I read Siddartha years ago. Recently I read Demian and Steppenwolf. I'm currently reading Gertrude and a biography entitled Hermann Hesse: Pilgrim of Crisis by Ralph Freedman, Copyright 1978, ISBN 0-394-41981-2; I've dablled in existential philosophy and as a counselor done some studies in existential psychotherapy. I'm bipolar. I often experience periods of severe meaninglessness and lack of purpose. Teach me.

my father had bipolar disorder and committed suicide when I was a year and a half. When I read Steppenwolf, I had this intense feeling of recognition, as if Harry Haller were the man my 21-year-old father never had a chance to become. The contradictions within himself seem so similar to what I imagine my father experiencing.
I sometimes wonder if these feelings of "meaninglessness" that you describe are really just the truth. For in fact, do we really know the meaning of life, or if there is one at all? I suppose the key is to realize the futility of trying to figure anything out or know the answers, but to live as well as you can anyway. I think this is the secret that Hermine passes on to Harry. This ability to live with death and uncertainty, dancing with it, rather than fighting or fearing it or trying to control it.