Siddhartha Paperback – 15 Mar. 2022

After being a Buddhist all my life this beautifully written book has been an eye opener, and strong influence on the onward spiritual journey for me. The author questions the essence of what it is to be a Buddhist and how to practice buddhism. Using the parallel lives of siddhartha and Gautama, Hesse questions whether following a structured path and removing one's self from mainstream society is the only way to enlightenment or like siddhartha whether to live life to its fullest in order to experience the full range of emotion and physical and sensory existence on order to appreciate and gain wisdom to reach enlightened viewpoint of the connectivity and oneness of the universe as suggested in hindu and Buddhist philosophy.Hesse has studied buddhism thoroughly in order to pose this essential question..... which has haunted me all my life. As someone born into buddhism and struggled to follow it in its proscribed form, is renouncing every day life, family, work the only path to enlightenment? or can we reach our goals as a Buddhist whilst being compelled to lead a worldly life?

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A heartwrenching and powerful tale of human experience that spans a man's life searching for enlightenment. He follows his heart and follows no idols or teacher, gives way to his yearning for firsthand knowledge without dogmatic scripture or religious guidance. He simply views nature, his pain and the utterances of his heart to discern the totality of existence. Like with all journeys, he ends up where he started, having learned so much and yet not much more than the simplicity of life itself as of being eternal, connected, whole and free from judgement. His joy and calmness is not through knowledge but through experience ie wisdom. This story is about living a full life, running the full gamet of human temptations and impositions, eschewing remote piety in favour of getting your hands dirty. It's also about taking your own path in life and living your story, synthesising your lessons, from your own firsthand sources. Anyway, I'll be pondering this book for a long time to come. Thank you Naval Ravikant. To anyone reading, check out his podcasts all over the internet.

A beautiful, simply written book set in ancient India at the time of the Buddha, wherein Siddhartha (the son of a Brahmin) sets off from home looking for enlightenment. He travels the countryside, meets different religious groups whose teachings he ends up rejecting, falls in love, has a son who abandons him, becomes rich then gives everything away, becomes a ferryman and eventually sort of understands the meaning of life. The society in which it is set is an alien one, yet I think the appeal of this book lies in the universal resonance of Siddhartha’s search for meaning and the many mistakes he makes along the way. His ultimate revelations have a sense of elegant wisdom:“I have had to experience so much stupidity, so many vices, so much error, so much nausea, disillusionment, and sorrow, just in order to become a child again and begin anew. I had to experience despair, I had to sink to the greatest mental depths, to thoughts of suicide, in order to experience grace.”

I loved it. Compelling and plainly written. Lighter in tone than his other work.

Not as inspiring and and uplifting as I was expecting, given this is considered a classic

Didn't like the narration. Personal choice and not a criticism. I failed to notice that I could pre-sample versions. However, I couldn't change my purchase to another narrator.

`Siddhartha' is one of those books that is both simple to read and yet powerful and profound at the same time. Following a young Brahmin's son as he tries to find his spiritual path in life, this book manages to weave a tale that is both captivating and enlightening. This book is so good I could read the first 30 pages alone and put the book down a happy man, the remainder is purely icing on the cake! Hesse manages to write in a deceptively simple style that belies the depth to the message he shows us and the skill behind his writing. He won the nobel prize for good reason. This may be a short book, but it is one that will stay with you long after you have read it and will bring you back to rediscover it's delights at regular intervals. Beautiful prose, beautiful message and highly recommended indeed.Feel free to check out my blog which can be found on my profile page.