Singapore Dream and Other Adventures: Travel Writings from an Asian Journey

Hermann Hesse's voyage to the East Indies, recorded in journal entries and other writings translated into English for the first time, describes the experiences that influenced his greatest works.

"I knew but few of the trees and animals that I saw around me by name, I was unable to read the Chinese inscriptions, and could exchange only a few words with the children, but nowhere in foreign lands have I felt so little like a foreigner and so completely enfolded by the self-existing naturalness of life's clear river as I did here."

In 1911, Hermann Hesse sailed through southeastern Asian waters on a trip that would define much of his later writing. Hesse brings his unique eye to scenes such as adventures in a rickshaw, watching foreign theater performances, exploring strange floating cities on stilts, and luxuriating in the simple beauty of the lush natural landscape. Even in the doldrums of travel, he records his experience with faithful humor, wit, and sharp observation, offering a broad vision of travel in the early 1900s.

With a glimpse into the workings of his mind through the pages of his journals, poems, and a short story--all translated into English for the first time--these writings describe the real-life experiences that inspired Hesse to pen his most famous works.

Author: Hermann Hesse
Publisher: Shambhala
Published: 06/26/2018
Pages: 160
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.40lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.40w x 0.70d
ISBN13: 9781611805895
ISBN10: 1611805899
BISAC Categories:
- Biography & Autobiography | Literary Figures
- Travel | Essays & Travelogues
- History | Asia | Southeast Asia

About the Author
HERMANN HESSE (1877-1962) was born in Calw, Germany. He was the son and grandson of Protestant missionaries and was educated in religious schools until the age of thirteen, when he dropped out of school. At age eighteen he moved to Basel, Switzerland, to work as a bookseller and lived in Switzerland for most of his life. During World War I, Hesse worked to supply German prisoners of war with reading materials and expressed his pacifist leanings in anti-war tracts and novels. Hesse's lifelong battles with depression drew him to study Freud during this period and, later, to undergo analysis with Jung. When Hesse's first marriage ended, he moved to Montagnola, Switzerland, where he created his best-known works. Hesse won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946.

SHERAB CHODZIN KOHN has been teaching Buddhism and meditation for more than forty years. He the author of A Life of the Buddha; he has edited a number of the books of his teacher, the Tibetan meditation master Chogyam Trungpa; and he has also translated many works including Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse, You Are Here by Thich Nhat Hanh, and Stories of God by Rainier Marie Rilke. He lives in Boulder, Colorado.