Comparison of Hermann Hesse and Shams Tabrizi with a Focus on Knulp and Maqalat

Abstract

Hermann Hesse (1877-1962 AD) was a German author and mystic. He became acquainted with the teachings of Christian theology from an early age and then showed an inclination towards Eastern mystical schools in his youth. The events in his life and his mystical studies created a special style for him, which could be seen in the story of Knulp ; a modern story that deals with the mystic personality of a character called Knulp. By way of comparison, Shams Tabrizi (582-645 AH) was an Iranian mystic whose stories have been narrated in Shams' Maqalat (Conversations). Analogies could be drawn between the mystical image of the character of Knulp in the story of Knulp and Shams Tabrizi in Maqalat. Applying a descriptive-comparative method, in this article, we first provide a brief introduction to Hesse and describe the place of mysticism in his thoughts and works. We then examine Knulp in terms of its form and content, and explain the mystical characteristics of the leading character at different stages of his life. In the following, we give a brief description of Shams' life to present his mystical features. In the final part, comparisons are made between the two works, Knulp and Shams Maqalat, and the similarities between the two characters of Knulp and Shams Tabrizi will be described. Among these similarities, we can refer to the narratives of both works which depict the personality traits of Knulp and Shams, such as spiritual loneliness and humor. The main difference, however, is that Knulp is a literary work, but Maqalat is an intuitive one.

Keywords

• knulp story
• shams
• mysticism
• shams maqalat
• hesse