Siddhartha
by Hermann Hesse 1877–1962
The book, and the century it came out of.
A brahmin’s son leaves home, joins the ascetics, abandons them for a courtesan and a merchant’s ledger, and ends up listening to a river. Hesse wrote it after his own collapse and a course of Jungian analysis; it went unnoticed in America for forty years, then sold in millions to the young of the 1960s. It is short, plain, and refuses to hand over its lesson. Illustrated with 60 full-page plates — paintings by North, van den Kerkhoff and Rousseau among them.
In the shade of the house, in the sunshine of the riverbank near the boats, in the shade of the Sal-wood[1] forest, in the shade of the fig tree is where Siddhartha grew up, the handsome son of the Brahman, the young falcon, together with his friend Govinda, son of a Brahman.
Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse, complete and unabridged. Spelling and punctuation follow present-day American usage; the sentences, the paragraphs and the voice are the author’s, word for word.
It was written in another era and may carry attitudes a reader today will find dated. They are kept for the sake of the work and do not reflect the views of this house.
- Series
- Literary Classics
- Format
- Ebook
- Extent
- about 120 pages
- Reading time
- about 2 hours
- Illustrations
- Full-page plates, credited
- Text
- Complete, unabridged
- Language
- en
- This edition
- 2026
- ISBN
- 9785486949067
60 paintings are bound into this edition
Six of them are shown here, taken from the volume itself. Each is reproduced full page and named with its painter and year.
This book in culture: one version
Most people meet a book like this one on a screen first. Here is what was made of it — and none of these is the book.
- 1997 Siddhartha Conrad Rooks
A page from this edition
Not a mock-up: this page is taken from the finished volume. The ornament above the chapter belongs to its shelf and to no other, the opening letter is set as a drop capital, and the plate below carries the name of the painter and the year.
Both photographed from the finished volume.
Siddhartha, first published 1922, issued in this edition by Aeneas Press in 2026 on the Literary Classics shelf. Newly set, with the ornament of its series above each chapter and a drop capital on the opening page. Illustrated with full-page plates, each named with its painter.
Published as an ebook and not issued in print by this house; it carries one ISBN, 9785486949067, and is supplied worldwide. This edition — its setting, its ornament, its cover art, and the selection and attribution of its plates — © 2026 Aeneas Press.
Questions readers ask
- Is this the whole of Siddhartha?
- Yes — complete and unabridged. Nothing is cut, condensed or paraphrased. This is the book, not a summary of it.
- What exactly did you change?
- The spelling and the punctuation follow present-day American usage. Hermann Hesse's sentences are untouched — same words, same order, same rhythm.
- Are the pictures really in the book?
- Yes. The edition carries full-page plates bound into the text, each one named with its painter and the year it was made. Six of them are shown on this page.
- How long is it?
- About 120 pages, which is roughly about 2 hours of reading.
- What do I actually get?
- An illustrated ebook with its own ISBN, sold worldwide. One file, yours to keep, readable on any device.
