Chapter 2, Waldzell Summary

Waldzell is where the best Glass Bead Game players come from and it is Waldzell that is the next stage in Knecht's education. It is also the school that is most devoted to the arts. "That is to say, whereas at other schools a particular branch of scholarship was distinctly dominant, such as classical philogy in Keuperheim, Aristotelian and Scholastic philosophy in Porta, mathematics in Planvaste, Waldzell traditionally cultivated a tendency toward universality and toward an alliance between scholarship and the arts. The highest symbol of these tendencies was the Glass Bead Game. Even here, as at all the other schools, the Game was by no means taught officially and as a compulsory subject. But Waldzell students devoted their private studies almost exclusively to it. Then again, the town of Waldzell was after all the seat of the official Glass Bead...