Hermann Hesse’s concept of world literature and his critique on Chinese literature

Abstract

Hermann Hesse drafted in 1927 an outline of world literature in his article Eine Bibliothek der Weltliteratur (A Library of World Literature) in which he took Chinese literature as one of the important sources. In 1935, from German translation of historical novel Water Margins (水浒传) Hesse gave a response to Goethe’s ideal of world literature and defined it as the last common spirit “through empathetic translation, to broaden and enrich one’s own language and literature”. Chinese literature playing this landmark role in Hesse’s world literature is not groundless, but closely related with his continuous reading, commenting on a variety of Chinese literature for 30 years in his early career. He praised the perfect form of Chinese poetry, and ascribed Chinese drama to a treasure of stage art. He argued Chinese short narration with the magic to transform freely and broke through reality and illusion. Hesse also evaluated three Chinese romantic fictions The Fortunate Union (好逑传), The Wonder of the Second-Plum (二度梅) and The Plum in the Golden Vase (金瓶梅). He commented twice on the masterpiece Dream of the Red Chamber (红楼梦), initially criticized it was not a classic because it embodied no Chinese wisdom, only afterwards reaffirmed that it was a masterpiece depicting “a mood of decline and fatigue”. Hesse’s critique on Chinese classical literature not only provides a vision of literary communication between the East and the West, it is also closely related with his cultivation of world literature, which greatly enriches the construction of “world literature” in the early twentieth century.