"In [Kierkegaard's] journal passage from 1848, he wrote: 'In order to bear mental tension such as mine, I need diversion, the diversion of chance contacts on the streets and alleys, because association with a few exclusive individuals is actually no diversion'...he described how on his way home, 'overwhelmed with ideas ready to be written down and in a sense so weak that I could scarcely walk,' he would often encounter a poor man, and if he refused to speak with him, the ideas would flee,'and I would sink into the most dreadful spiritual tribulation at the idea that God could do to me what I had done to that man. But if I took the time to talk with the poor man, things never went that way.' -Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust, p. 24-25
"In [Kierkegaard's] journal passage from 1848, he wrote: 'In order to bear mental tension such as mine, I need diversion, the diversion of chance contacts on the streets and alleys, because association with a few exclusive individuals is actually no diversion'...he described how on his way home, 'overwhelmed with ideas ready to be written down and in a sense so weak that I could scarcely walk,' he would often encounter a poor man, and if he refused to speak with him, the ideas would flee,'and I would sink into the most dreadful spiritual tribulation at the idea that God could do to me what I had done to that man. But if I took the time to talk with the poor man, things never went that way.'
ReplyDelete-Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust, p. 24-25
Thanks for that J!
ReplyDelete