Hermann Hesse

Hermann Hesse was a German-Swiss poet, novelist and painter, born on 2 July 1877 in Calw, in the German Empire. He grew up in a devout Protestant family with ties to missionary work in India, and his early years were marked by rebellion against strict schooling. He worked in a bookshop before turning to writing full time. Later he settled in Switzerland, where he lived for most of his adult life and became a Swiss citizen. He also took up painting, and he wrote many poems and essays.

Hesse's fiction follows people searching for an authentic self, often torn between intellect and instinct, society and solitude. His interest in psychology and in Indian and Chinese thought gave his work a distinctive spiritual tone. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1946. His books found a large new readership around the world in the decades after the Second World War, and they still speak to young readers facing questions of identity. He died on 9 August 1962.