Spiritual Writings: A New Translation and Selection

“By far the most profound thinker of the 19th century” —Ludwig Wittgenstein

“Kierkegaard’s great contribution to Western philosophy was to assert, or to reassert with Romantic urgency, that, subjectively speaking, each existence is the center of the universe.” —John Updike, The New Yorker

Harper Perennial Modern Classics presents the rediscovered spiritual writings of Søren Kierkegaard, edited and translated by Oxford theologian George Pattison. Called “the first modernist” by The Guardian and “the father of existentialism” by the New York Times, Kierkegaard left an indelible imprint on existential writers from Sartre and Camus to Kafka and Derrida. In works like Fear and Trembling, Sickness unto Death, and Either/Or, he by famously articulated that all meaning is rooted in subjective experience—but the devotional essays that Patterson reveals in Spiritual Writings will forever change our understanding of the great philosopher, uncovering the spiritual foundations beneath his secularist philosophy.

In this new collection, Oxford theologian George Pattison translates and selects Søren Kierkegaard's previously neglected writings on spirituality—works that greatly deepen our understanding of the influential thinker. In philosophy and literature, Kierkegaard ("By far the most profound thinker of the nineteenth century"—Ludwig Wittgenstein) is generally perceived as epitomizing existential angst. However, there is much moreto Kierkegaard than the popular image of the “melancholy Dane” or the iconoclastic critic of established Christendom. Alongside the pseudonymous books for which he is largely known, Kierkegaard also wrote many devotional works, which he called "upbuilding" or "edifying" discourses. Taken as a whole, these writings offer something very different from the popular view—they embody a spirituality grounded in a firm sense of human life as a divine gift.

“George Pattison offers us a deeply valuable introduction to a great philosopher.” - Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury