A new 2023 translation of Hesse's 1904 The Art of Idleness (Die Kunst des Müßiggangs). The Art of Idleness is an essay that was unpublished in his life, but published by his estate in 1973. This edition also contains an epilogue by the translator, a philosophical glossary of concepts used by Hesse and a chronology of his life and work. Hesse won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1947. He also received the Goethe Prize of Frankfurt in 1946 and the 1955 Peace Prize of the German Booksellers.

"I cannot read Hermann Hesse without feeling that I am drawn into the presence of a deeply serious mind, a mind that is searching for the meaning of life." - Carl Jung