1813–1855
Søren Kierkegaard
Kierkegaard lived in Copenhagen. Either/Or, Fear and Trembling, and other major works of 1843–46 were published under pseudonyms, and he asked readers not to treat those voices as a simple report of his own doctrine. A recurring theme is the individual before God, and the claim that a decision of faith is not the conclusion of a public proof. He is a poor fit for a secular “create your own meaning” slogan, and also a poor fit for a merely social morality.
Also in the atlas
- The single individual
- Faith and offense
- Pseudonymous authorship
Reading, not a syllabus ranking
- Either/Or (1843) — Pseudonymous contrasts among aesthetic and ethical ways of life.
- Fear and Trembling (1843) — Abraham, published under the name Johannes de Silentio.
Questions for reflection
- What is lost if a personal decision has to be justified in terms everyone already accepts?
Kierkegaard presses the individual pole of social life and resists both a purely invented meaning and a meaning that is only the crowd’s.