Narcissus and Goldmund

One of his masterpieces … without doubt a great novel * Observer *At the medieval monastery of Mariabronn, the restless Goldmund realises he isn’t cut out for a cloistered life under the tutelage of his friend and mentor, the ascetic Narziss, and so begins a series of travels that see him work his way through most of the seven deadly sins before finding a psychic resolution of sorts in an apprenticeship to a master sculptor. Only by feeding his appetite for worldly experience does Goldmund finally find the courage to face death. * The Guardian 1000 Novels Everyone Must Read *

Hermann Hesse was born in Calw, Germany, in 1877. After a short period at a seminary he moved to Switzerland to work as a bookseller. During the First World War he worked for the Red Cross. His later novels - most importantly Siddhartha (1922), Steppenwolf (1927), Narcissus und Goldmund (1930) and The Glass Bead Game (1943) - and his poems and critical essays established him as one of the towering literary figures of the German-speaking world. He won many literary awards including the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946. Hermann Hesse died in 1962.