CHRONOLOGY

1877	Born July 2 in Calw in Württemberg. Son of Johannes Hesse (1847–1916), Baltic-born missionary and later director of the Calw Publishing House, and Marie Hesse (1842–1902), widow of Karl Isenberg, née Gundert, the oldest daughter of the missionary and well-known scholar of Indic languages and cultures Hermann Gundert.
1881–6	Hesse lived with his parents in Basel, where his father taught at the Basel Mission School. In 1883, his father, born a Russian citizen, was granted Swiss citizenship.
1886–9	Return to Calw, where Hesse attended elementary school.
1890–1	Attended the Latin school in Göppingen, in order to prepare himself for the Württemberg regional examinations (July 1891). To qualify he had to renounce his Swiss citizenship, and so in November 1890 his father obtained citizenship from Württemberg for him.
1891–2	Student at the seminary in Maulbronn (September 1891), from which he fled after seven months, because he “wanted to be either a writer or nothing at all” (April 1892).
1892	Stayed with Christoph Blumhardt for treatment with exorcism in Bad Boll (April-May). Attempted suicide (June). Sojourn in the clinic for nervous diseases at Stetten (June-August). Admitted to the Gymnasium in Cannstatt (November 1892).
1893	In July passed the selective-service examination as a qualification for one year’s service as a volunteer. “Will become a Social Democrat and sit around in the cafés. Read almost only Heine, whom I have imitated a great deal.”
1894–5	Apprentice in Perrot’s Clockworks Factory in Calw.
1895–8	Apprentice in J. J. Heckenhauer’s Bookshop in Tübingen.
1899	Began writing a novel, Schweinigel (The Hedgehog), the manuscript of which has disappeared. Romantic Songs (Romantische Lieder). An Hour Beyond Midnight (Stunde hinter Mitternacht).
1899–1903	Employed as stock clerk in Basel (R. Reich Bookdealers and Wattenwyl’s Rare Books). Hesse began to write articles and reviews for the Allgemeine Schweizer Zeitung, which, more than his books, gave him “a certain local reputation that greatly improved his standing in society.”
1901	First Italian journey: to Florence, Genoa, Pisa, Venice. Hermann Lauscher.
1902	Poems (Gedichte), dedicated to his mother, who died shortly before publication of the small book.
1903	Second journey to Italy—to Florence and Venice—in connection with his profession as a bookdealer. Finished the composition of Peter Camenzind, which he sent to Berlin at the invitation of S. Fischer Publishers.
1904	Peter Camenzind. Married Maria Bernoulli, member of an old Basel academic family. Moved in July to a vacant peasant house in Gaienhofen on Lake Constance. Began career as free-lance writer and contributor to numerous newspapers and journals (among others, Die Propyläen, the Munich newspaper; Die Rheinlande; Simplicissimus; Der Schwabenspiegel, the Württemberg newspaper). Boccaccio. Francis of Assisi (Franz von Assisi).
1905	Birth of his first son, Bruno.
1906	Beneath the Wheel (Unterm Rad), which Hesse had begun in 1903–4. Founding of März, a liberal weekly directed against the personal authority of Kaiser Wilhelm II. Hesse continued as co-editor until 1912.
1907	In This World (Diesseits). In Gaienhofen, Hesse had a house of his own built and moved into it: Am Erlenloh.
1908	Neighbors (Nachbarn).
1909	Birth of his second son, Heiner.
1910	Gertrude (Gertrud).
1911	On the Road (Unterwegs), poems. Birth of his third son, Martin. Journey to India with his friend Hans Sturzenegger, the artist.
1912	Detours (Umwege), stories. Hesse left Germany and moved with his family to Bern, where he lived in the former residence of his friend Albert Welti, the artist.
1913	Sketches from an Indian Journey (Aus Indien).
1914	Rosshalde. When the war began, Hesse reported for duty voluntarily. Deferred when found unfit for military service and assigned to the embassy in Bern. Edited and managed newspapers for German prisoners of war. Established a separate publishing company for prisoners of war (called the Publisher of the Book Center for German Prisoners of War), through which twenty-two volumes appeared from 1918 to 1919.
1914–19	Numerous political articles, admonitions, open letters appeared in German, Swiss, and Austrian newspapers.
1915	Knulp (prepublication in 1908). Along the Way (Am Weg). Music of the Lonely (Musik der Einsamen), poems. Youth, Beautiful Youth (Schön ist die Jugend). Death of his father, illness of his wife and his youngest son, Martin, led to a nervous breakdown. First psychotherapy with J. B. Lang, student of C. G. Jung, in Sonnmatt near Lucerne.
1919	Political pamphlet Zarathustra’s Return (Zarathustras Wiederkehr) published anonymously. (Later, with the author’s name, 1920.) Moved to Montagnola, Ticino, where he lived in the Casa Camuzzi until 1931. Little Garden (Kleiner Garten). Demian, published under the pseudonym Emil Sinclair. Strange News from Another Star (Märchen). Founder and editor of the monthly Vivos Voco.
1920	Poems of the Painter (Gedichte des Malers), ten poems with sketches in color. Klingsor’s Last Summer (Klingsor’s letzter Sommer). Wandering (Wanderung).
1921	In Sight of Chaos (Blick ins Chaos). Selected Poems (Ausgewählte Gedichte). Crisis with almost eighteen months of unproductivity between the writing of the first and second parts of Siddhartha. Psychoanalysis with C. G. Jung in Küsnacht near Zurich. Eleven Watercolors of Ticino (Elf Aquarelle aus dem Tessin).
1922	Siddhartha.
1923	Sinclair’s Notebook (Sinclairs Notizbuch). First sojourn at the spa in Baden near Zurich.
1924	Hesse became a Swiss citizen again. Married Ruth Wenger, daughter of the writer Lisa Wenger. A Guest at the Spa (Kurgast; private printing); appeared a year later as the first volume of his Collected Works.
1925	A Guest at the Spa.
1926	Picture Book (Bilderbuch). Elected a member of the Prussian Academy of Writers (poetry section). He resigned from it in 1931: “I have the feeling that during the next war this academy will contribute quite a few names to the group of those ninety or one hundred prominent men who again, just as in 1914, will deceive the people about all important questions at the bidding of the state.”
1927	The Journey to Nuremberg (Die Nürnberger Reise). Steppenwolf. Hesse biography by Hugo Ball published for Hesse’s fiftieth birthday. At the request of his second wife, Ruth, a divorce was granted.
1928	Reflections (Betrachtungen). Crisis: Pages from a Diary (Krisis: Ein Stück Tagebuch).
1929	Consolation of the Night (Trost der Nacht), poems. A Library of World Literature (Eine Bibliothek der Weltliteratur).
1930	Narcissus and Goldmund (Narziss und Goldmund).
1931	Married Ninon Dolbin, née Ausländer, an art historian. Moved into the house on the Collina d’Oro in Montagnola built by H. C. Bodmer for Hesse, with lifetime right of occupancy. The Inward Way (Weg nach Innen), four stories (Siddhartha, Soul of a Child, Klein and Wagner, Klingsor’s Last Summer).
1932	Journey to the East (Die Morgenlandfahrt). 1932–43 Composition of The Glass Bead Game (Glasperlenspiel).
1933	Little World (Kleine Welt), stories from Neighbors, Detours, and Sketches from an Indian Journey, slightly revised.
1934	From the Tree of Life (Vom Baum des Lebens), selected poems.
1935	Storybook (Fabulierbuch).
1936	Hours in the Garden (Stunden im Garten).
1937	In Memoriam (Gedenkblätter). New Poems (Neue Gedichte). The Lame Boy (Der lahme Knabe).
1939–45	Hesse’s works were proscribed in Germany. Steppenwolf, Reflections, Narcissus and Goldmund could no longer be printed. In all, during the years 1933–45, twenty titles by Hesse (including reprints) were available, and in those twelve years they reached a total of 481,000 copies (a number somewhat below the number of Hesse books sold in German-speaking countries in 1972 alone). To be sure, 250,000 of these copies may be accounted for by the Reclam volume In the Old Sun (1943) and a further 70,000 by the selection of poems From the Tree of Life, which appeared in 1934 in the series Insel-Bücherei. Nevertheless, the publication of the Collected Works in Separate Volumes continued in Switzerland with Fretz and Wasmuth Publishers.
1942	Poems (Die Gedichte), the first complete edition of Hesse’s poetry.
1943	The Glass Bead Game.
1945	The Flowering Branch (Der Blütenzweig), a selection from the poems. Bertold. Dream Traces (Traumfährte).
1946	If the War Goes On … (Krieg und Frieden). Publication of Hesse’s works was resumed in Germany by Suhrkamp Publishing Company (formerly S. Fischer). Goethe Prize awarded by Frankfurt am Main. Nobel Prize.
1951	Late Prose (Späte Prosa). Letters (Briefe).
1952	Collected Works in six volumes (Gesammelte Dichtungen). Special edition for the author’s seventy-fifth birthday.
1954	Piktor’s Metamorphoses (Piktors Verwandlungen). Facsimile edition. The Correspondence of Hermann Hesse and Romain Rolland (Briefe: Hermann Hesse—Romain Rolland).
1955	Conjurations (Beschwörungen). Late Prose/New Series (Späte Prosa/Neue Folge). Peace Prize of the German Booksellers’ Association.
1956	Establishment of a Hermann Hesse Prize by the Society for the Advancement of German Art in Baden-Württemberg.
1957	Collected Works in seven volumes (Gesammelte Schriften).
1961	Steps (Stufen), a selection of old and new poetry.
1962	In Memoriam (Gedenkblätter). (The 1937 edition expanded to include fifteen additional texts.) August 9—the death of Hermann Hesse in Montagnola.