the_glass_bead_game epitome of incomprehensibility Herman Hesse. In a new translation by Richard and Clara Winston, not so new now. The cover is trippy. The title in German is quite melodious: Das Glasperlenspiel. Often long German words sound awkward to English ears, but "Das Glasperlenspiel" is a thing of beauty. 160802 ... e_o_i I'm trying to make things out of actual beads for a craft show Sunday. I don't have purple beads in the right size to make a rainbow flag. Did I mention this before? Of course Dorval has its Dorval Celebrates thing on the same day as the Montreal gay pride parade, so I've lost some of my target demographic. "Target demographic" is my new heavy metal band. It's solid gold. My eyes are heavy - sleep is good - but I'm lonely so I'm writing. Boo-hoo. Emo like a Ticon. Crash of the titans for forty winks and forty knights. A frustration again: can't find some yellow glass seed beads, size 3, that are integral to a necklace I left unfinished. 160810 ... e_o_i Yes, I mentioned the lack of purple in detail in purple_pride. Anyway, the actual book is an imaginary biography of a leader of an imaginary intellectual discipline in an imaginary province called Castalia, a place entirely devoted to intellectual disciplines (it's part of a larger country that seems a bit like Switzerland, though the author was German). People there study art such as music in detail, but they rarely do creative work themselves. It sounds a bit boring, but it's kind of fascinating. Maybe not exciting, exactly, but interesting - meditative - and not quite like anything I've read before. It's partly serious, partly satirical. At first, when I was in the section where the main character Joseph Knecht keeps rising in the hierarchy, it seemed to me like "success porn" (I was feeling unsuccessful when I thought that). Where are the obstacles, the conflicts? And why are things so abstract all the time? (Halfway through the book, now, some conflict has reappeared; not only personal conflict, but conflict between the lifestyle of Castalia and the "world".) But it's also specific in its descriptions, and that's where some of the humour comes from: e.g. the white guy who lives like his idea of a Chinese sage and has everybody call him Elder Brother. There's a long description of a goldfish pond in his garden - and at the same time it's calm and meditative, and serious enough in a way. I don't know. I feel like I need to read what other people think of it. But I'll wait until I finish the book first. 160811 what's it to you? who go blather from