Editing Hermann Hesse (section)

=== Childhood ===
From childhood, Hesse was headstrong and hard for his family to handle. In a letter to her husband, Hermann's mother Marie wrote: "The little fellow has a life in him, an unbelievable strength, a powerful will, and, for his four years of age, a truly astonishing mind. How can he express all that? It truly gnaws at my life, this internal fighting against his tyrannical temperament, his passionate turbulence [...] God must shape this proud spirit, then it will become something noble and magnificent – but I shudder to think what this young and passionate person might become should his upbringing be false or weak."<ref>Volker Michels (ed.): ''Über Hermann Hesse''. Verlag Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main, vol 1: ''1904–1962, Repräsentative Textsammlung zu Lebzeiten Hesses''. 2nd ed., 1979, {{ISBN|978-3-518-06831-1}}, p. 400.</ref>

[[File:Nikolausbrücke Calw.jpg|thumb|St. Nicholas-Bridge (''Nikolausbrücke''), one of Hesse's favourite childhood places. Click to see an enlarged image, in which the statue of Hesse can be seen near the centre.]]
Hesse showed signs of serious depression as early as his first year at school.<ref>Freedman, p. 30</ref> In his [[juvenilia]] collection ''Gerbersau'', Hesse vividly describes experiences and anecdotes from his childhood and youth in Calw: the atmosphere and adventures by the river, the bridge, the chapel, the houses leaning closely together, hidden nooks and crannies, as well as the inhabitants with their admirable qualities, their oddities, and their idiosyncrasies. The fictional town of Gerbersau is pseudonymous for Calw, imitating the real name of the nearby town of [[Hirsau]]. It is derived from the German words ''gerber'', meaning "tanner", and ''aue'', meaning "meadow".<ref>An English equivalent would be "Tannersmead".</ref> Calw had a centuries-old leather-working industry, and during Hesse's childhood the tanneries' influence on the town was still very much in evidence.<ref>Siegfried Greiner ''Hermann Hesse, Jugend in Calw'', Thorbecke (1981), {{ISBN|978-3-7995-2009-6}} p. viii</ref> Hesse's favourite place in Calw was the St. Nicholas Bridge (''Nikolausbrücke''), which is why a Hesse monument was built there in 2002.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://rockysmith.net/2010/04/05/a-special-fondness-2/|title=A Special Fondness|first=Rocky|last=Smith|work=Mr. Writer|date=5 April 2010|access-date=4 March 2019}}</ref>

Hermann Hesse's grandfather [[Hermann Gundert]], a doctor of philosophy and fluent in multiple languages, encouraged the boy to read widely, giving him access to his library, which was filled with works of world literature. All this instilled a sense in Hermann Hesse that he was a citizen of the world. His family background became, he noted, "the basis of an isolation and a resistance to any sort of nationalism that so defined my life".<ref name="autogenerated414"/>

Young Hesse shared a love of music with his mother. Both music and poetry were important in his family. His mother wrote poetry, and his father was known for his use of language in both his sermons and the writing of religious tracts. His first role model for becoming an artist was his half-brother, Theo, who rebelled against the family by entering a music conservatory in 1885.<ref>Freedman (1978) pp. 30–32</ref> Hesse showed a precocious ability to rhyme, and by 1889–90 had decided that he wanted to be a writer.<ref>Freedman (1978) p. 39</ref>