Beneath the Wheel

Rating:
Summary: Fall from grace
Review: BENEATH THE WHEEL is the tragic story of young Hans Giebenrath. Young Hans is a precocious, possibly genius young man from a small one-horse German village. It's a working class town that is known for its steadfast character of its denizens, but not for the scope & breadth of their erudition. Hans is the exception to the rule: he is far & away intellectually superior to his peers, and he knows it.

So bright is Hans that he is selected to attend a German monastery to continue his academic studies. So prestigious is this academy that it would be comparable to an American student being accepted to Princeton or Stanford. It is on this journey that we join young Hans; so full of promise as well as a wee bit of arrogance.

In some ways, this book could be described as the anti-CATCHER IN THE RYE. Instead of extolling education as something worthwhile as opposed to merely banal, Hesse has a far less flattering view of the educational system. The crux of the book is found in the following passage:

"A schoolmaster will prefer to have a couple of dumbheads in his class rather than a single genius, and if you regard it objectively, he is of course right. His task is not to produce extravagant intellects but good Latinists, arithmeticians and sober decent folk." (99-100)

Here it becomes evident that Hesse has little regard for a German pedagogic system which places pragmatism above nourishing persons of exceptional mental acumen. Most of the rest of the book revolves around the nucleus of this passage.

The whole tone and style of this book very much reminds me of Thomas Mann. The theme of transition from adolesence to adulthood is present in Mann's works as well. By coincidence, due to the fact that they're both German authors, Mann's & Hesse's books are alongside each other on my bookcase. After reading this novel, I found this arrangement to be all the more fitting. I do know that Mann & Hesse were friends; it appears that they held an influence over each others works as well.

This book is highly recommended, particularly to promising high school students who plan on attending college. It engages one of the most horrifying prospects that a serious student faces: flunking out and falling back into the milieu of the blue collar working environment. Of course, working any honest job is a noble endeavor. However, we at once remember the closing paragraph of Schopenhaur's essay ON GENIUS:

"A person of high, rare mental gifts, compelled to attend to a merely useful piece of business for which the most ordinary person would be fitted, is like a valuable vase decorated with the most beautiful painting, which is used as a kitchen-pot; and to compare useful men with men of genius is like comparing bricks with diamonds" (Arthur Schopenhaur, PHILOSOPHICAL WRITINGS, p. 97. Trans: E. F. J. Payne)

For those of us caught in the middle of Schopenhaur's dichotemy, it is with the greatest strain that we reach for the one, but end up plunging into the other. This is both a consoling and cathartic novel for all the people out there who (like me!) have strived for greatness, but fallen short. When it comes to profoundity, most of us tend to fall beneath the wheel.

Rating:
Summary: Fall from grace
Review: BENEATH THE WHEEL is the tragic story of young Hans Giebenrath. Young Hans is a precocious, possibly genius young man from a small one-horse German village. It's a working class town that is known for its steadfast character of its denizens, but not for the scope & breadth of their erudition. Hans is the exception to the rule: he is far & away intellectually superior to his peers, and he knows it.

So bright is Hans that he is selected to attend a German monastery to continue his academic studies. So prestigious is this academy that it would be comparable to an American student being accepted to Princeton or Stanford. It is on this journey that we join young Hans; so full of promise as well as a wee bit of arrogance.

In some ways, this book could be described as the anti-CATCHER IN THE RYE. Instead of extolling education as something worthwhile as opposed to merely banal, Hesse has a far less flattering view of the educational system. The crux of the book is found in the following passage:

"A schoolmaster will prefer to have a couple of dumbheads in his class rather than a single genius, and if you regard it objectively, he is of course right. His task is not to produce extravagant intellects but good Latinists, arithmeticians and sober decent folk." (99-100)

Here it becomes evident that Hesse has little regard for a German pedagogic system which places pragmatism above nourishing persons of exceptional mental acumen. Most of the rest of the book revolves around the nucleus of this passage.

The whole tone and style of this book very much reminds me of Thomas Mann. The theme of transition from adolesence to adulthood is present in Mann's works as well. By coincidence, due to the fact that they're both German authors, Mann's & Hesse's books are alongside each other on my bookcase. After reading this novel, I found this arrangement to be all the more fitting. I do know that Mann & Hesse were friends; it appears that they held an influence over each others works as well.

This book is highly recommended, particularly to promising high school students who plan on attending college. It engages one of the most horrifying prospects that a serious student faces: flunking out and falling back into the milieu of the blue collar working environment. Of course, working any honest job is a noble endeavor. However, we at once remember the closing paragraph of Schopenhaur's essay ON GENIUS:

"A person of high, rare mental gifts, compelled to attend to a merely useful piece of business for which the most ordinary person would be fitted, is like a valuable vase decorated with the most beautiful painting, which is used as a kitchen-pot; and to compare useful men with men of genius is like comparing bricks with diamonds" (Arthur Schopenhaur, PHILOSOPHICAL WRITINGS, p. 97. Trans: E. F. J. Payne)

For those of us caught in the middle of Schopenhaur's dichotemy, it is with the greatest strain that we reach for the one, but end up plunging into the other. This is both a consoling and cathartic novel for all the people out there who (like me!) have strived for greatness, but fallen short. When it comes to profoundity, most of us tend to fall beneath the wheel.

Rating:
Summary: Under the wheel of social pressure
Review: Hans lives in a small town with a small-town life and mentality. He turns out to be a remarkably intelligent boy and the leaders of the community take an interest in him. So they take him under their care, and start preparing him for admission into the Seminary. First sign: Nobody ever asks Hans if he wants to become a priest. It is simply assumed that a gifted boy like that, a rare jewel in such a sleepy town, has to go that way. An added pressure is that Hans's father is very proud of his boy and, besides, he has no mother. So he tacitly accepts studying Latin, Greek and Math, with a memorizing method. Studies are hard and abstract, and not connected at all with reality. Hans is rather shy and introspective, but likable nonetheless. For a year, he dedicates all his time to study, and finally gets to be admitted in the Seminary. He goes there, but finds life miserable (hint: he doesn't really like the idea of becoming a priest). There, he meets the excentric poet-to-be Hermann Heilner, and feels attracted to him. Heilner is an embittered young man, a loner and pompous lecturer. Their friendship gets Hans in trouble, and he becomes alienated from the rest of the students. He starts to underperform in class, and at some point suffers dismays and nervous breakdowns. And so he is sent back home, to suffer the disappointment of the town, which had put hope in him. Hans, of course, will always be conscious of his great failure: he didn't live up to the expectations he arose on his fellow townsmen. Hans then becomes a mechanic, surrounded by fellows he clearly does not belong with. One day, they go for a drink and, on returning home.. well, I won't spoil the ending. although it's not hard to imagine.

I have no idea if Hesse projected himself in this book or not. What is clear is that, frequently, brilliant people are forced to live lives they don't want, but find extremely painful and difficult to speak their minds. Think of XIX century, puritan Germany. There was no way that Hans could say to his father and the local leaders: "Hey, I'm smart but I'm not that ambitious. I just want to develop like a normal boy and then see what happens. I'm free to decide my life". No way. He falls prey to strict social structures, as so many people do even today.

"Under the wheel" is certainly not one of the best books by Hesse. But it is well written and a first step in the elaboration of the basic subjects of all Hesse's work: the individual conscience and its relation to the World; the search to find a meaning to life; religion and individuality. Let's say that if you read this book, you'll find it easier to understand subsequent and more elaborate books.

Rating:
Summary: A lesson as fresh today as when it was written
Review: Herman Hesse wrote this novel in 1906, long before he became known as one of the greatest writers in the 20th century. Obviously autobiographical, it tells the story of a Hans, young boy from a small village in the Black Forest region of Germany, who was pushed to study for exams so that he could gain admittance into a famous school that prepared boys for the ministry. Under the tutelage of the schoolmaster and the minister, he is pushed almost beyond endurance to master Greek, Latin, Hebrew, mathematics and other subjects. His childhood is spent in unrelenting study and he even has to give up his love of fishing. And then when he passes his exams and is admitted to the school, the pressure gets even worse. No wonder he gets splitting headaches!

Immediately, the reader is drawn into the story and we become the young Hans, and see the world through his eyes. We are there with him during the long hours of study and we meet his schoolmates, one young man in particular, a poet, who rebels against the system that is forcing the students to keep pushing themselves from getting crushed "beneath the wheel." Young Hans starts to have episodes of forgetfulness and fainting and eventually has a nervous breakdown and is sent back to his village in disgrace. The inevitable conclusion is tragic.

I can easily see the making of the great writer in Hesse's youthful novel. He's a master of simply stating the contradictions around him without making the connections obvious. And his descriptions of the beauty of nature are wonderful. He captures the essence of the heavy price we pay in doing what is expected of us without question. There's historical significance here too because, as we read, we have the hindsight to know what later happened in Germany. And yet, we also see that there's a strong element in our own American culture that pushes young people to bend to the yoke of prescribed achievement too. There is food for thought throughout and this book is as fresh today as when it was written almost a century ago. Recommended.

Rating:
Summary: A life wasted
Review: Hermann Hesse's second novel, Beneath the Wheel, concerns the plight of young Hans Giebenrath who is a highly-prized student of his village. the pastor, the school master and Hans' father contrive to make the boy work hard so that he can take the examination that would allow him to enter the academy.

In a society rife with class-consciousness, a middle class youth has few options. An academic career leading to a church position is the highest they can achieve. There is not much between. To be a clerk or artisan is looked down upon at his school. Hans achieves well.

But his success is not enough. he is worked harder and at the academy he finds a friendship that clearly demonstrates that this type of striving is wrong-headed. His friend, Heilner, is considered a revel and forced to leave the school. The hypocrisy of the staff is evident in the losses the school suffers.

Hans returns home in disgrace having experienced a breakdown no one diagnoses correctly. His own death is something only the shoemaker Flaig can assess correctly.

Some of this plot seems aubiographical, but Hesse makes a point in 1906, the year in which this book was published, that a society that divides people by class and forces their young into desperate work is doomed. The wheel of time, of fate, of relentless, mindless motion will grind the ones who seek something more transcendant.

The book is touching. Yet in light of Hesse's other works, this book is somewhat immature. It certainly remains a good start and the author will go on to write farw more challening material. Yet Beneath the Wheel offers challenge to the x-generation. Are they, too, mindlessly achieving without attending to the transcendant?

Rating:
Summary: a hundred years before the test obsession
Review: Hesse wrote this before he had full access to the wellsprings of creativity that produced masterpieces like STEPPENWOLF and NARCISSUS AND GOLDMUND. Nevertheless, the idea that standards from outside drive a gifted student to despair takes on new prophetic meaning as the current U.S. government strives to force all students (and teachers) into standardized measurements that can only shame those who do not "measure up" or whose uncalculatable gifts--you know, artistic talent, intuition, faith, courage, imagination, passion, idealism, love of learning--all that trivial stuff--will now fall ever more deeply into the cultural shadow.

Later in his life, Hesse saw his early novels as hopelessly bourgeois. Some critics have followed him in this, but it's simply wrong. He always wrote from the heart; the difference is that the later novels spring from a heart fully cracked open.

BENEATH THE WHEEL reflects the beginnings of that painful opening up to wider vistas for the author....and, it is hoped, for the reader as well.

Rating:
Summary: A message of warning
Review: I couldn't have read this book at a better time. Like a lot of American high-schoolers in the "fast track" to college, I was feeling way overworked. I never had time anymore to enjoy nature, good books or anything else. It seemed that my life was school, and nothing else.

On a whim, I picked this up. "Beneath the Wheel," or "Unterm Rad" (auf Deutsch) is the story of a brilliant young man (in the prodigy sense) who is worked to death by those who unconsciously care nothing for him, but to see his advancement.

While I never experienced anything as extreme as Hans, this book really made me question why I was doing what I was doing. Why was I working myself to death in high school? Was I learning anything? Was I growing as a person?

This book is wonderful because Hesse tells the story is such a simple and poetic way; and it is translated marvelously. Simply a joy to read. I can read it over and over again. So, take heed, reader. Enjoy this book and spend many an afternoon questioning the merits of forced education; and different systems of learning. A good technical follow-up is "Teaching As A Subersive Activity." Check it out.

Rating:
Summary: masterpiece
Review: I like this better than all of Hesse's other books because it paints such a vivid picture of the downfalls of modern education. The rigid intellect is stressed that crushes the human spirit and creative mind. So you can bubble a few circles on a scantron? So what! This book is incredible in describing how pushy adults live their lives through youth. When you find me floating down the river, don't ask why, just look in the mirror. Pure genius. Read and never look at your education the same way.

Rating:
Summary: We don't need no education -Teacher leave those kids alone!
Review: In short, "Beneath the Wheel" is 29 year old Hermann Hesse's attack on the educational system of his day. Unfortunately, too many youths (and adults) in our own contemporary society continue to be crushed by parents & teachers with personal agendas at odds with individuality. This is most harmful in youths because they haven't been given an opportunity to explore or pursue themselves, and who often wind up emotionally stunted throughout their adult lives. Now as far as Hesse goes, he is one of my favorite authors, and I'd love to give this book more than three measly stars. However I don't think "Unterm Rad" ("Beneath the Wheel", aka: "The Prodigy") is nearly as interesting as his later works. I even think his earlier novel "Peter Camenzind", though less developed, is more enjoyable. Still, there are some good reasons to read this book. Though it was written after "Peter Camenzind" it details an earlier period of Hesse's life. Like Hans Giebenrath, Hesse was miserably unsatisfied with the pressures and direction of his early schooling. Hans' father (like Hesse, his mother was deceased early in his life) and the local village community push Hans to excel in the state examinations. His required studies include Latin, German, Greek & mathematics. Hans is a very sensitive and emotional boy who prefers poetry, art, and the simple pleasures of fishing to the rigid manner in which he taught the classics he otherwise enjoys immensely. Although Hesse doesn't go into great character depth with Hans, it's plain for all to see that he's stressed out and unhappy. He is even denied a summer vacation in between schools in favor of preparatory study. When he does manage to advance into the Maulbronn Seminary we experience "college" (boarding school) student life with Hans. He befriends a rebellious boy named Heilner who is a stock-type in many of Hesse's novels, and who represents the person Hesse actually wanted to be, or strove to be, as opposed to the protagonist who is always the person he believed himself to be. Hermann Heilner (note the similarity in name with Hermann Hesse) is eventually kicked out of school for his obstinance and basically disappears from the scene, but remains largely in the consience of Hans. Heilner is similar to Richard from "Peter Camenzind", except that he does not "die" here. Richard represented an intellectual & bohemian aspect of Hesse's life after college that he felt required to "shed" in order to grow into the "respectable" & "responsible" married man he became in and around 1905. If you read enough of Hesse's works you'll find that all of his novels pick up where the previous one left off in terms of inner-development. So for example, Hesse separates Heilner from Hans because he needs to take Hans to his natural conclusion right here and now, before returning to the Heilner in him in "Gertrude", "Rosshalde", and then "Demian", and so forth. Hans and Richard never completely leave Hesse or his future protagonists, but play smaller and less significant parts of their lives in the same way we grow older and (hopefully!) develop into wiser, more complex individuals.

Literary analysis aside, "Beneath the Wheel" is Hesse's second full-length novel and you'll find him here building strength as a writer and artist; especially through his vivid descriptions of German Black Forest village life, the refreshing natural scenery always comforting and reflecting individual psychology, and a little bit in the colorful depictions of local characters and dialogue. Although I find "Peter Camenzind" more interesting as a novel, "Unterm Rad" is more well written and developed than "Peter Camenzind" which comes across as fragmented and incomplete. Both novels deal with the real, inner-life of youth and are morose, and depressing at times. No one reads Hesse for humor though. He has been aptly described as a "biographer of the soul", and I think this is why he appeals to so many individuals throughout time and country. "Beneath the Wheel" presents two important characters in the Hesse universe, all the more important for representing the early stages of individual human development amidst an indifferent and sometimes damaging social-system. Young Hans, like so many of us at one time or another struggles with the pressures of callous parents, neighbors, teachers, and society in general. He has to confront peer pressure, awkwardness in balancing his desires with what's desired of him, and the strangeness and power of first-love and sexuality. He excels in spite of himself, is on the "track", and a part of the system. He then falls off, and now suddenly must handle disappointment for the first time in his life. How will he deal with these unforseen (but predicatble) obstacles? This is the dark, mysterious realm where true character strength, courage, resillence, individuality, and beauty are forged in man & woman alike. Sadly, it is also the unknown realm which comfortable, status-quo, pigeon-holing, stereotypical, automaton producing society opposes, fears, and needs to repress, crush, and see defeated in order to vindicate itself.

Thankfully, this will not happen as long as there are friends & soul-mates of writers like Hesse who continue to stand up for the demands and freedoms of individuality amidst the larger, impersonal society Hesse eventually comes to have great hope for in "The Journey to the East" and "The Glass Bead Game".

Rating:
Summary: One of the best commentaries of education, ever.
Review: This is a story about a kid, Hans Giebernath, who gets pushed into higher academics and testing instead of being allowed to flourish on his own. It happens all the time, and will happen far into the 21st century. I won't tell you what happens, but it's described beautifully, and hits you hard.

What's really incredible about this book is it was written almost a hundred years ago and concersn the German education system. But it translates well to our SAT-driven society and the pressure we put on gifted adolescents to acheive in the areas "we" believe they should acheive in.