Stages on Life’s Way

by Søren Kierkegaard

  Deleted from sketch; see 262:38-263:21:

  In Part 2

  Morning

  What is the happiest life? It is [that of] a young girl sixteen years old. (to be found in the black Berlin portfolio that lies in the mahogany box in which everything pertaining to this affair is to be found).—Pap. V B 97:30 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 262:38-263:21:

  What is the happiest life? It is [that of] a young girl eighteen years old.

  (This little piece is in my Berlin portfolio, which is in the mahogany box, where all these papers pertaining to Guilty/and Not-Guilty? are kept.)

  —Pap. V 102:9 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 263:38-264:16:

  Is this not like the time when the rescue equipment was in the house close to the beach where the dying person lay, but the keys to the building were with the Commander, who* was not at home. Indeed, if only I were afloat myself, I would promptly be there in my boat. How just one word can awaken much in a person and have an infinite power over the soul.

  In margin: * lived far away from there and

  —Pap. V B 102:10 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 264:23:

  . . . . . in the wind, like a mermaid’s streaming hair.

  —Pap. V B 102:11 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 265:10:

  disabled.

  The Clothes of Gladness

  —Pap. V B 97:31 n.d, 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 265:25:

  Midnight.

  I actually suffer sympathetically; the formative for me in this.—Pap. V B 97:32 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 266:27-267:8:

  . . . . . but I can despair over an eternal responsibility.

  —Pap. V B 102:12 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 267:10-30:

  At the beginning of April, conditions are such that he has to check on the effect this has had upon her, how the whole situation stands, and look, she says that she does not care for him at all. She does not want to answer, is simply devil-may-care peevish: O depression, how you do make a fool of a person; here I have worked to the best of my ability, continually worried about making her unhappy, and the whole thing is a false alarm. —All my depression is gone, and I can treat her just the way I have treated everyone else.—Pap. V B 97:20 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 267:17-19:

  The whole thing ad modum [in the manner of] (Benedick’s*) and Beatrice’s declaration of love in Viel Lärmen um Nichts [Much Ado about Nothing], act V, sc. 4, p. 196 bot., in vol. VII of Tieck and Schlegel.

  * for I did not play Benedick

  —Pap. V B 102:13 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 267:33-35:

  If only I were absolutely confident, so that I would dare to use force against her because I would be certain of making her happy—Pap. V B 102:14 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 268:21-274:12:

  Midnight

  What if she now became insane

  Nina105

  a psychological construction of feminine insanity

  In margin: to have to experience insanity sympathetically

  —Pap. V B 97:33 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 268:27-269:12:

  I could consult a poet. Nina became insane from love, it says in the play, and the poster says the same. She saw the beloved, whom she could not have, leap into the sea; she saw a bloody head bob up—and the daylight of consciousness was changed into the fog of insanity. This is inappropriate. She has not seen me jump into the water, nor has she seen a bloody head bob up, ergo—. What a consolation to have a poet who has the psychological genius to pose the problem. For Nina became insane from love; and it was not from fear or horror over the bloody head, it was not even a consequence of the dreadful irony by which the father had changed their relationship into a jest and in jest had given his consent. One would think that sufficient to make a girl insane, more than sufficient, but the poet makes use of the bloody head.—Pap. V B 102:15 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 275:9:

  I dispute colloquio privatissimo [in a private colloquium] with God in heaven.—Pap. V B 102:17 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 275:12-20:

  she has said, and which forms depression’s dark dream.* In that sense I need no relief; it does not help me. It cannot be done, the case has gone to the highest court. I do not care about any degree or about gradus ad Parnassum [a step toward Parnassus]; I care only about my responsibility.

  Penciled in margin: * I could not wish that, for then she would come to be totally insignificant.—Pap. V B 102:18 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 276:17-21:

  Even in her refractoriness there is an acknowledgment of my power for she is like a little girl who is mocking her father. If she felt herself to be my betrothed she would of course know that she has just as much power as I, and the person who has the power never behaves that way.—Pap. V B 102:19 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 276:23-288:38:

  No. 4

  Father-concern [*] [V B 131 222]

  [*]In margin: A possibility

  The Prodigal Son

  In a little country village there lived a very tall and slender man; every day he walked a set course outside his house; all the children knew him.[**]

  [**] In margin: in Christianshavn

  (the idyllic to be developed)

  Some claimed that in his youth he had been in love with a [V B 131 223] queen of Russia—

  But at certain times of the year he went on a journey, going away notably at the time the stork came. Thus he traveled widely, and when he was at home there was only one thing that engrossed him. He looked at them so closely that it was terrible, went home and looked into big books, checking and checking. For he had a very large library, but only of physiological works. [†]

  [†] In margin: He could also be called The Ratcatcher from—what was the name of the city—the one who led all the children away with his playing.

  Hameln.106

  He believed he was a father—a lapse in his youth—did not know what had become of the girl or who she was or whether there was a child. Now he was studying the physiological laws, family resemblance, etc.

  This happened very early in his youth. Several years had passed without his really thinking about it; then it suddenly became very vivid to him. Now he withdrew from the world and sank into brooding thoughts. The only relative he had was an old uncle, who was a man rather experienced in life, now old, and not exactly venerable, but with the kind of old man’s witticism so unbecoming to gray hair. He often talked about such things and always used to say that no one could know how many children he had.[*]

  So he became insane and lived on in this way.

  Every two weeks he went [deleted: to the club][**] and spoke [V B 131 224] with an old ship captain, who thought that he was sixty years old although he was only thirty-nine.

  [Deleted: journal, p. 49 (Pap. IV A 105), can be used.]

  [*] In margin: And this silence and this witticism worked upon him so long that his understanding finally decided to move away [skifte] because it could not bear serving in a household such as that, and he exchanged [omskifte] understanding for insanity.

  [**] In margin: At a café in Christianshavn. There I have seen him laugh.

  —Pap. V B 131 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 276:34:

  In this respect, life on the streets and alleys of a metropolis at times has something very humbling for the elite and at times something charming for the simpler class, for His Lordship must jump off the sidewalk and yield to the maidservant with her market basket, and the omnibus driver blows his horn at the gentlemen’s carriages, for if he cannot drive out of the way for them, they have to drive out of the way for him.—Pap. V B 135:2 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 277:8-14:

  Magnificence is not to be found out there, and misery is so at home that it does not even occur to the miserable to want to escape from it across the ocean per mare pauperiem
fugiens [fleeing poverty through sea].107—Pap. V B 135:4 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 277:28-278:2:

  Christianshavn is like a market town. Christianshavn has a great deal of atmosphere.[*] —When one stands on Snurre Bridge. The orphanage. A couple of doomed individuals who have a conversation near Frelsers Church.

  Christianshavn, like market towns, has several characters whom everyone knows. Just as almost every market town has a mentally deranged person.

  [*]In margin: sadness.

  —Pap. V B 135:6 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 280:10-23:

  The situation often stirred me deeply, for here the charitableness had acquired a strange equality. The poor woman needed money, she received it, but on the other hand the poor woman would not easily be tempted to be envious of the fortunate, for she no doubt felt that this man, her noble benefactor (this, of course, is the poor people’s expression) was more unfortunate than she. Therefore she had a double joy in being grateful to him. If he had been a happy individual, she perhaps would have been hurt by the thought that he did not care much for her gratitude. If he who was her benefactor had been a fortunate individual who passed her by without once touching his hat or looking at her, she would have been hurt; now, however, she was placated by the thought of his suffering.—Pap. V B 135:12 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 288:6-10:

  . . . Eventually the bookkeeper died [*]. . . .

  [*] In margin: —he was ill several days, and his delusion faded away; death remedied it; he had had nothing to worry about as far as that possibility was concerned.—Pap. V B 135:22 n.d., 1844

  From sketch; see 285:18-20:

  For no. 1. The man who in jest repeated a stock joke that no one could know how many children he had. —This contributed to his becoming insane. His pathos-filled despair and the flippancy of the other man.—Pap. V B 127 n.d., 1844

  Penciled in margin of draft; see 276:23, 288:38, 289:1:

  April 5 Midnight

  A Possibility.

  —Pap. V B 103:1 n.d., 1844;

  Deleted from sketch; see 290:3-27:

  Midnight.

  I was at a party; some brilliant women who hinted that if the girl is not intelligent enough, then it is all right to break the engagement.

  Ah, to have to be silent lest she find out something. —Otherwise I should have crushed them.

  In margin: summa summarum [sum of sums] of her hidden and manifest charms.

  love—[deleted: whore]

  play—drink—love N.B.

  —Pap. V B 97:36 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 293:12:

  Recensenten og Dyret108

  —Pap. V B 103:2 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 293:23-294:18:

  [Deleted: One should not change the language. I am thinking of a line by the servant in Kong Salomon og Jørgen Hattemager: Play as much as you want to, drink as much as you want to, love as much as you want to.109 Father Holberg would not have been timorous; he would have said: Whore as much as you wish.]

  But falling in love gives absolute meaning, and faithfulness in one’s love is the ideality. Although ordinarily I do not attend funerals, I would gladly attend the funeral of the lowliest servant girl who was faithful in her love.—Pap. V B 103:5 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from final copy; see 293:24:

  Therefore one should not, as an author has done whose linguistic merit is otherwise worthy of respect, one should not have the servant in Kong Salomon og Jørgen Hattemager say: . . . . . —Pap.VI B 8:12 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 295:12-21:

  Midnight.

  I have everything ready, just for the sake of possibility. At the second-hand furniture store a complete set of furniture is ready at my expense. My apartment is large enough. If only the moment arrives, that very second I will make up for everything, will apply all my ingenuity to enchant her.—Pap.V B 97:37 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 295:35-38:

  . . . . . it not at all. In a little Swedish ballad it says, “In a pinch, one must oneself be the godparent,” that is, when one cannot find any godparents, and likewise when one cannot find a wife.—Pap. V B 103:7 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 295:35-38:

  . . . . . is an extremely serious matter, and just as two pennies are important to the conscientious accountant lest the account be confused, so here every insignificant thing is important to me, and just as an accountant can be happy when the account balances down to two pennies, so I shall be happy or, more correctly, infinitely more happy, if I obtain permission to draw up my account.—Pap. V B 103:8 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 297:16-28:

  [V B 103 9 198] If she wants to begin and presumably in order to say something entirely different, I interrupt again and say: But good Lord, my dear girl, can’t you remember it*—partly because she fears that I, like Gert Westphaler,110 will attack her, like Jørgen Handskemager, in the flank, if she wants to carry on any political and curious discourse whatsoever. If I exchange a word with her alone, it is always about unimportant things, only when I converse in company do I slip in hints, but always with inverse passion, for I do not wish other parties to it.

  In margin: * indeed, it was yesterday evening, or was it (and at the same moment my face is changed for a second and is [V B 103 9 199] understandable only to her) three nights ago. (Three nights ago we were not enemies.)—Pap. V B 103:9 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 298:13-14:

  And yet if this prompted a defiance in her soul, if she became for me what I once was for the person who loved me more than anyone has, an object of grave concern! But this is why I do not remove the religious—under this we are both still equal—and this is why I do not withdraw my attention from her, for I am more watchful now than ever.—Pap. V B 103:10 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 298:18-21:

  Most people perhaps would be inclined to take something like that as an exaggeration, as was indeed the case with that man. And yet in a curious way he was both right and wrong. Which is why he has always interested me as a psychological phenomenon.—Pap. V B 103:11 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 298:29-30:

  When there is a high mortality among women in confinement, one sometimes takes the precaution of suppressing information about it to the living, but why should anyone think of taking precaution with regard to me.—Pap. V B 103:12 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 298:33-38:

  How much I have suffered in this way. If my path is otherwise [V B 103.13 199] strewn with thorns, these random contacts are a unique kind that pain bitterly. In poetry, in random comments, in mystifications in newspapers, I am continually seeing clues, ghosts, and I do not ever dare to let it be noticed that I am terrified. Since I myself am initiated into and am practiced in countless mystifications, I cannot refrain from crediting her with similar proficiency. I actually believe a policeman could learn something from me. He should see me when I come to some place or other where I know that she also comes; he should see me make a search if I believe that she has been there. Indeed, if one is entitled to order all the hiding places to be opened, this is not so difficult, but if one must come up with an idea in order to have permission to look into a table [V B 103 13 200] drawer, if one must admire a vase of artificial flowers in order to see if there might be a slip of paper in the big flower, if one must stumble because only in that position can one look under a work table etc.—that is something else.—Pap. V B 103:13 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 298:26-37:

  Midnight.

  Yesterday I read in the newspaper about a young girl who had taken her own life. I understand all sorts of lines personally.

  Penciled: tradesmen’s wives—death in the newspaper

  —Pap. V B 97:40 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 299:36:

  Underscored with pencil and with N.B. penciled in margin: her mother

  —Pap. V B 103:14 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 300:25-301:18:

&nbs
p; Midnight.

  In the church

  —Pap. V B 97:12 n.d., 1844

  Deleted from sketch; see 300:25-301:18:

  Midnight

  The second time in the church

  see journal [Pap. IV A 97]

  The method is changed.

  —Pap. V B 97:13 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 300:31:

  Whether she knows it, I do not know, but I go to the churches I customarily attend and almost always sit in my usual place.—Pap. V B 103:16 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 301:4-302:16:

  Whether it was the tension she was in or whatever it was, she looked very troubled. Nevertheless, I understood this greeting in my own way. I lifted my head and let it fall down on my chest, somewhat like one who is bidding at an auction and says Yes, but did it also like one who is singing a hymn very loudly;* at least I have noticed Hiorthøy111 doing it. Then she disappeared; I saw her no more.

  In margin: * Which I also did, so that the people standing nearby looked at me; she also could do it all the more safely.—Pap. V B 103:17 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 302:21:

  Suppose I myself were the one who had to give her this message—what a situation: I with my wish, and a wish for both of us, and she has lost the sense for this language.—Pap.V B 103:18 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 305:4-5:

  And I do not deny that I have signed—certainly not indifferently but yet calmly—more than one death sentence—that is, from my standpoint I have had to judge that this kind of life was slovenly.—Pap. V B 103:19 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 306:10:

  In this respect I have in the past probed her under the guise of laughter and flippancy. This was not exactly out of character for me, but truly not one serious word was exchanged between us about what she should do.—Pap. V B 103:20 n.d., 1844

  From draft; see 307:19-21:

  And yet I have perhaps made too strong an impression. It is so seldom that I want anything in the world of finitude; therefore it is certainly possible that I, if I do want something with decided passion, as was the case here, have made the strongest impression precisely by the short, simple statement. It is certainly possible that when a girl is altogether ignorant of a person’s passion, and the time comes when not only with all his passion but also with its opposite, with calm self-possession, he says these words, “It is you I have sought; it is you I am seeking—I love you”—that this can make too powerful an impression, and far more powerful than all erotic gestures. Suppose it were so, that she was indeed taken by surprise! Well, so it goes.—Pap. V B 103:22 n.d., 1844