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This Warbler Classics edition includes Alan Watts’s essay The Way of Liberation in Zen Buddhism, which offers a clear, compelling overview of the history and philosophy of Buddhist thought.
Herman Karl Hesse (1877–1962) was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. Along with Siddhartha, his best-known works include Demian (1922), Steppenwolf (1927), Narcissus and Goldmund (1933), and The Glass Bead Game (1943), each of which explores an individual’s search for authenticity, self-knowledge, and spirituality. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1946. He died on August 9, 1962.
Alan Wilson Watts (1915–1973) was an English writer, theologian, and speaker known for interpreting and popularizing Buddhism, Taoism, and Hinduism for a Western audience. He wrote more than twenty-five books and articles on religion and philosophy, including The Way of Zen (1957), one of the first bestselling books on Buddhism. He died on November 16, 1973, at his cabin in Druid Heights, California.
Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read.
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The novel is imbued with philosophical concepts, the most prominent of which is probably the final assertion that wisdom can be lived, experienced, but never taught. The journey of Siddhartha gives the reader a god-like position to examine this young man's life choices, to understand the motives behind them, and to relate to one's own life and decisions. In the early stages of his life, Siddhartha became alienated from his family and peers on account of his viewpoints and decisions. He questioned the faith and life-style of his own father, adopted another, became skeptical of that one too, and ended up suspicious of all teachings and teachers. His progress, however, illustrates the difference between individualism and herd morality. Unlike his best friend Govinda, Siddhartha wanted to find his own path instead of following that of another. He wanted to think for himself instead of hearing wisdom spoken from the mouth of another man. Nature with all its beauty and serenity had helped Siddhartha along the way. The book addresses, in fact, the break up between man and nature, his total immersion in artificiality and the quest for pleasures. At one point, Siddhartha lost himself in the existential vacuum of humanity. He gave in to women, money, delicious food, and fashionable clothes. In a word, he lost his bond with his own inner self. The murmuring sounds of a river brought him back to himself, annihilated both his former thirst for worldly life and his despair and regret in regard to his progress. By the same token, the plot investigates the inefficiencies of a dichotomic regime. Siddhartha discovered that life can neither be lived in an exclusive state of nirvana or one of samsara. There is always a middle ground between shadow and persona, worldly and spiritual, light and dark, good and evil. This state of duality is only normal. What matters the most is a balance. The quest for what is meaningful forms an equally important part of the story. Along the years, Siddhartha had gradually realized that what he wanted and what was of importance in his life was neither money, nor women, neither glory, nor fame. He adopted at last a simple life-style with barely enough income to afford anything more than food. But to him this was a meaningful life, one that brought him completion and validation. According to Aristotle, we are what we do, not what we think or say. This applies to Siddhartha's journey. When he left the forest, went to the city, and mixed with the people, Siddhartha kept thinking that he was spiritually and morally superior to his peers. Little by little, however, he became one of them and lost all the vestiges of moral ascendency. Thinking that he was different and special was far from sufficient for this young man to secure such a position between his people. What was needed was actions.