Under the wheels

Published in 1906, "Beneath the Wheel" is a prodigious recreation of the world of adolescence, but in it Hermann Hesse (1877-1962) also formulates a severe indictment against educational systems that are imposed at the expense of imagination and the harmonious cultivation of spiritual, emotional, and physical faculties. Separated from his childhood environment and forced by parents and teachers into an exhausting preparation for entry into a seminary, its protagonist, Hans Giebenrath, finally achieves his goal, but at the high price of losing first his sensitivity and, later, his emotional balance.

Published in 1906, "Beneath the Wheel" is a prodigious recreation of the world of adolescence, but in it Hermann Hesse (1877-1962) also formulates a severe indictment against educational systems that are imposed at the expense of imagination and the harmonious cultivation of spiritual, emotional, and physical faculties. Separated from his childhood environment and forced by parents and teachers into an exhausting preparation for entry into a seminary, its protagonist, Hans Giebenrath, finally achieves his goal, but at the high price of losing first his sensitivity and, later, his emotional balance.