Demian
EditionTranslated from the original German
A boy caught in a bully’s power is set free by a strange older schoolmate, and begins to follow the mark of Cain toward himself.
Also in the library: the complete Korean translation.
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DRM-free files. Translation CC BY-NC 4.0; the original work is in the public domain.
About the book
Emil Sinclair grows up in a pious, orderly house, yet even as a child he feels a second, darker world pressing at its doors. When a lie told to impress a bully puts him in that boy’s power, he is rescued by Max Demian, an older pupil who reads the story of Cain the other way round and seems to know what Sinclair is thinking. Through drinking bouts at boarding school, a girl he names Beatrice, an organist who teaches him the name Abraxas, and Demian’s mother, Frau Eva, Sinclair looks for the way that leads to himself, until the war of 1914 overtakes them all.
This complete English translation is made directly from the German of the S. Fischer edition of 1921. Sinclair’s long, returning sentences are kept, the words the book turns on, the mark, fate, the guide, the bird and the egg, are rendered the same way each time, and each of the 793 paragraphs of the original appears as one paragraph.
Highlights
- The life of every human being is a way to himself, the attempt at a way, the intimation of a path.
- Whoever would be born must destroy a world.
- The true calling for everyone was only this one thing: to come to himself.
Contents
Anyone can read up to the first chapter. Chapters with a lock are open to free members.
Colophon
Translated from the original German. Licensed CC BY-NC 4.0.Full colophon
Demian
The Story of Emil Sinclair’s Youth
Original title · Demian. Die Geschichte von Emil Sinclairs Jugend
Author · Hermann Hesse (1877–1962)
Translator · Ether Library
First publication · 1919, S. Fischer Verlag, Berlin.
Source text · A public-domain digital transcription of the S. Fischer edition (Berlin, 1921). Translated directly from the German.
Extent · Complete and unabridged · a prologue and eight chapters · 793 paragraphs, as in the original · no translator’s notes
Copyright · First published in 1919, the original work is in the public domain in the United States. The author died in 1962; the work is also in the public domain in Korea. In the European Union, the United Kingdom, and other countries with a term of life plus seventy years, it remains protected until the end of 2032.
This translation · Translated from the German by Ether Library. The English text is © Ether Library and is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0): you may copy and share it for noncommercial purposes, with attribution.
Edition · English edition 1.0 · October 2026
Typography · Set in Lora (SIL Open Font License 1.1). Cover painting and design by Ether Library.
Original in the public domain (United States, Korea) · English translation CC BY-NC 4.0
Ether Library · No. 0015