All nineteen pieces in [Pictor's Metamorphoses and Other Fantasies] are fantasies, chosen by Theodore Ziolkowski from a half century of Hesse's writings. Some are tales of magic in the style of the Brothers Grimm or The Arabian Nights; at the other extreme we find social satires in which prevalent and objectionable trends are exaggerated to appear fantastical. All are perfectly representative of an author whose fictional heroes, from Demian to Harry Haller in Steppenwolf and Josef Knecht in The Glass Bead Game, are aware of the plausible explanation and reject it in favour of dream.

Hesse includes in one of his later stories published here a fairytale written when he was ten. It is his first known piece of prose composition, and it sets the tone for the "soul biographies" (his term) which are his collected works. In every case the illogical starts from known life…. Incidents from...