Harry Haller is a sad and lonely figure, a reclusive intellectual for whom life holds no joy. He struggles to reconcile the wild primeval wolf and the rational man within himself without surrendering to the bourgeois values he despises. His life changes dramatically when he meets a woman who is his opposite, the carefree and elusive Hermine.

Alienated from society, Harry Haller is the Steppenwolf, wild, strange and shy. His despair and desire for death draw him into an enchanted, Faust-like underworld. Through a series of shadowy encounters, romantic, freakish and savage by turn, Haller begins to rediscover the lost dreams of his youth.

Harry Haller is the Steppenwolf: wild, strange, shy and alienated from society. His despair and desire for death draw him into a dark, enchanted underworld. Through a series of shadowy encounters - romantic, freakish and savage by turn - the misanthropic Haller gradually begins to rediscover the lost dreams of his youth.