Beneath the Wheel

For anyone being crushed and canned within the (mostly) incompetant and self-serving system of American Educational Faculty personnel, this book is a fair warning to any prospective college student (of any age) as to what they are really signing up for. I would suggest it as required reading prior to completing applications for any US institution of "higher learning". I completed a BA, MBA, and PhD...and found two professors in all that time who even vaguely gave an idle damn about the students they were supposedly educating. I have since found that comparative discussions with peers have proven my experience to be anything but unique...indeed, my observations have met commonplace agreement, and therefore are all the more disappointing as a result. Hesse called it fairly and true way in advance of current times.

As an educator, I just had two of my gifted students read this novel, and am pleased that I can now read it with multiple lenses. I re-read it recalling my own experiences of high pressure and one-up-manship from an affluent Catholic suburban high school. But now, as a teacher, I see all the dangers in creating gateways and irreversible standards for present day students where colorless logic and linguistics have sadly replaced the need for creativity, independence, and integrity. Set in pre-World War Germany of the early 1900s, it's also a remarkable read when you compare it to the state of affairs of modern America. These timeless themes have surprisingly remained the same: social status over spiritual discovery, labels and test scores over substance and meaning, product over process. One must ask, are we headed in the same direction as early 20th century Germany? How many Hans Giebenrath's will we neglect in our lifetime? How many times will we set up an education system where genius is stifled? It makes you wonder how many great minds are lost in the rat race of modernity. This classic is a great way to generate discussion between teacher and student, especially the student who strives for excellence yet struggles to maintain sanity and identity in a world that has unfortunately favored high SAT's and social rank over family, honor, friendship, and art for art's sake. It's a beautiful contrast of the real and the ideal; the simple life and the complexity of adolescence.

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.

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.

Having been a long time Hermann Hesse fan, I was more than pleasantly surprised by Beaneth the Wheel - the story of early conflict between fitting into and earning respect in a bourgeois society and allowing for the discovery of the self and life's meaning. This conflict would be further enumerated in such books as Narcissus and Goldmund and Steppenwolf. The writing style is very straight-forward and not as developed as in later works, but overall this is a much better introduction to Hermann Hesse than most high school students get in the form of Siddartha or Damian. I would recommend it highly to any age group.