Narcissus and Goldmund by the nobel laureate Herman Hesse has as its theme, the mother/father, masculine/feminine imagery....a theme, I am told, has been a hallmark of Hesse’s writing including Demian, Steppenwolf and Siddhartha. The two principal characters in the novel are a contrasting study - Narcissus, a brilliant young man with elegant Greek, faultless courtly manners, fated to rule men due to his special gift to see into the depth of minds representing the father/masculine part; Goldmund, a young attractive pupil at the cloister of which Narcissus is a teaching assistant, with a dream of devoting himself to an ascetic Christian life. Needless to say, a deep relationship develops between the two resulting in breaking the shackles of Goldmund’s dreams! The more Narcissus talks to Goldmund, the more Goldmund begins to feel that he isn’t fit for cloister life. Narcissus helps him see his mother, a beautiful dancer of high but pagan birth whose wayward ways and the subsequent hush ups relinquished her to a vague memory within Goldmund. Awakened, Goldmund leaves the cloister, succumbing to the call of the wild, in search of a higher understanding the symbolic mother.
The vagabond Goldmund, on his journey, meets countless number of women...everyone drawn towards him and his beauty! Of particular focus to the story are his encounters with Lydia whom he begins to love & lust only to lose. After this episode, he carries on with his wandering life...but adds more than sexual experience to his life :an observation that the painful grimaces of a woman giving birth differs very little from the expressions of a woman in the ecstacy of lovemaking, a murder, loneliness, fear of death, freedom etc - a bucketful of experiences! However a chance encounter with a beautiful statue helps his mind to give a try at art as a sculptor with the famous Master Niklaus. He pours out all his creativity, his experiences and the whole gamut of their meanings & implications into a statue of John which he carves in Narcissus’s likeness, letting all the love he feels for his friend flow into the carving. Hesse does remind us that Goldmund still keeps seeing the face of a mother: not a personal one...but of Eve...the mother of humankind. All his creativity expended, Goldmund pursues a wanderer’s life again. Only this time, its a lot tougher: a lot of deaths & suffering due to plague. A young boy named Robert becomes his companion and Lene, a young girl becomes his friend as they set up a stationary life in a forest until a stranger attempts to rape Lene and gets killed by Goldmund! During his fight with the stranger, Goldmund sees the same ecstasy in Lene’s eyes that he had seen in the eyes of the woman giving birth...in the sensual pleasure of all women...thus signifying the similarity of deeply felt emotions in all women! However, Lene contracts plague and Goldmund watches her die! He returns to Master Nicklaus to find him also dead...and his pretty daughter disfigured by the plague! Whilst pondering in the same city, he sights his eyes on the beautiful Agnes, a Count’s mistress and his sensuality is aroused. He offers himself as a present to her but gets caught by the Count on their second day of courtship. He is sentenced to death but gets saved by Narcissus, now, the new abbot of the cloister! The book picks up on its philosophical theme during the conversation between Narcissus and Goldmund. They discuss about the duality of life comparing it to their own opposing but complementary natures. Goldmund, driven by his sensual urges, follows the call of the mother whilst Narcissus, driven by his intellect, follows the call of the father. However, they have the same goal as Narcissus points out that the images in the soul of the artist are no different from the ideas in the soul of the philosopher. Later on, Narcissus invites Goldmund to set up a workshop at the cloister and Goldmund agrees. He scupts two incredible works - a stairway and pulpit for the refectory and a statue of Mary, her facial features patterned after those of the chaste but lusting Lydia - a Mary who is a synthesis of the Old Testament’s Mother of man nad the new testaments mother of God, symbolising one long continuum of feminine qualities, from the temptress to divine purity.
I could go on revealing the entire plot of the story...but then I shall stop it here. It has been shown throughout the novel that Narcissus and Goldmund have the same goal and their lives complement each other - Goldmund lived a full sensual and creative life, a feminine imagery...whilst Narcissus lived an austere, scholarly life. However, the climax of the novel seems to negate the complementariness. Hesse’s writing (though in translation) seemed beautiful and highly philosophical! A better understanding of the novel could be gained only through a repeated reading else one would fail to see the metaphors and the symbolisms used. All in all, this novel is a challenging read.