Books like Narcissus and Goldmund
12 books with a reading profile close to Narcissus and Goldmund by Hermann Hesse. Deep, inward-looking, contemplative and thought-provoking; a moderate read.
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1
East of Eden
Also deep and inward-looking · philosophy, narrative
Set in the Salinas Valley between the Civil War and World War I, the narrative tracks the interconnected fates of the Trask and Hamilton families.
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2
Silence
by Shūsaku Endō
Also deep and inward-looking · philosophy, narrative
In seventeenth-century Japan, Father Sebastião Rodrigues, a Portuguese Jesuit, enters the country secretly to locate his former mentor, Cristóvão Ferreira, who reportedly committed apostasy under torture.
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3
The Plague
by Albert Camus
Also deep and contemplative · philosophy, narrative
Set in the coastal city of Oran, the narrative begins when rats emerge from the shadows to die in the streets, signaling an outbreak of bubonic plague.
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4
Invisible Man
Also deep and inward-looking · philosophy, narrative
An unnamed Narrator chronicles his descent from a hopeful Southern student to a disillusioned resident of a basement apartment in Harlem.
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5
The Great Divorce
by C.S. Lewis
Also deep and inward-looking · philosophy, narrative
A narrator boards a flying bus in a grey, rainy city and travels to the foothills of Heaven.
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6
Wise Blood
Also deep and thought-provoking · philosophy, narrative
Hazel Motes returns from war to a rural Tennessee landscape and establishes the Church Without Christ.
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7
Zorba the Greek
Also deep and inward-looking · philosophy, narrative
Set in rural Crete, the narrative follows an unnamed intellectual who attempts to reopen a lignite mine while escaping his bookish existence.
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8
Peter Camenzind
Also inward-looking and contemplative · philosophy, narrative
The story follows Peter Camenzind, a boy born into a secluded Swiss mountain village who leaves his rural environment to pursue an intellectual life in Zurich.
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9
The Bridge of San Luis Rey
Also deep and contemplative · philosophy, narrative
In 1714, a rope bridge in Peru collapses, sending five travelers to their deaths in the chasm below.
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10
The Picture of Dorian Gray Illustrated
by Oscar Wilde
Also deep and contemplative · philosophy, narrative
In Victorian London, the young Dorian Gray sits for a portrait by artist Basil Hallward, who captures the youth's extraordinary beauty on canvas.
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11
The Baron in the Trees
Also deep and contemplative · philosophy, narrative
In 1767, twelve-year-old Cosimo Piovasco di Rondò, a young nobleman in Liguria, climbs a tree after a quarrel at dinner, and vows never to come down.
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12
The Pilgrim's Progress
by John Bunyan
Also deep and inward-looking · philosophy, narrative
The narrative follows Christian, a man fleeing the City of Destruction after reading a book that reveals his impending doom.
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