Siddhartha is a novel by Hermann Hesse that deals with the spiritual journey of self-discovery of a man named Siddhartha during the time of the Gautama Buddha. The book, Hesse's ninth novel, was written in German, in a simple, lyrical style. It was published in the U.S. in 1951 and became influential during the 1960s.
The word Siddhartha is made up of two words in Sanskrit language, siddha (achieved) + artha (what was searched for), which together means "he who has found meaning (of existence)" or "he who has attained his goals". In fact, the Buddha's own name, before his renunciation, was Siddhartha Gautama, Prince of Kapilavastu. In this book, the Buddha is referred to as "Gotama".
I actually got through this one pretty quickly just cause the book itself is pretty small and also pretty short. Like, if you wanted, you could probably read it in two sittings, it's only 150 or so pages. Don't let its length fool you, though, this book is really great. It's the tale of a man searching for meaning and is, while a little out of line with what I typically enjoy reading, very very good. The philosophical tangents and paragraphs upon paragraphs of reflection are a clear highlight of this. Really really worth a read if you're into Milan Kundera or you want a not depressing and brutally long version of The Book of Disquiet. It's a little here and there from time to time with a lot of the story being Siddhartha going from place to place to try a different means of answering a question of his, but also, it's only 150 pages so it's not really that big of a deal
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