The largest German prose writer of the 20th century and Nobel Prize laureate in Literature, Hermann Hesse, is known in Russia primarily as the author of “Siddhartha,” “Steppenwolf,” “The Glass Bead Game,” and his stories and fairy tales. This book gathers critical essays by the classic author about world literature—about the fates of books and spiritual values in the 20th century. They are devoted to the works of writers and philosophers of Germany, Austria, France, England, Russia, as well as Spain and China. A significant part of the texts is published in Russian for the first time.