av福利社

For over a century, the Danish thinker S酶ren Kierkegaard (1813鈥�55) has been at the center of a number of important discussions, concerning not only philosophy and theology, but also, more recently, fields such as social thought, psychology, and contemporary aesthetics, especially literary theory.

Despite his relatively short life, Kierkegaard was an extraordinarily prolific writer, as attested to by the 26-volume av福利社 edition of all of his published writings. But Kierkegaard left behind nearly as much unpublished writing, most of which consists of what are called his 鈥渏ournals and notebooks.鈥� Kierkegaard has long been recognized as one of history’s great journal keepers, but only rather small portions of his journals and notebooks are what we usually understand by the term 鈥渄iaries.鈥� By far the greater part of Kierkegaard鈥檚 journals and notebooks consists of reflections on a myriad of subjects鈥攑hilosophical, religious, political, personal. Studying his journals and notebooks takes us into his workshop, where we can see his entire universe of thought. We can witness the genesis of his published works, to be sure鈥攂ut we can also see whole galaxies of concepts, new insights, and fragments, large and small, of partially (or almost entirely) completed but unpublished works. Kierkegaard鈥檚 Journals and Notebooks enables us to see the thinker in dialogue with his times and with himself.

Kierkegaard wrote his journals in a two-column format, one for his initial entries and the second for the extensive marginal comments that he added later. This edition of the journals reproduces this format, includes several photographs of original manuscript pages, and contains extensive scholarly commentary on the various entries and on the history of the manuscripts being reproduced.

Volume 9 of this 11-volume series includes five of Kierkegaard鈥檚 important 鈥淣B鈥� journals (Journals NB26 through NB30), which span from June 1852 to August 1854. This period was marked by Kierkegaard鈥檚 increasing preoccupation with what he saw as an unbridgeable gulf in Christianity鈥攂etween the absolute ideal of the religion of the New Testament and the official, state-sanctioned culture of 鈥淐hristendom,鈥� which, embodied by the Danish People鈥檚 Church, Kierkegaard rejected with increasing vehemence. Crucially, Kierkegaard鈥檚 nemesis, Bishop Jakob Peter Mynster, died during this period and, in the months following, Kierkegaard can be seen moving inexorably toward the famous 鈥渁ttack on Christendom鈥� with which he ended his life.