Harry Haller, a 48-year-old Central European intellectual, is the near-eponymous protagonist of Hermann Hesse's novel, Steppenwolf. Harry senses war over the horizon and is appalled that the hypocritical Establishment basks in self-satisfaction. Harry eagerly awaits his fiftieth birthday - when he intends to commit suicide. Still, a redemptive, rebellious force stirs within him, that is, bizarrely, a wolf.