prompt:
Chapter: GOTAMA

In the town of Savathi, every child knew the name of the exalted Buddha,
and every house was prepared to fill the alms-dish of Gotama's
disciples, the silently begging ones.  Near the town was Gotama's
favourite place to stay, the grove of Jetavana, which the rich merchant
Anathapindika, an obedient worshipper of the exalted one, had given him
and his people for a gift.

All tales and answers, which the two young ascetics had received in
their search for Gotama's abode, had pointed them towards this area.
And arriving at Savathi, in the very first house, before the door of
which they stopped to beg, food has been offered to them, and they
accepted the food, and Siddhartha asked the woman, who handed them the
food:

"We would like to know, oh charitable one, where the Buddha dwells, the
most venerable one, for we are two Samanas from the forest and have
come, to see him, the perfected one, and to hear the teachings from his
mouth."

Quoth the woman:  "Here, you have truly come to the right place, you
Samanas from the forest.  You should know, in Jetavana, in the garden
of Anathapindika is where the exalted one dwells.  There you pilgrims
shall spent the night, for there is enough space for the innumerable,
who flock here, to hear the teachings from his mouth."

This made Govinda happy, and full of joy he exclaimed:  "Well so, thus
we have reached our destination, and our path has come to an end!  But
tell us, oh mother of the pilgrims, do you know him, the Buddha, have
you seen him with your own eyes?"

Quoth the woman:  "Many times I have seen him, the exalted one.  On many
days, I have seen him, walking through the alleys in silence, wearing
his yellow cloak, presenting his alms-dish in silence at the doors of
the houses, leaving with a filled dish."

Delightedly, Govinda listened and wanted to ask and hear much more.
But Siddhartha urged him to walk on.  They thanked and left and hardly
had to ask for directions, for rather many pilgrims and monks as well
from Gotama's community were on their way to the Jetavana.  And since
they reached it at night, there were constant arrivals, shouts, and
talk of those who sought shelter and got it.  The two Samanas,
accustomed to life in the forest, found quickly and without making any
noise a place to stay and rested there until the morning.

At sunrise, they saw with astonishment what a large crowd of believers
and curious people had spent the night here.  On all paths of the
marvellous grove, monks walked in yellow robes, under the trees they
sat here and there, in deep contemplation--or in a conversation about
spiritual matters, the shady gardens looked like a city, full of people,
bustling like bees.  The majority of the monks went out with their
alms-dish, to collect food in town for their lunch, the only meal of the
day.  The Buddha himself, the enlightened one, was also in the habit of
taking this walk to beg in the morning.

Siddhartha saw him, and he instantly recognised him, as if a god had
pointed him out to him.  He saw him, a simple man in a yellow robe,
bearing the alms-dish in his hand, walking silently.

"Look here!" Siddhartha said quietly to Govinda.  "This one is the
Buddha."

Attentively, Govinda looked at the monk in the yellow robe, who seemed
to be in no way different from the hundreds of other monks.  And soon,
Govinda also realized:  This is the one.  And they followed him and
observed him.

The Buddha went on his way, modestly and deep in his thoughts, his
calm face was neither happy nor sad, it seemed to smile quietly and
inwardly.  With a hidden smile, quiet, calm, somewhat resembling a
healthy child, the Buddha walked, wore the robe and placed his feet
just as all of his monks did, according to a precise rule.  But his
face and his walk, his quietly lowered glance, his quietly dangling hand
and even every finger of his quietly dangling hand expressed peace,
expressed perfection, did not search, did not imitate, breathed softly
in an unwhithering calm, in an unwhithering light, an untouchable peace.

Thus Gotama walked towards the town, to collect alms, and the two
Samanas recognised him solely by the perfection of his calm, by the
quietness of his appearance, in which there was no searching, no desire,
no imitation, no effort to be seen, only light and peace.

"Today, we'll hear the teachings from his mouth." said Govinda.

Siddhartha did not answer.  He felt little curiosity for the teachings,
he did not believe that they would teach him anything new, but he had,
just as Govinda had, heard the contents of this Buddha's teachings
again and again, though these reports only represented second- or
third-hand information.  But attentively he looked at Gotama's head,
his shoulders, his feet, his quietly dangling hand, and it seemed to
him as if every joint of every finger of this hand was of these
teachings, spoke of, breathed of, exhaled the fragrant of, glistened of
truth.  This man, this Buddha was truthful down to the gesture of his
last finger.  This man was holy.  Never before, Siddhartha had venerated
a person so much, never before he had loved a person as much as this
one.

They both followed the Buddha until they reached the town and then
returned in silence, for they themselves intended to abstain from
on this day.  They saw Gotama returning--what he ate could not even have
satisfied a bird's appetite, and they saw him retiring into the shade
of the mango-trees.

But in the evening, when the heat cooled down and everyone in the camp
started to bustle about and gathered around, they heard the Buddha
teaching.  They heard his voice, and it was also perfected, was of
perfect calmness, was full of peace.  Gotama taught the teachings of
suffering, of the origin of suffering, of the way to relieve suffering.
Calmly and clearly his quiet speech flowed on.  Suffering was life,
full of suffering was the world, but salvation from suffering had been
found:  salvation was obtained by him who would walk the path of the
Buddha.  With a soft, yet firm voice the exalted one spoke, taught the
four main doctrines, taught the eightfold path, patiently he went the
usual path of the teachings, of the examples, of the repetitions,
brightly and quietly his voice hovered over the listeners, like a light,
like a starry sky.

When the Buddha--night had already fallen--ended his speech, many a
pilgrim stepped forward and asked to accepted into the community, sought
refuge in the teachings.  And Gotama accepted them by speaking:  "You
have heard the teachings well, it has come to you well.  Thus join us
and walk in holiness, to put an end to all suffering."

Behold, then Govinda, the shy one, also stepped forward and spoke:  "I
also take my refuge in the exalted one and his teachings," and he asked
to accepted into the community of his disciples and was accepted.

Right afterwards, when the Buddha had retired for the night, Govinda
turned to Siddhartha and spoke eagerly:  "Siddhartha, it is not my place
to scold you.  We have both heard the exalted one, we have both
perceived the teachings.  Govinda has heard the teachings, he has taken
refuge in it.  But you, my honoured friend, don't you also want to walk
the path of salvation?  Would you want to hesitate, do you want to wait
any longer?"

Siddhartha awakened as if he had been asleep, when he heard Govinda's
words.  For a long time, he looked into Govinda's face.  Then he spoke
quietly, in a voice without mockery:  "Govinda, my friend, now you have
taken this step, now you have chosen this path.  Always, oh Govinda,
you've been my friend, you've always walked one step behind me.  Often I
have thought:  Won't Govinda for once also take a step by himself,
without me, out of his own soul?  Behold, now you've turned into a man
and are choosing your path for yourself.  I wish that you would go it up
to its end, oh my friend, that you shall find salvation!"

Govinda, not completely understanding it yet, repeated his question in
an impatient tone:  "Speak up, I beg you, my dear!  Tell me, since it
could not be any other way, that you also, my learned friend, will take
your refuge with the exalted Buddha!"

Siddhartha placed his hand on Govinda's shoulder:  "You failed to hear
my good wish for you, oh Govinda.  I'm repeating it:  I wish that you
would go this path up to its end, that you shall find salvation!"

In this moment, Govinda realized that his friend had left him, and he
started to weep.

"Siddhartha!" he exclaimed lamentingly.

Siddhartha kindly spoke to him:  "Don't forget, Govinda, that you are
now one of the Samanas of the Buddha!  You have renounced your home
and your parents, renounced your birth and possessions, renounced your
free will, renounced all friendship.  This is what the teachings
require, this is what the exalted one wants.  This is what you wanted
for yourself.  Tomorrow, oh Govinda, I'll leave you."

For a long time, the friends continued walking in the grove; for a long
time, they lay there and found no sleep.  And over and over again,
Govinda urged his friend, he should tell him why he would not want to
seek refuge in Gotama's teachings, what fault he would find in these
teachings.  But Siddhartha turned him away every time and said:  "Be
content, Govinda!  Very good are the teachings of the exalted one, how
could I find a fault in them?"

Very early in the morning, a follower of Buddha, one of his oldest
monks, went through the garden and called all those to him who had as
novices taken their refuge in the teachings, to dress them up in the
yellow robe and to instruct them in the first teachings and duties of
their position.  Then Govinda broke loose, embraced once again his
childhood friend and left with the novices.

But Siddhartha walked through the grove, lost in thought.

Then he happened to meet Gotama, the exalted one, and when he greeted
him with respect and the Buddha's glance was so full of kindness and
calm, the young man summoned his courage and asked the venerable one for
the permission to talk to him.  Silently the exalted one nodded his
approval.

Quoth Siddhartha:  "Yesterday, oh exalted one, I had been privileged to
hear your wondrous teachings.  Together with my friend, I had come from
afar, to hear your teachings.  And now my friend is going to stay with
your people, he has taken his refuge with you.  But I will again start
on my pilgrimage."

"As you please," the venerable one spoke politely.

"Too bold is my speech," Siddhartha continued, "but I do not want to
leave the exalted one without having honestly told him my thoughts.
Does it please the venerable one to listen to me for one moment longer?"

Silently, the Buddha nodded his approval.

Quoth Siddhartha:  "One thing, oh most venerable one, I have admired in
your teachings most of all.  Everything in your teachings is perfectly
clear, is proven; you are presenting the world as a perfect chain, a
chain which is never and nowhere broken, an eternal chain the links of
which are causes and effects.  Never before, this has been seen so
clearly; never before, this has been presented so irrefutably; truly,
the heart of every Brahman has to beat stronger with love, once he has
seen the world through your teachings perfectly connected, without gaps,
clear as a crystal, not depending on chance, not depending on gods.
Whether it may be good or bad, whether living according to it would be
suffering or joy, I do not wish to discuss, possibly this is not
essential--but the uniformity of the world, that everything which
happens is connected, that the great and the small things are all
encompassed by the same forces of time, by the same law of causes, of
coming into being and of dying, this is what shines brightly out of your
exalted teachings, oh perfected one.  But according to your very own
teachings, this unity and necessary sequence of all things is
nevertheless broken in one place, through a small gap, this world of
unity is invaded by something alien, something new, something which had
not been there before, and which cannot be demonstrated and cannot be
proven: these are your teachings of overcoming the world, of salvation.
But with this small gap, with this small breach, the entire eternal and
uniform law of the world is breaking apart again and becomes void.
Please forgive me for expressing this objection."

Quietly, Gotama had listened to him, unmoved.  Now he spoke, the
perfected one, with his kind, with his polite and clear voice:  "You've
heard the teachings, oh son of a Brahman, and good for you that you've
thought about it thus deeply.  You've found a gap in it, an error.  You
should think about this further.  But be warned, oh seeker of knowledge,
of the thicket of opinions and of arguing about words.  There is nothing
to opinions, they may be beautiful or ugly, smart or foolish, everyone
can support them or discard them.  But the teachings, you've heard from
me, are no opinion, and their goal is not to explain the world to those
who seek knowledge.  They have a different goal; their goal is salvation
from suffering.  This is what Gotama teaches, nothing else."

"I wish that you, oh exalted one, would not be angry with me," said the
young man.  "I have not spoken to you like this to argue with you, to
argue about words.  You are truly right, there is little to opinions.
But let me say this one more thing:  I have not doubted in you for a
single moment.  I have not doubted for a single moment that you are
Buddha, that you have reached the goal, the highest goal towards which
so many thousands of Brahmans and sons of Brahmans are on their way.
You have found salvation from death.  It has come to you in the course
of your own search, on your own path, through thoughts, through
meditation, through realizations, through enlightenment.  It has not
come to you by means of teachings!  And--thus is my thought, oh exalted
one,--nobody will obtain salvation by means of teachings!  You will not
be able to convey and say to anybody, oh venerable one, in words and
through teachings what has happened to you in the hour of enlightenment!
The teachings of the enlightened Buddha contain much, it teaches many to
live righteously, to avoid evil.  But there is one thing which these so
clear, these so venerable teachings do not contain:  they do not contain
the mystery of what the exalted one has experienced for himself, he
alone among hundreds of thousands.  This is what I have thought and
realized, when I have heard the teachings.  This is why I am continuing
my travels--not to seek other, better teachings, for I know there are
none, but to depart from all teachings and all teachers and to reach my
goal by myself or to die.  But often, I'll think of this day, oh exalted
one, and of this hour, when my eyes beheld a holy man."

The Buddha's eyes quietly looked to the ground; quietly, in perfect
equanimity his inscrutable face was smiling.

"I wish," the venerable one spoke slowly, "that your thoughts shall not
be in error, that you shall reach the goal!  But tell me:  Have you seen
the multitude of my Samanas, my many brothers, who have taken refuge in
the teachings?  And do you believe, oh stranger, oh Samana, do you
believe that it would be better for them all the abandon the teachings
and to return into the life the world and of desires?"

"Far is such a thought from my mind," exclaimed Siddhartha.  "I wish
that they shall all stay with the teachings, that they shall reach their
goal!  It is not my place to judge another person's life.  Only for
myself, for myself alone, I must decide, I must chose, I must refuse.
Salvation from the self is what we Samanas search for, oh exalted one.
If I merely were one of your disciples, oh venerable one, I'd fear that
it might happen to me that only seemingly, only deceptively my self
would be calm and be redeemed, but that in truth it would live on and
grow, for then I had replaced my self with the teachings, my duty to
follow you, my love for you, and the community of the monks!"

With half of a smile, with an unwavering openness and kindness,
Gotama looked into the stranger's eyes and bid him to leave with a
hardly noticeable gesture.

"You are wise, oh Samana.", the venerable one spoke.

"You know how to talk wisely, my friend.  Be aware of too much wisdom!"

The Buddha turned away, and his glance and half of a smile remained
forever etched in Siddhartha's memory.

I have never before seen a person glance and smile, sit and walk this
way, he thought; truly, I wish to be able to glance and smile, sit and
walk this way, too, thus free, thus venerable, thus concealed, thus
open, thus child-like and mysterious.  Truly, only a person who has
succeeded in reaching the innermost part of his self would glance and
walk this way.  Well so, I also will seek to reach the innermost part
of my self.

I saw a man, Siddhartha thought, a single man, before whom I would have
to lower my glance.  I do not want to lower my glance before any other,
not before any other.  No teachings will entice me any more, since this
man's teachings have not enticed me.

I am deprived by the Buddha, thought Siddhartha, I am deprived, and
even more he has given to me.  He has deprived me of my friend, the one
who had believed in me and now believes in him, who had been my shadow
and is now Gotama's shadow.  But he has given me Siddhartha, myself.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: In this sequence, Siddhartha goes with Govinda to hear the teachings of Buddha, and Govinda remains with Buddha to become his disciple. Siddhartha, however, feels that everyone must find his own way to salvation and, hence, does not remain. The "Gotama" sequence begins with Buddha's taking alms in the town of Savathi and his abiding in the Jetavana grove. Reference is made to a specific night when a lady tells Siddhartha and Govinda that they may sleep among the pilgrims. By daybreak, the town is swarming with the followers of Gotama Buddha, and Siddhartha and Govinda see him for the first time. Despite his commonplace appearance and traditional yellow monk's garb, he stands out because he radiates inner peace. It is during this day that we learn of Siddhartha's affinity to Buddha and his complete love for him for possessing truth, knowledge, and peace. However, we learn that despite his attraction toward Buddha, Siddhartha is adamant in his disinterest in teachings. That evening, Buddha preaches before the crowd that there is salvation from pain and suffering for those who follow the prescribed course of Buddhism -- that is, the Four Noble Truths -- of which the fourth involves the taking of the Eightfold Path. Govinda volunteers to join the Buddhist pilgrims and hopes that Siddhartha will also join. Siddhartha, however, declines, and the impending separation of the two boyhood friends brings tears to their eyes. After their fraternal embrace and Govinda's taking the monk's habit, Siddhartha wanders through the grove and meets Gotama. They engage in a deep conversation in which Siddhartha extols Gotama's doctrine of understanding the world as a complete, unbroken, eternal chain, linked together by cause and effect. It is in this conversation that Siddhartha points out that the doctrine of salvation is neither shown nor proven. Gotama concedes the flaw in logic but asserts that his message is not for the intellectually curious, but that he seeks only to teach salvation. Siddhartha again voices the central idea of the novel: He reminds the Buddha that the process of enlightenment which he underwent is unteachable, that there is no way of communicating first-hand experience to disciples. One can find the secret of self-realization only by going one's own way. Siddhartha, speaking only for himself and not for the other pilgrims, tells of his resolve to leave all doctrines and all teachers behind and to reach his goal alone. As they part, the smile of the Buddha remains in Siddhartha's mind, and he associates it with a man who has conquered his self. And even though Siddhartha feels that he has lost his friend Govinda to Buddha, he feels that he has gained something from Buddha -- the inspiration of direct, firsthand contact with the Illustrious One, which further strengthens his resolve to conquer self. Yet Siddhartha again rejects formal doctrine for the same reason as before: Enlightenment defies structured doctrine and transcends the teaching process. The formal doctrine of Buddhist salvation is briefly as follows: It includes a system of which the keys are alluded to in the text -- that is, the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. The Four Noble Truths include the existence of pain, pain's cause being desire or attachment, the possibility of enduring pain by suppressing desire, and the Eightfold Path to salvation. This path involves right faith, right life, right language, right purpose, right practice, right effort, right thinking, and right meditation. The link between this system and salvation lies in a "chain of causation," which is based on the cause-effect relationship between desire and pain. The root cause of pain is birth , for the consequence of birth is exposure to time, illness, and death. Birth is but one point in the transmigration of souls inherent in the life cycle. Of the important motifs of the novel, the one which is introduced in the "Gotama" sequence is that of the smile. It is evoked from self-realization and will appear again in the final section of the novel


prompt:
Chapter: AWAKENING

When Siddhartha left the grove, where the Buddha, the perfected one,
stayed behind, where Govinda stayed behind, then he felt that in this
grove his past life also stayed behind and parted from him.  He pondered
about this sensation, which filled him completely, as he was slowly
walking along.  He pondered deeply, like diving into a deep water he
let himself sink down to the ground of the sensation, down to the place
where the causes lie, because to identify the causes, so it seemed to
him, is the very essence of thinking, and by this alone sensations turn
into realizations and are not lost, but become entities and start to
emit like rays of light what is inside of them.

Slowly walking along, Siddhartha pondered.  He realized that he was no
youth any more, but had turned into a man.  He realized that one thing
had left him, as a snake is left by its old skin, that one thing no
longer existed in him, which had accompanied him throughout his youth
and used to be a part of him: the wish to have teachers and to listen to
teachings.  He had also left the last teacher who had appeared on his
path, even him, the highest and wisest teacher, the most holy one,
Buddha, he had left him, had to part with him, was not able to accept
his teachings.

Slower, he walked along in his thoughts and asked himself:  "But what
is this, what you have sought to learn from teachings and from teachers,
and what they, who have taught you much, were still unable to teach
you?"  And he found:  "It was the self, the purpose and essence of which
I sought to learn.  It was the self, I wanted to free myself from, which
I sought to overcome.  But I was not able to overcome it, could only
deceive it, could only flee from it, only hide from it.  Truly, no
thing in this world has kept my thoughts thus busy, as this my very own
self, this mystery of me being alive, of me being one and being
separated and isolated from all others, of me being Siddhartha!  And
there is no thing in this world I know less about than about me, about
Siddhartha!"

Having been pondering while slowly walking along, he now stopped as
these thoughts caught hold of him, and right away another thought sprang
forth from these, a new thought, which was:  "That I know nothing about
myself, that Siddhartha has remained thus alien and unknown to me, stems
from one cause, a single cause:  I was afraid of myself, I was fleeing
from myself!  I searched Atman, I searched Brahman, I was willing to
dissect my self and peel off all of its layers, to find the core of
all peels in its unknown interior, the Atman, life, the divine part, the
ultimate part.  But I have lost myself in the process."

Siddhartha opened his eyes and looked around, a smile filled his face
and a feeling of awakening from long dreams flowed through him from his
head down to his toes.  And it was not long before he walked again,
walked quickly like a man who knows what he has got to do.

"Oh," he thought, taking a deep breath, "now I would not let Siddhartha
escape from me again!  No longer, I want to begin my thoughts and my
life with Atman and with the suffering of the world.  I do not want to
kill and dissect myself any longer, to find a secret behind the ruins.
Neither Yoga-Veda shall teach me any more, nor Atharva-Veda, nor the
ascetics, nor any kind of teachings.  I want to learn from myself, want
to be my student, want to get to know myself, the secret of Siddhartha."

He looked around, as if he was seeing the world for the first time.
Beautiful was the world, colourful was the world, strange and mysterious
was the world!  Here was blue, here was yellow, here was green, the sky
and the river flowed, the forest and the mountains were rigid, all of it
was beautiful, all of it was mysterious and magical, and in its midst was
he, Siddhartha, the awakening one, on the path to himself.  All of this,
all this yellow and blue, river and forest, entered Siddhartha for the
first time through the eyes, was no longer a spell of Mara, was no
longer the veil of Maya, was no longer a pointless and coincidental
diversity of mere appearances, despicable to the deeply thinking Brahman,
who scorns diversity, who seeks unity.  Blue was blue, river was river,
and if also in the blue and the river, in Siddhartha, the singular and
divine lived hidden, so it was still that very divinity's way and
purpose, to be here yellow, here blue, there sky, there forest, and here
Siddhartha.  The purpose and the essential properties were not somewhere
behind the things, they were in them, in everything.

"How deaf and stupid have I been!" he thought, walking swiftly along.
"When someone reads a text, wants to discover its meaning, he will not
scorn the symbols and letters and call them deceptions, coincidence,
and worthless hull, but he will read them, he will study and love them,
letter by letter.  But I, who wanted to read the book of the world and
the book of my own being, I have, for the sake of a meaning I had
anticipated before I read, scorned the symbols and letters, I called the
visible world a deception, called my eyes and my tongue coincidental
and worthless forms without substance.  No, this is over, I have
awakened, I have indeed awakened and have not been born before this
very day."

In thinking these thoughts, Siddhartha stopped once again, suddenly, as
if there was a snake lying in front of him on the path.

Because suddenly, he had also become aware of this:  He, who was indeed
like someone who had just woken up or like a new-born baby, he had to
start his life anew and start again at the very beginning.  When he had
left in this very morning from the grove Jetavana, the grove of that
exalted one, already awakening, already on the path towards himself,
he had every intention, regarded as natural and took for granted, that
he, after years as an ascetic, would return to his home and his father.
But now, only in this moment, when he stopped as if a snake was lying on
his path, he also awoke to this realization:  "But I am no longer the
one I was, I am no ascetic any more, I am not a priest any more, I am no
Brahman any more.  Whatever should I do at home and at my father's
place?  Study?  Make offerings?  Practise meditation?  But all this is
over, all of this is no longer alongside my path."

Motionless, Siddhartha remained standing there, and for the time of
one moment and breath, his heart felt cold, he felt a cold in his chest,
as a small animal, a bird or a rabbit, would when seeing how alone he
was.  For many years, he had been without home and had felt nothing.
Now, he felt it.  Still, even in the deepest meditation, he had been
his father's son, had been a Brahman, of a high caste, a cleric.  Now,
he was nothing but Siddhartha, the awoken one, nothing else was left.
Deeply, he inhaled, and for a moment, he felt cold and shivered.
Nobody was thus alone as he was.  There was no nobleman who did not
belong to the noblemen, no worker that did not belong to the workers,
and found refuge with them, shared their life, spoke their language.
No Brahman, who would not be regarded as Brahmans and lived with them,
no ascetic who would not find his refuge in the caste of the Samanas,
and even the most forlorn hermit in the forest was not just one and
alone, he was also surrounded by a place he belonged to, he also
belonged to a caste, in which he was at home.  Govinda had become a
monk, and a thousand monks were his brothers, wore the same robe as he,
believed in his faith, spoke his language.  But he, Siddhartha, where
did he belong to?  With whom would he share his life?  Whose language
would he speak?

Out of this moment, when the world melted away all around him, when he
stood alone like a star in the sky, out of this moment of a cold and
despair, Siddhartha emerged, more a self than before, more firmly
concentrated.  He felt:  This had been the last tremor of the awakening,
the last struggle of this birth.  And it was not long until he walked
again in long strides, started to proceed swiftly and impatiently,
heading no longer for home, no longer to his father, no longer back.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: This brief sequence portends a basic turning point in the novel and signals the end of Part I. The mood of this sequence is one of great loneliness, for Siddhartha is beyond the point of being able to return home again, and now he has parted ways with Govinda. He reflects that he has left his former life behind him and has now matured from youth to manhood. He again contemplates the limitations of teachers and reflects that among the things that they cannot teach is the matter of the self. The tone approaches despair as Siddhartha seeks to rid himself of self, or at least to try to flee from self. He sees that there is nothing about which he knows less than his self. He reflects that his lack of knowledge of his self grew out of fear and the desire to flee, and that in his search for Atman he became lost. He feels an awakening and asserts that he will no longer try to escape from Siddhartha. He believes now that he can slough off his search for Atman, his asceticism, and the scriptures. He resolves to learn the secret of Siddhartha from himself. At this point, all the world around Siddhartha exudes the colorations of sensual beauty, and he is at the brink of the theory that reality is in the world itself, the sensual world. He feels that he has suddenly awakened. Then an icy chill comes over him as he realizes that he is completely alone. Having shed the old skin of meditation, he realizes now that he is not the Brahmin's son any more. Realizing that he belongs to no family or peer group whatever, he falls into a spasm of despair, while at the same time he feels more firmly himself than ever. As Siddhartha experiences the pangs of this awakening, he resolves to never again "walk backwards." This "Awakening" sequence terminates Part I and prefigures Siddhartha's crossing the river to enter into the sensual world of the city with the beautiful courtesan Kamala. The metaphorically rich imagery of a snake molting its old skin anticipates a later appearance of this popular Indian motif.


prompt:
Chapter: SECOND PART Dedicated to Wilhelm Gundert, my cousin in Japan KAMALA

Siddhartha learned something new on every step of his path, for the
world was transformed, and his heart was enchanted.  He saw the sun
rising over the mountains with their forests and setting over the
distant beach with its palm-trees.  At night, he saw the stars in the
sky in their fixed positions and the crescent of the moon floating like
a boat in the blue.  He saw trees, stars, animals, clouds, rainbows,
rocks, herbs, flowers, stream and river, the glistening dew in the
bushes in the morning, distant high mountains which were blue and
pale, birds sang and bees, wind silverishly blew through the rice-field.
All of this, a thousand-fold and colourful, had always been there,
always the sun and the moon had shone, always rivers had roared and
bees had buzzed, but in former times all of this had been nothing more
to Siddhartha than a fleeting, deceptive veil before his eyes,
looked upon in distrust, destined to be penetrated and destroyed by
thought, since it was not the essential existence, since this essence
lay beyond, on the other side of, the visible.  But now, his liberated
eyes stayed on this side, he saw and became aware of the visible, sought
to be at home in this world, did not search for the true essence, did
not aim at a world beyond.  Beautiful was this world, looking at it thus,
without searching, thus simply, thus childlike.  Beautiful were the moon
and the stars, beautiful was the stream and the banks, the forest and
the rocks, the goat and the gold-beetle, the flower and the butterfly.
Beautiful and lovely it was, thus to walk through the world, thus
childlike, thus awoken, thus open to what is near, thus without
distrust.  Differently the sun burnt the head, differently the shade
of the forest cooled him down, differently the stream and the cistern,
the pumpkin and the banana tasted.  Short were the days, short the
nights, every hour sped swiftly away like a sail on the sea, and under
the sail was a ship full of treasures, full of joy.  Siddhartha saw a
group of apes moving through the high canopy of the forest, high in the
branches, and heard their savage, greedy song.  Siddhartha saw a male
sheep following a female one and mating with her.  In a lake of reeds,
he saw the pike hungrily hunting for its dinner; propelling themselves
away from it, in fear, wiggling and sparkling, the young fish jumped in
droves out of the water; the scent of strength and passion came
forcefully out of the hasty eddies of the water, which the pike stirred
up, impetuously hunting.

All of this had always existed, and he had not seen it; he had not been
with it.  Now he was with it, he was part of it.  Light and shadow
ran through his eyes, stars and moon ran through his heart.

On the way, Siddhartha also remembered everything he had experienced in
the Garden Jetavana, the teaching he had heard there, the divine Buddha,
the farewell from Govinda, the conversation with the exalted one.  Again
he remembered his own words, he had spoken to the exalted one, every
word, and with astonishment he became aware of the fact that there he
had said things which he had not really known yet at this time.  What he
had said to Gotama: his, the Buddha's, treasure and secret was not the
teachings, but the unexpressable and not teachable, which he had
experienced in the hour of his enlightenment--it was nothing but this
very thing which he had now gone to experience, what he now began to
experience.  Now, he had to experience his self.  It is true that he had
already known for a long time that his self was Atman, in its essence
bearing the same eternal characteristics as Brahman.  But never, he had
really found this self, because he had wanted to capture it in the net
of thought.  With the body definitely not being the self, and not the
spectacle of the senses, so it also was not the thought, not the
rational mind, not the learned wisdom, not the learned ability to draw
conclusions and to develop previous thoughts in to new ones.  No, this
world of thought was also still on this side, and nothing could be
achieved by killing the random self of the senses, if the random self of
thoughts and learned knowledge was fattened on the other hand.  Both,
the thoughts as well as the senses, were pretty things, the ultimate
meaning was hidden behind both of them, both had to be listened to, both
had to be played with, both neither had to be scorned nor overestimated,
from both the secret voices of the innermost truth had to be attentively
perceived.  He wanted to strive for nothing, except for what the voice
commanded him to strive for, dwell on nothing, except where the voice
would advise him to do so.  Why had Gotama, at that time, in the hour
of all hours, sat down under the bo-tree, where the enlightenment hit
him?  He had heard a voice, a voice in his own heart, which had
commanded him to seek rest under this tree, and he had neither preferred
self-castigation, offerings, ablutions, nor prayer, neither food nor
drink, neither sleep nor dream, he had obeyed the voice.  To obey like
this, not to an external command, only to the voice, to be ready like
this, this was good, this was necessary, nothing else was necessary.

In the night when he slept in the straw hut of a ferryman by the river,
Siddhartha had a dream:  Govinda was standing in front of him, dressed
in the yellow robe of an ascetic.  Sad was how Govinda looked like,
sadly he asked:  Why have you forsaken me?  At this, he embraced
Govinda, wrapped his arms around him, and as he was pulling him close
to his chest and kissed him, it was not Govinda any more, but a woman,
and a full breast popped out of the woman's dress, at which Siddhartha
lay and drank, sweetly and strongly tasted the milk from this breast.
It tasted of woman and man, of sun and forest, of animal and flower,
of every fruit, of every joyful desire.  It intoxicated him and rendered
him unconscious.--When Siddhartha woke up, the pale river shimmered
through the door of the hut, and in the forest, a dark call of an owl
resounded deeply and pleasantly.

When the day began, Siddhartha asked his host, the ferryman, to get him
across the river.  The ferryman got him across the river on his
bamboo-raft, the wide water shimmered reddishly in the light of the
morning.

"This is a beautiful river," he said to his companion.

"Yes," said the ferryman, "a very beautiful river, I love it more than
anything.  Often I have listened to it, often I have looked into its
eyes, and always I have learned from it.  Much can be learned from a
river."

"I thank you, my benefactor," spoke Siddhartha, disembarking on the other
side of the river.  "I have no gift I could give you for your
hospitality, my dear, and also no payment for your work.  I am a man
without a home, a son of a Brahman and a Samana."

"I did see it," spoke the ferryman, "and I haven't expected any payment
from you and no gift which would be the custom for guests to bear.  You
will give me the gift another time."

"Do you think so?" asked Siddhartha amusedly.

"Surely.  This too, I have learned from the river: everything is coming
back!  You too, Samana, will come back.  Now farewell!  Let your
friendship be my reward.  Commemorate me, when you'll make offerings to
the gods."

Smiling, they parted.  Smiling, Siddhartha was happy about the
friendship and the kindness of the ferryman.  "He is like Govinda," he
thought with a smile, "all I meet on my path are like Govinda.  All are
thankful, though they are the ones who would have a right to receive
thanks.  All are submissive, all would like to be friends, like to
obey, think little.  Like children are all people."

At about noon, he came through a village.  In front of the mud cottages,
children were rolling about in the street, were playing with
pumpkin-seeds and sea-shells, screamed and wrestled, but they all
timidly fled from the unknown Samana.  In the end of the village, the
path led through a stream, and by the side of the stream, a young
woman was kneeling and washing clothes.  When Siddhartha greeted her,
she lifted her head and looked up to him with a smile, so that he saw
the white in her eyes glistening.  He called out a blessing to her, as
it is the custom among travellers, and asked how far he still had to go
to reach the large city.  Then she got up and came to him, beautifully
her wet mouth was shimmering in her young face.  She exchanged humorous
banter with him, asked whether he had eaten already, and whether it was
true that the Samanas slept alone in the forest at night and were not
allowed to have any women with them.  While talking, she put her left
foot on his right one and made a movement as a woman does who would want
to initiate that kind of sexual pleasure with a man, which the textbooks
call "climbing a tree".  Siddhartha felt his blood heating up, and since
in this moment he had to think of his dream again, he bend slightly
down to the woman and kissed with his lips the brown nipple of her
breast.  Looking up, he saw her face smiling full of lust and her
eyes, with contracted pupils, begging with desire.

Siddhartha also felt desire and felt the source of his sexuality moving;
but since he had never touched a woman before, he hesitated for a
moment, while his hands were already prepared to reach out for her.  And
in this moment he heard, shuddering with awe, the voice if his innermost
self, and this voice said No.  Then, all charms disappeared from the
young woman's smiling face, he no longer saw anything else but the damp
glance of a female animal in heat.  Politely, he petted her cheek,
turned away from her and disappeared away from the disappointed woman
with light steps into the bamboo-wood.

On this day, he reached the large city before the evening, and was
happy, for he felt the need to be among people.  For a long time, he
had lived in the forests, and the straw hut of the ferryman, in which
he had slept that night, had been the first roof for a long time he has
had over his head.

Before the city, in a beautifully fenced grove, the traveller came
across a small group of servants, both male and female, carrying
baskets.  In their midst, carried by four servants in an ornamental
sedan-chair, sat a woman, the mistress, on red pillows under a colourful
canopy.  Siddhartha stopped at the entrance to the pleasure-garden and
watched the parade, saw the servants, the maids, the baskets, saw the
sedan-chair and saw the lady in it.  Under black hair, which made to
tower high on her head, he saw a very fair, very delicate, very smart
face, a brightly red mouth, like a freshly cracked fig, eyebrows which
were well tended and painted in a high arch, smart and watchful dark
eyes, a clear, tall neck rising from a green and golden garment, resting
fair hands, long and thin, with wide golden bracelets over the wrists.

Siddhartha saw how beautiful she was, and his heart rejoiced.  He bowed
deeply, when the sedan-chair came closer, and straightening up again,
he looked at the fair, charming face, read for a moment in the smart
eyes with the high arcs above, breathed in a slight fragrant, he did
not know.  With a smile, the beautiful women nodded for a moment and
disappeared into the grove, and then the servant as well.

Thus I am entering this city, Siddhartha thought, with a charming omen.
He instantly felt drawn into the grove, but he thought about it, and
only now he became aware of how the servants and maids had looked at him
at the entrance, how despicable, how distrustful, how rejecting.

I am still a Samana, he thought, I am still an ascetic and beggar.  I
must not remain like this, I will not be able to enter the grove like
this.  And he laughed.

The next person who came along this path he asked about the grove and
for the name of the woman, and was told that this was the grove of
Kamala, the famous courtesan, and that, aside from the grove, she owned
a house in the city.

Then, he entered the city.  Now he had a goal.

Pursuing his goal, he allowed the city to suck him in, drifted through
the flow of the streets, stood still on the squares, rested on the
stairs of stone by the river.  When the evening came, he made friends
with barber's assistant, whom he had seen working in the shade of an
arch in a building, whom he found again praying in a temple of Vishnu,
whom he told about stories of Vishnu and the Lakshmi.  Among the boats
by the river, he slept this night, and early in the morning, before the
first customers came into his shop, he had the barber's assistant shave
his beard and cut his hair, comb his hair and anoint it with fine oil.
Then he went to take his bath in the river.

When late in the afternoon, beautiful Kamala approached her grove in her
sedan-chair, Siddhartha was standing at the entrance, made a bow and
received the courtesan's greeting.  But that servant who walked at the
very end of her train he motioned to him and asked him to inform his
mistress that a young Brahman would wish to talk to her.  After a while,
the servant returned, asked him, who had been waiting, to follow him
conducted him, who was following him, without a word into a pavilion,
where Kamala was lying on a couch, and left him alone with her.

"Weren't you already standing out there yesterday, greeting me?" asked
Kamala.

"It's true that I've already seen and greeted you yesterday."

"But didn't you yesterday wear a beard, and long hair, and dust in your
hair?"

"You have observed well, you have seen everything.  You have seen
Siddhartha, the son of a Brahman, who has left his home to become a
Samana, and who has been a Samana for three years.  But now, I have
left that path and came into this city, and the first one I met, even
before I had entered the city, was you.  To say this, I have come to
you, oh Kamala!  You are the first woman whom Siddhartha is not
addressing with his eyes turned to the ground.  Never again I want to
turn my eyes to the ground, when I'm coming across a beautiful woman."

Kamala smiled and played with her fan of peacocks' feathers.  And asked:
"And only to tell me this, Siddhartha has come to me?"

"To tell you this and to thank you for being so beautiful.  And if it
doesn't displease you, Kamala, I would like to ask you to be my friend
and teacher, for I know nothing yet of that art which you have mastered
in the highest degree."

At this, Kamala laughed aloud.

"Never before this has happened to me, my friend, that a Samana from the
forest came to me and wanted to learn from me!  Never before this has
happened to me, that a Samana came to me with long hair and an old, torn
loin-cloth!  Many young men come to me, and there are also sons of
Brahmans among them, but they come in beautiful clothes, they come in
fine shoes, they have perfume in their hair and money in their pouches.
This is, oh Samana, how the young men are like who come to me."

Quoth Siddhartha:  "Already I am starting to learn from you.  Even
yesterday, I was already learning.  I have already taken off my beard,
have combed the hair, have oil in my hair.  There is little which is
still missing in me, oh excellent one: fine clothes, fine shoes, money
in my pouch.  You shall know, Siddhartha has set harder goals for
himself than such trifles, and he has reached them.  How shouldn't I
reach that goal, which I have set for myself yesterday:  to be your
friend and to learn the joys of love from you!  You'll see that I'll
learn quickly, Kamala, I have already learned harder things than what
you're supposed to teach me.  And now let's get to it: You aren't
satisfied with Siddhartha as he is, with oil in his hair, but without
clothes, without shoes, without money?"

Laughing, Kamala exclaimed:  "No, my dear, he doesn't satisfy me yet.
Clothes are what he must have, pretty clothes, and shoes, pretty shoes,
and lots of money in his pouch, and gifts for Kamala.  Do you know it
now, Samana from the forest?  Did you mark my words?"

"Yes, I have marked your words," Siddhartha exclaimed.  "How should I
not mark words which are coming from such a mouth!  Your mouth is like
a freshly cracked fig, Kamala.  My mouth is red and fresh as well, it
will be a suitable match for yours, you'll see.--But tell me, beautiful
Kamala, aren't you at all afraid of the Samana from the forest, who has
come to learn how to make love?"

"Whatever for should I be afraid of a Samana, a stupid Samana from the
forest, who is coming from the jackals and doesn't even know yet what
women are?"

"Oh, he's strong, the Samana, and he isn't afraid of anything.  He could
force you, beautiful girl.  He could kidnap you.  He could hurt you."

"No, Samana, I am not afraid of this.  Did any Samana or Brahman ever
fear, someone might come and grab him and steal his learning, and his
religious devotion, and his depth of thought?  No, for they are his very
own, and he would only give away from those whatever he is willing to
give and to whomever he is willing to give.  Like this it is, precisely
like this it is also with Kamala and with the pleasures of love.
Beautiful and red is Kamala's mouth, but just try to kiss it against
Kamala's will, and you will not obtain a single drop of sweetness from
it, which knows how to give so many sweet things!  You are learning
easily, Siddhartha, thus you should also learn this: love can be
obtained by begging, buying, receiving it as a gift, finding it in the
street, but it cannot be stolen.  In this, you have come up with the
wrong path.  No, it would be a pity, if a pretty young man like you
would want to tackle it in such a wrong manner."

Siddhartha bowed with a smile.  "It would be a pity, Kamala, you are so
right!  It would be such a great pity.  No, I shall not lose a single
drop of sweetness from your mouth, nor you from mine!  So it is settled:
Siddhartha will return, once he'll have what he still lacks:
clothes, shoes, money.  But speak, lovely Kamala, couldn't you still
give me one small advice?"

"An advice?  Why not?  Who wouldn't like to give an advice to a poor,
ignorant Samana, who is coming from the jackals of the forest?"

"Dear Kamala, thus advise me where I should go to, that I'll find these
three things most quickly?"

"Friend, many would like to know this.  You must do what you've learned
and ask for money, clothes, and shoes in return.  There is no other way
for a poor man to obtain money.  What might you be able to do?"

"I can think.  I can wait.  I can fast."

"Nothing else?"

"Nothing.  But yes, I can also write poetry.  Would you like to give me
a kiss for a poem?"

"I would like to, if I'll like your poem.  What would be its title?"

Siddhartha spoke, after he had thought about it for a moment, these
verses:

Into her shady grove stepped the pretty Kamala,
At the grove's entrance stood the brown Samana.
Deeply, seeing the lotus's blossom,
Bowed that man, and smiling Kamala thanked.
More lovely, thought the young man, than offerings for gods,
More lovely is offering to pretty Kamala.

Kamala loudly clapped her hands, so that the golden bracelets clanged.

"Beautiful are your verses, oh brown Samana, and truly, I'm losing
nothing when I'm giving you a kiss for them."

She beckoned him with her eyes, he tilted his head so that his face
touched hers and placed his mouth on that mouth which was like a
freshly cracked fig.  For a long time, Kamala kissed him, and with a
deep astonishment Siddhartha felt how she taught him, how wise she was,
how she controlled him, rejected him, lured him, and how after this first
one there was to be a long, a well ordered, well tested sequence of
kisses, everyone different from the others, he was still to receive.
Breathing deeply, he remained standing where he was, and was in this
moment astonished like a child about the cornucopia of knowledge and
things worth learning, which revealed itself before his eyes.

"Very beautiful are your verses," exclaimed Kamala, "if I was rich, I
would give you pieces of gold for them.  But it will be difficult for
you to earn thus much money with verses as you need.  For you need a lot
of money, if you want to be Kamala's friend."

"The way you're able to kiss, Kamala!" stammered Siddhartha.

"Yes, this I am able to do, therefore I do not lack clothes, shoes,
bracelets, and all beautiful things.  But what will become of you?
Aren't you able to do anything else but thinking, fasting, making
poetry?"

"I also know the sacrificial songs," said Siddhartha, "but I do not want
to sing them any more.  I also know magic spells, but I do not want to
speak them any more.  I have read the scriptures--"

"Stop," Kamala interrupted him.  "You're able to read?  And write?"

"Certainly, I can do this.  Many people can do this."

"Most people can't.  I also can't do it.  It is very good that you're
able to read and write, very good.  You will also still find use for
the magic spells."

In this moment, a maid came running in and whispered a message into
her mistress's ear.

"There's a visitor for me," exclaimed Kamala.  "Hurry and get yourself
away, Siddhartha, nobody may see you in here, remember this!  Tomorrow,
I'll see you again."

But to the maid she gave the order to give the pious Brahman white
upper garments.  Without fully understanding what was happening to him,
Siddhartha found himself being dragged away by the maid, brought into
a garden-house avoiding the direct path, being given upper garments as a
gift, led into the bushes, and urgently admonished to get himself out of
the grove as soon as possible without being seen.

Contently, he did as he had been told.  Being accustomed to the forest,
he managed to get out of the grove and over the hedge without making a
sound.  Contently, he returned to the city, carrying the rolled up
garments under his arm.  At the inn, where travellers stay, he
positioned himself by the door, without words he asked for food, without
a word he accepted a piece of rice-cake.  Perhaps as soon as tomorrow,
he thought, I will ask no one for food any more.

Suddenly, pride flared up in him.  He was no Samana any more, it was no
longer becoming to him to beg.  He gave the rice-cake to a dog and
remained without food.

"Simple is the life which people lead in this world here," thought
Siddhartha.  "It presents no difficulties.  Everything was difficult,
toilsome, and ultimately hopeless, when I was still a Samana.  Now,
everything is easy, easy like that lessons in kissing, which Kamala is
giving me.  I need clothes and money, nothing else; this a small, near
goals, they won't make a person lose any sleep."

He had already discovered Kamala's house in the city long before, there
he turned up the following day.

"Things are working out well," she called out to him.  "They are
expecting you at Kamaswami's, he is the richest merchant of the city.
If he'll like you, he'll accept you into his service.  Be smart, brown
Samana.  I had others tell him about you.  Be polite towards him, he is
very powerful.  But don't be too modest!  I do not want you to become
his servant, you shall become his equal, or else I won't be satisfied
with you.  Kamaswami is starting to get old and lazy.  If he'll like
you, he'll entrust you with a lot."

Siddhartha thanked her and laughed, and when she found out that he had
not eaten anything yesterday and today, she sent for bread and fruits
and treated him to it.

"You've been lucky," she said when they parted, "I'm opening one door
after another for you.  How come?  Do you have a spell?"

Siddhartha said:  "Yesterday, I told you I knew how to think, to wait,
and to fast, but you thought this was of no use.  But it is useful for
many things, Kamala, you'll see.  You'll see that the stupid Samanas are
learning and able to do many pretty things in the forest, which the
likes of you aren't capable of.  The day before yesterday, I was still a
shaggy beggar, as soon as yesterday I have kissed Kamala, and soon I'll
be a merchant and have money and all those things you insist upon."

"Well yes," she admitted.  "But where would you be without me?  What
would you be, if Kamala wasn't helping you?"

"Dear Kamala," said Siddhartha and straightened up to his full height,
"when I came to you into your grove, I did the first step.  It was my
resolution to learn love from this most beautiful woman.  From that
moment on when I had made this resolution, I also knew that I would
carry it out.  I knew that you would help me, at your first glance at
the entrance of the grove I already knew it."

"But what if I hadn't been willing?"

"You were willing.  Look, Kamala:  When you throw a rock into the water,
it will speed on the fastest course to the bottom of the water.  This
is how it is when Siddhartha has a goal, a resolution.  Siddhartha does
nothing, he waits, he thinks, he fasts, but he passes through the things
of the world like a rock through water, without doing anything, without
stirring; he is drawn, he lets himself fall.  His goal attracts him,
because he doesn't let anything enter his soul which might oppose the
goal.  This is what Siddhartha has learned among the Samanas.  This is
what fools call magic and of which they think it would be effected by
means of the daemons.  Nothing is effected by daemons, there are no
daemons.  Everyone can perform magic, everyone can reach his goals, if
he is able to think, if he is able to wait, if he is able to fast."

Kamala listened to him.  She loved his voice, she loved the look from
his eyes.

"Perhaps it is so," she said quietly, "as you say, friend.  But perhaps
it is also like this: that Siddhartha is a handsome man, that his glance
pleases the women, that therefore good fortune is coming towards him."

With one kiss, Siddhartha bid his farewell.  "I wish that it should be
this way, my teacher; that my glance shall please you, that always
good fortune shall come to me out of your direction!"

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Unlike Part I, the second part of this novel was written with extreme difficulty. Part I, Hesse said, flowed in a potent burst of creative energy, but this creative energy seemed suddenly to run dry; Hesse didn't know how to continue his story or how to end it, so he put the manuscript away for about eighteen months. One would never guess, however, that Hesse had problems with this section. It begins with a superb lyric passage extolling the wonders of the tangible world. Its descriptions of nature have a lulling, trance-like quality, swirling with color and suggestion. The prose is almost biblical, awesome and spell-binding. And beneath the prose, we discern the familiar Hesse theme of Natur/Geist -- the temporal realm and the spiritual realm residing on opposite sides of reality -- the temporal world on this side of reality and the permanent world on the other side. Now we will learn about the impact of Siddhartha's three years with the Samanas. Despite the allurements of the sensual world of Natur, Samana life has so conditioned Siddhartha that he will be capable of realizing the nature/spirit dichotomy. Siddhartha's inner voice, though neglected, is never quite extinguished. The "Kamala" sequence, like previous sequences, seems to hover for some time in expository prose, undelineated in definite time, and then suddenly Hesse zooms in for a close-up of a particular day and a half, beginning with a night and continuing through the next day. The events of this particular night and the following day are extremely important in the development of the rest of the novel because they are heavy with symbols and motifs that are used in later sections of the novel. For example, Siddhartha sleeps in a ferryman's hut; the ferryman will be the key figure in Siddhartha's self-resolution and synthesis. Also, the dream which Siddhartha has in the hut is not only full of Jungian symbolism, but it is also the vehicle by which the worlds of sense and spirit are united. Govinda, Siddhartha's shadow , appears in that dream as not only Siddhartha's shadow, but also as a hermaphrodite -- that is, a symbol of the "anima" . There is also the symbolism of the beginning of life, of oneness, in the maternal images associated with the female element in the dream. The sense of the flow of life and of oneness can also be associated symbolically with the ferryman's hut, perhaps itself a womb symbol because it will be the ferryman who will be instrumental in Siddhartha's union with the river, a symbol of beginning and of life. The day after Siddhartha has his dream is significant because it is during this time that Siddhartha meets the ferryman and hears his remarks about one's being able to "learn" from the river. The river, of course, is an archetypal symbol, and here it is the symbolic boundary between the two worlds of sense and spirit. Siddhartha regards his meeting the ferryman as a mere accident, but the ferryman's comments about Siddhartha's destiny to return eventually are structurally and philosophically important. One of the secrets of the river that the ferryman has learned, and one which Siddhartha will finally learn, is that all things eventually return. Like primal waters, everything is imbued with the quality of recurrence. There is no death. There is no time. The river is timeless, ever-changing and yet changeless. Siddhartha, however, is too involved in pursuing the education of his senses to fathom the significance of his conversation with the ferryman and so he dismisses him as, for the present, merely a likable, Govinda-like person. After having passed the river and the ferryman, Siddhartha finally has his first glimpse of Kamala in the late afternoon. He resolves to shed his beggar's appearance, fearing that Kamala would scorn him. The night passes and on the following day, Siddhartha manipulates his meeting with Kamala, who recalls Siddhartha's deferential bow of the previous afternoon. Siddhartha beseeches Kamala to be his teacher, and we see Kamala's utterly materialistic values in her demand that Siddhartha have fine clothes and shoes. When the question arises as to what Siddhartha can do to earn a living, he can only remember the virtues of thinking, waiting, and fasting which he learned as a Samana. Shortly, however, it is discovered that he can read and write, whereupon he is considered valuable enough to become the partner of the rich merchant Kamaswami. It is even suggested in Kamala's remarks that Siddhartha might be qualified to succeed Kamaswami, for a remark is made about the rich merchant's advanced age. The observant reader, however, can sense that he is not the man whose place Siddhartha will take. In this city, Siddhartha will no more learn love from Kamala's teaching than would he have learned truth from the Hindus' or Buddhists' or Samana's teachings. But Siddhartha will never quite lose those arts which he learned as a Samana. It will be by way of the conditioning inherent in thinking, waiting, and fasting that he will attain the capacity to attain his goal. Siddhartha, of course, means "he who attains his goal."


prompt:
Chapter: WITH THE CHILDLIKE PEOPLE

Siddhartha went to Kamaswami the merchant, he was directed into a rich
house, servants led him between precious carpets into a chamber, where
he awaited the master of the house.

Kamaswami entered, a swiftly, smoothly moving man with very gray hair,
with very intelligent, cautious eyes, with a greedy mouth.  Politely,
the host and the guest greeted one another.

"I have been told," the merchant began, "that you were a Brahman, a
learned man, but that you seek to be in the service of a merchant.
Might you have become destitute, Brahman, so that you seek to serve?"

"No," said Siddhartha, "I have not become destitute and have never been
destitute.  You should know that I'm coming from the Samanas, with
whom I have lived for a long time."

"If you're coming from the Samanas, how could you be anything but
destitute?  Aren't the Samanas entirely without possessions?"

"I am without possessions," said Siddhartha, "if this is what you mean.
Surely, I am without possessions.  But I am so voluntarily, and
therefore I am not destitute."

"But what are you planning to live of, being without possessions?"

"I haven't thought of this yet, sir.  For more than three years, I have
been without possessions, and have never thought about of what I should
live."

"So you've lived of the possessions of others."

"Presumable this is how it is.  After all, a merchant also lives of
what other people own."

"Well said.  But he wouldn't take anything from another person for
nothing; he would give his merchandise in return."

"So it seems to be indeed.  Everyone takes, everyone gives, such is
life."

"But if you don't mind me asking: being without possessions, what would
you like to give?"

"Everyone gives what he has.  The warrior gives strength, the merchant
gives merchandise, the teacher teachings, the farmer rice, the fisher
fish."

"Yes indeed.  And what is it now what you've got to give?  What is it
that you've learned, what you're able to do?"

"I can think.  I can wait.  I can fast."

"That's everything?"

"I believe, that's everything!"

"And what's the use of that?  For example, the fasting--what is it
good for?"

"It is very good, sir.  When a person has nothing to eat, fasting is the
smartest thing he could do.  When, for example, Siddhartha hadn't
learned to fast, he would have to accept any kind of service before this
day is up, whether it may be with you or wherever, because hunger would
force him to do so.  But like this, Siddhartha can wait calmly, he knows
no impatience, he knows no emergency, for a long time he can allow
hunger to besiege him and can laugh about it.  This, sir, is what
fasting is good for."

"You're right, Samana.  Wait for a moment."

Kamaswami left the room and returned with a scroll, which he handed to
his guest while asking:  "Can you read this?"

Siddhartha looked at the scroll, on which a sales-contract had been
written down, and began to read out its contents.

"Excellent," said Kamaswami.  "And would you write something for me on
this piece of paper?"

He handed him a piece of paper and a pen, and Siddhartha wrote and
returned the paper.

Kamaswami read:  "Writing is good, thinking is better.  Being smart is
good, being patient is better."

"It is excellent how you're able to write," the merchant praised him.
"Many a thing we will still have to discuss with one another.  For
today, I'm asking you to be my guest and to live in this house."

Siddhartha thanked and accepted, and lived in the dealers house from now
on.  Clothes were brought to him, and shoes, and every day, a servant
prepared a bath for him.  Twice a day, a plentiful meal was served, but
Siddhartha only ate once a day, and ate neither meat nor did he drink
wine.  Kamaswami told him about his trade, showed him the merchandise
and storage-rooms, showed him calculations.  Siddhartha got to know
many new things, he heard a lot and spoke little.  And thinking of
Kamala's words, he was never subservient to the merchant, forced him
to treat him as an equal, yes even more than an equal.  Kamaswami
conducted his business with care and often with passion, but Siddhartha
looked upon all of this as if it was a game, the rules of which he
tried hard to learn precisely, but the contents of which did not touch
his heart.

He was not in Kamaswami's house for long, when he already took part in
his landlords business.  But daily, at the hour appointed by her, he
visited beautiful Kamala, wearing pretty clothes, fine shoes, and soon
he brought her gifts as well.  Much he learned from her red, smart
mouth.  Much he learned from her tender, supple hand.  Him, who was,
regarding love, still a boy and had a tendency to plunge blindly and
insatiably into lust like into a bottomless pit, him she taught,
thoroughly starting with the basics, about that school of thought which
teaches that pleasure cannot be taken without giving pleasure, and
that every gesture, every caress, every touch, every look, every spot
of the body, however small it was, had its secret, which would bring
happiness to those who know about it and unleash it.  She taught him,
that lovers must not part from one another after celebrating love,
without one admiring the other, without being just as defeated as they
have been victorious, so that with none of them should start feeling
fed up or bored and get that evil feeling of having abused or having
been abused.  Wonderful hours he spent with the beautiful and smart
artist, became her student, her lover, her friend.  Here with Kamala
was the worth and purpose of his present life, nit with the business
of Kamaswami.

The merchant passed to duties of writing important letters and contracts
on to him and got into the habit of discussing all important affairs
with him.  He soon saw that Siddhartha knew little about rice and wool,
shipping and trade, but that he acted in a fortunate manner, and that
Siddhartha surpassed him, the merchant, in calmness and equanimity, and
in the art of listening and deeply understanding previously unknown
people.  "This Brahman," he said to a friend, "is no proper merchant and
will never be one, there is never any passion in his soul when he
conducts our business.  But he has that mysterious quality of those
people to whom success comes all by itself, whether this may be a good
star of his birth, magic, or something he has learned among Samanas.
He always seems to be merely playing with out business-affairs, they
never fully become a part of him, they never rule over him, he is never
afraid of failure, he is never upset by a loss."

The friend advised the merchant:  "Give him from the business he
conducts for you a third of the profits, but let him also be liable for
the same amount of the losses, when there is a loss.  Then, he'll become
more zealous."

Kamaswami followed the advice.  But Siddhartha cared little about this.
When he made a profit, he accepted it with equanimity; when he made
losses, he laughed and said:  "Well, look at this, so this one turned
out badly!"

It seemed indeed, as if he did not care about the business.  At one
time, he travelled to a village to buy a large harvest of rice there.
But when he got there, the rice had already been sold to another
merchant.  Nevertheless, Siddhartha stayed for several days in that
village, treated the farmers for a drink, gave copper-coins to their
children, joined in the celebration of a wedding, and returned extremely
satisfied from his trip.  Kamaswami held against him that he had not
turned back right away, that he had wasted time and money.  Siddhartha
answered:  "Stop scolding, dear friend!  Nothing was ever achieved by
scolding.  If a loss has occurred, let me bear that loss.  I am very
satisfied with this trip.  I have gotten to know many kinds of people,
a Brahman has become my friend, children have sat on my knees, farmers
have shown me their fields, nobody knew that I was a merchant."

"That's all very nice," exclaimed Kamaswami indignantly, "but in fact,
you are a merchant after all, one ought to think!  Or might you have
only travelled for your amusement?"

"Surely," Siddhartha laughed, "surely I have travelled for my amusement.
For what else?  I have gotten to know people and places, I have received
kindness and trust, I have found friendship.  Look, my dear, if I had
been Kamaswami, I would have travelled back, being annoyed and in a
hurry, as soon as I had seen that my purchase had been rendered
impossible, and time and money would indeed have been lost.  But like
this, I've had a few good days, I've learned, had joy, I've neither
harmed myself nor others by annoyance and hastiness.  And if I'll ever
return there again, perhaps to buy an upcoming harvest, or for whatever
purpose it might be, friendly people will receive me in a friendly and
happy manner, and I will praise myself for not showing any hurry and
displeasure at that time.  So, leave it as it is, my friend, and don't
harm yourself by scolding!  If the day will come, when you will see:
this Siddhartha is harming me, then speak a word and Siddhartha will go
on his own path.  But until then, let's be satisfied with one another."

Futile were also the merchant's attempts, to convince Siddhartha that he
should eat his bread.  Siddhartha ate his own bread, or rather they both
ate other people's bread, all people's bread.  Siddhartha never listened
to Kamaswami's worries and Kamaswami had many worries.  Whether there
was a business-deal going on which was in danger of failing, or whether
a shipment of merchandise seemed to have been lost, or a debtor seemed
to be unable to pay, Kamaswami could never convince his partner that it
would be useful to utter a few words of worry or anger, to have wrinkles
on the forehead, to sleep badly.  When, one day, Kamaswami held against
him that he had learned everything he knew from him, he replied:  "Would
you please not kid me with such jokes!  What I've learned from you is
how much a basket of fish costs and how much interests may be charged on
loaned money.  These are your areas of expertise.  I haven't learned to
think from you, my dear Kamaswami, you ought to be the one seeking to
learn from me."

Indeed his soul was not with the trade.  The business was good enough
to provide him with the money for Kamala, and it earned him much more
than he needed.  Besides from this, Siddhartha's interest and curiosity
was only concerned with the people, whose businesses, crafts, worries,
pleasures, and acts of foolishness used to be as alien and distant to
him as the moon.  However easily he succeeded in talking to all of them,
in living with all of them, in learning from all of them, he was still
aware that there was something which separated him from them and this
separating factor was him being a Samana.  He saw mankind going through
life in a childlike or animallike manner, which he loved and also
despised at the same time.  He saw them toiling, saw them suffering,
and becoming gray for the sake of things which seemed to him to entirely
unworthy of this price, for money, for little pleasures, for being
slightly honoured, he saw them scolding and insulting each other, he
saw them complaining about pain at which a Samana would only smile, and
suffering because of deprivations which a Samana would not feel.

He was open to everything, these people brought his way.  Welcome was
the merchant who offered him linen for sale, welcome was the debtor who
sought another loan, welcome was the beggar who told him for one hour
the story of his poverty and who was not half as poor as any given
Samana.  He did not treat the rich foreign merchant any different than
the servant who shaved him and the street-vendor whom he let cheat him
out of some small change when buying bananas.  When Kamaswami came to
him, to complain about his worries or to reproach him concerning his
business, he listened curiously and happily, was puzzled by him, tried
to understand him, consented that he was a little bit right, only as
much as he considered indispensable, and turned away from him, towards
the next person who would ask for him.  And there were many who came to
him, many to do business with him, many to cheat him, many to draw some
secret out of him, many to appeal to his sympathy, many to get his
advice.  He gave advice, he pitied, he made gifts, he let them cheat him
a bit, and this entire game and the passion with which all people played
this game occupied his thoughts just as much as the gods and Brahmans
used to occupy them.

At times he felt, deep in his chest, a dying, quiet voice, which
admonished him quietly, lamented quietly; he hardly perceived it.  And
then, for an hour, he became aware of the strange life he was leading,
of him doing lots of things which were only a game, of, though being
happy and feeling joy at times, real life still passing him by and not
touching him.  As a ball-player plays with his balls, he played with
his business-deals, with the people around him, watched them, found
amusement in them; with his heart, with the source of his being, he was
not with them.  The source ran somewhere, far away from him, ran and
ran invisibly, had nothing to do with his life any more.  And at several
times he suddenly became scared on account of such thoughts and wished
that he would also be gifted with the ability to participate in all of
this childlike-naive occupations of the daytime with passion and with
his heart, really to live, really to act, really to enjoy and to live
instead of just standing by as a spectator.  But again and again, he
came back to beautiful Kamala, learned the art of love, practised the
cult of lust, in which more than in anything else giving and taking
becomes one, chatted with her, learned from her, gave her advice,
received advice.  She understood him better than Govinda used to
understand him, she was more similar to him.

Once, he said to her:  "You are like me, you are different from most
people.  You are Kamala, nothing else, and inside of you, there is a
peace and refuge, to which you can go at every hour of the day and be
at home at yourself, as I can also do.  Few people have this, and yet
all could have it."

"Not all people are smart," said Kamala.

"No," said Siddhartha, "that's not the reason why.  Kamaswami is just as
smart as I, and still has no refuge in himself.  Others have it, who are
small children with respect to their mind.  Most people, Kamala, are
like a falling leaf, which is blown and is turning around through the
air, and wavers, and tumbles to the ground.  But others, a few, are
like stars, they go on a fixed course, no wind reaches them, in
themselves they have their law and their course.  Among all the learned
men and Samanas, of which I knew many, there was one of this kind, a
perfected one, I'll never be able to forget him.  It is that Gotama,
the exalted one, who is spreading that teachings.  Thousands of
followers are listening to his teachings every day, follow his
instructions every hour, but they are all falling leaves, not in
themselves they have teachings and a law."

Kamala looked at him with a smile.  "Again, you're talking about him,"
she said, "again, you're having a Samana's thoughts."

Siddhartha said nothing, and they played the game of love, one of the
thirty or forty different games Kamala knew.  Her body was flexible
like that of a jaguar and like the bow of a hunter; he who had learned
from her how to make love, was knowledgeable of many forms of lust, many
secrets.  For a long time, she played with Siddhartha, enticed him,
rejected him, forced him, embraced him: enjoyed his masterful skills,
until he was defeated and rested exhausted by her side.

The courtesan bent over him, took a long look at his face, at his eyes,
which had grown tired.

"You are the best lover," she said thoughtfully, "I ever saw.  You're
stronger than others, more supple, more willing.  You've learned my art
well, Siddhartha.  At some time, when I'll be older, I'd want to bear
your child.  And yet, my dear, you've remained a Samana, and yet you
do not love me, you love nobody.  Isn't it so?"

"It might very well be so," Siddhartha said tiredly.  "I am like you.
You also do not love--how else could you practise love as a craft?
Perhaps, people of our kind can't love.  The childlike people can;
that's their secret."

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: This second sequence of Part II develops Siddhartha's acquaintance with Kamala and introduces Siddhartha to Kamaswami. Significant is the meaning inherent in names, beginning with "Kama"; Kama is the Hindu god of lustful love and desire. The word "swami" designates Kamaswami as a master -- in this case, the master of the hedonistic, worldly realm. We can begin to see the conditioning of the Samana's surfacing when Siddhartha takes an indifferent attitude toward business, possessions, and worldly people. Siddhartha can sense that he is different from these worldly "child-people," but he finds this distinction between himself and then problematical. Siddhartha's spiritual background has only partially enlightened him for he has not yet found peace, and he comes to envy these ordinary, unintellectual people. Kamala, nevertheless, is attracted to Siddhartha because of his detachment, this refuge which she feels that only the two of them have. Likewise, Kamala's detachment will also become problematical for it will be discovered that love cannot be dispensed as an art. The most significant event of this section is Siddhartha's mentioning Gotama Buddha to Kamala for the first time. To Siddhartha, Buddha exemplifies the kind of man who possesses a special guide and wisdom within himself. This conversation is of particular significance because it prefigures Kamala's future destiny. The eventual coming of Kamala's future son is also signaled at this point. Time sequence ends with a verbal exchange on the subject of love, significant because an inability to love will be the source of both Kamala's and Siddhartha's despair.