Luís's Reviews > O Lobo das Estepes

The Steppe Wolf is a novel by German writer Hermann Hesse. The author is a pacifist and a great humanist. The book was published in 1927. Although this novel was published at the beginning of the 20th Century, it has kept all its freshness and brilliance. This work is a robust, powerful, and dense book. A preface precedes this novel by the publisher, where he explains how he came into possession of the manuscript. The main protagonist of the story is Harry Haller. He is in his fifties and lives alone because his wife left him. He has an extraordinary intelligence quotient: IQ. He's an introvert. He avoids his peers and only goes out at nightfall to roam the city. He likes to read philosophy books, listen to classical music, and love poetry. He runs away from people, so he gives himself the nickname of Steppe Wolf. He has suicidal impulses because he sometimes thinks about suicide. One evening, afraid of taking action, he enters a tavern. There, he meets a bubbly young woman, Hermine. The latter, taking life on the bright side, becomes attached to him and leads him to dance, drink, and live like his fellows. With the meeting with Hermine, Harry became another. He must reconcile the two sides: the animal part in us and the spiritual domain. The Steppe Wolf: A masterpiece!