Just as you sense a sadness at the departing summer, the arrival of Goldmund brings a great waft of warm light and colour. One of the most beautiful depictions of friendship I have come across is between Goldmund and Narziss, diametrically opposed in character, but always close even when far apart.
The summer ended; poppies and cornflowers, corn-campion and starwort, withered and vanished, the frogs in the fishponds ceased to croak, the storks flew high, preparing to depart. Then Goldmund came.
It’s been a wonderful summer here, our first in Italy, and now we will enjoy the autumn. May you too, or in reverse order if you are in a different hemisphere.
And may whoever is a Goldmund in your life soon arrive.
Source: Hermann Hesse, Narziss and Goldmund, trans. by Geoffrey Dunlop (Harmondsworth: Penguin Modern Classics, 1982), p. 291
Photo credit: sogard at pixabay
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