Søren Kierkegaard On What It Means To Be A Poet

A mildly depressing quote that can be interpreted optimistically

Søren Kierkegaard was christian existentialist philosopher living in the 1800s in Denmark. What is existentialism? It’s the idea that individuals are ultimately free to make their own choices, and are therefore responsible for their own life in this strange world.

People who believe in the sovereignty of the individual are one step away from also being a poet. What individualists and poets have in common is their care for and focus on the subjective, personal experience of life.

Here’s Kierkegaard’s words on what it means to be a poet:

“What is a poet? An unhappy man who hides deep anguish in his heart, but whose lips are so formed that when the sigh and cry pass through them, it sounds like lovely music…. And people flock around the poet and say: ‘Sing again soon’ — that is, ‘May new sufferings torment your soul but your lips be fashioned as before, for the cry would only frighten us, but the music, that is blissful.”
— Søren Kierkegaard, Either/or

Existentialism presents reality as the individual versus the universe — you and your free choices against the infinite strangeness of existing. Very often this comes across as a negative experience. The world…