The Prodigy

The Prodigy, written 1905, is Hermann Hesses's bitter indictment of the educational system prevalent in Europe at the time. It is the story of Hans Giebenrath, the brilliant young son of provincial bourgeouis in southern Germany who becomes the first boy from his town to pass into a prestigious Protestant theological college. His spirit, however, is systematically broken by his parents and teachers; over anxious about his success, they forget to consider his health and happiness. Subsiding into a fatal apathy, he is taken home for medical reasons. Here he falls in love, becomes an engineer's apprentice, learns to drink alcohol, and eventually dies by drowning.