| This dissertation asserts that the Hermann Hesse approaches the themes and techniques of literary Modernism with ambivalence. The first chapter outlines the role of philosophical and literary walking in Hesse's work in general as well as how these depictions differ from those produced by his predecessors. The second chapter takes Hesse's reinterpretation of Nietzsche and Rousseau and applies it to three of Hesse's early novels, Unterm Rad, Peter Camenzind, and Knulp. The third chapter examines Der Steppenwolf as an ambivalently Modernist autobiography, using Eugene Stelzig's notion of Seelenbiographie. The last chapter examines Hesse's two final novels, Die Morgenlandfahrt and Das Glasperlenspiel as exemplars of Hesse's ambivalence towards modernist literary techniques overall. |
