Magister Mundi? Hermann Hesse’s Global Impact (ACLA 2022, Taipeh - extended deadline)

There is a ‘universal’ element to be found in Hermann Hesse’s works. Hesse is ‘global’ as a writer in the sense that his texts reach and affect individual readers transculturally in a way that they perceive to be of personal relevance. However, this is does not means that Hesse appeals to the lowest common denominator among a global readership but rather that he touches upon themes that call out to the spiritual side of human existence and to which readers have found specific individual responses in different cultural communities. His prose and poetry offer potentially an oasis of calm, authenticity and spirituality - as ‘spiritual capital’ ringfences a mental terrain for profound and genuine meaning. It may be argued that this ‘spiritual capital’ flows from the argument that Hesse’s journey was not over with Das Glasperlenspiel by any means, and that his willingness to adapt and change while holding on to universal truths may help us in uncertain times, without the doctrines of organized religions or ideologies.


Weber argued that ‘It is not the “actual” interconnection of “things” … but the conceptual interconnection of problems which define the scope of the various sciences. A new “science” emerges where a new problem is pursued by a new method.’ Therefore, this seminar is particularly interested in exploring recent theoretical advances in the conceptualisation of an epistemology of World Literature and how they may help us in understanding Hermann Hesse’s global impact by comparing Hesse’s reception in different areas, languages and cultures. What is Hesse’s legacy? What is Hesse’s global cultural legacy? What are the eras of Hesse’s global legacy: in space-times of life, death, and afterlife?


We may approach these questions on the basis of work already done by Damrosch (2003) on national literatures and elliptical trajectories of works entering a global, universal literary space (Cassanova 2004), or the concept of ‘worlding’ based on aesthetic and historical-contextual aspects (Braun 2020). Contributions may also conceive of the global literary space as a network of nodes with multiple entry and exit points of differing cultural influence and varying domination (Cunningham 2021), e.g. Goethe in Korea via Japanese colonialization (1910-1945) with complex layers of ‘domination, distinction, and cosmopolitan prestige’ (Gagum 2018), whereby this global literary space is also further layered through translational networks (Mani 2017) of key languages and language worlds. Anticipating the future global impact of Hesse may also mean turning to gaming and utopias (Klosinski 2018) or the concept of an international community of spiritual wayfarers (Cornils 2002). We also welcome comparisons with other authors such as Franz Kafka or Thomas Mann, who may be termed ‘global’ and have reached individual readers across the cultural borders without the same spiritual connection.