'Siddhartha' is probably the book which has come closest to answering that big question that is the title of my blog. I've been meaning to read it for ages, but hadn't really got around to it until now. And now that I've read it what can I say?
The language - I suppose the translation, reads strangely in this day and age - a very effusive, passionate type of speaking, and writing, which doubles every emotion, and still keeps you constantly aware that this is a book, a story, not a could-have-been-reality.
His journey is as important as the lessons he learns, and the most important lesson to us, I think, is that each person has to make the journey in their own way, has to want to make that journey, and each person takes a different path.
The language - I suppose the translation, reads strangely in this day and age - a very effusive, passionate type of speaking, and writing, which doubles every emotion, and still keeps you constantly aware that this is a book, a story, not a could-have-been-reality.
The story is of a man's search for peace - the lessons he learns - no one more important than the other - that it is something to be lived, not taught, to be detached and to take no pride in his achievements - all of these we read, over and over, in every quasi-philosophical book. But the last piece of philosophy was interesting - to love something for what it was, not what it could be - to love and yet remain detached from it - to welcome both pain and joy as a part of life - to be able to love everything that life brings.
