Beneath the Wheel

Beneath the Wheel (Unterm Rad) is a 1906 novel written by Hermann Hesse. In 1957 it was reissued as The Prodigy, in the Peter Owen Publishers translation. It severely criticizes education that focuses only on students' academic performance, and in that respect is typical of Hesse. There are also autobiographical elements in the story, as he attended and was expelled from the seminary described.