Preface

The preface to Steppenwolf is told in the first person by a man who recalls his acquaintance with Harry Haller, the Steppenwolf (“wolf of the Steppes”). Haller was a man of about fifty who rented two rooms on the top floor of the house owned by the narrator's aunt. In the narrator's view, he was unsociable, shy, wild, and lonely, seemingly coming from another world than the comfortable bourgeois existence enjoyed by the narrator. However, Haller was a quiet, polite lodger, and the narrator's aunt took to him immediately. As the narrator gradually got to know Haller, he found him intellectually gifted and emotionally deep. The narrator had also suffered a lot and seemed full of self-hatred. Haller lived a disorderly life and followed no profession. He slept until late in the morning and spent his days with his books, which included many volumes of German poetry...