you, not in ideas and books. Truth is lived, not taught.
Hermann Hesse
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People with courage and character always seem sinister to the rest. It was a scandal that a breed of fearless and sinister people ran around freely, so they attached a nickname and a myth to these people to get even with them, to make up for the many times they had felt afraid.
Hermann Hesse
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Fortunately, like most children, I had learned what is most valuable, most indispensable for life before school years began, taught by apple trees, by rain and sun, river and woods.
Hermann Hesse
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Art is the contemplation of the world in a state of grace.
Hermann Hesse
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I realize today that nothing in the world is more distasteful to a man than to take the path that leads to himself.
Hermann Hesse
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To study history means submitting to chaos and nevertheless retaining faith in order and meaning.
Hermann Hesse
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And what is called history at school, and all we learn by heart there about heroes and geniuses and great deeds and fine emotions, is all nothing but a swindle invented by the schoolmasters for educational reasons to keep children occupied for a given number of years. It has always been so and always will be.
Hermann Hesse
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Seriousness is an accident of time. It consists of putting too high a value on time. In eternity there is no time. Eternity is a moment, just long enough for a joke
Hermann Hesse
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Whither will my path yet lead me? This path is stupid, it goes in spirals, perhaps in circles, but whichever way it goes, I will follow it.
Hermann Hesse
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In fear I hurried this way and that. I had the taste of blood and chocolate in my mouth, the one as hateful as the other.
Hermann Hesse
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It was all a lie, it all stank, stank of lies, it all gave the illusion of meaning and happiness and beauty, and all of it was just putrefaction that no one would admit to. Bitter was the taste of the world. Life was a torment.
Hermann Hesse
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What should I possibly have to tell you, oh venerable one? Perhaps that you're searching far too much? That in all that searching, you don't find the time for finding?
Hermann Hesse
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One cannot apologize for something fundamental, and a child feels and knows this as well and as deeply as any sage.
Hermann Hesse
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Until 1914 I loved to travel I often went to Italy and once spent a few months in India. Since then I have almost entirely abandoned travelling, and I have not been outside of Switzerland for over ten years.
Hermann Hesse
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Life is always frightful. We cannot help it and we are responsible all the same. One's born and at once one is guilty.
Hermann Hesse
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Making music together is the best way for two people to become friends.
Hermann Hesse
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I began to understand that suffering and disappointments and melancholy are there not to vex us or cheapen us or deprive us of our dignity but to mature and transfigure us.
Hermann Hesse