Overview

Kierkegaard lamented that many people find life distressingly empty, devoid of consolation, and a cause for despair; and set out to provide a remedy to this malaise. As a ""singular kind of poet and thinker,"" he employed a holistic approach, which he strikingly called ""dialectical lyric,"" to the all-important question of how we should live. His poetic task is to praise ideals, and heroes who represent them, in order to make readers profoundly appreciate the worth of the ideals, to help them experience intimately and concretely what it is like to serve something of infinite value, and thus to awaken them to their own heroic vocations. His task as a thinker or dialectician is to articulate the essence of competing ways of life, and to distinguish them from one another, so that it is possible to choose between them responsibly and without confusion. In Poetry and Heroism readers will encounter Kierkegaard's alluring invitation to live poetically and heroically, or to become the hero of one's own life, by striving passionately to become a faithful replica of ideals which can give profound meaning to human existence and which can help readers discover what Kierkegaard calls one's ""eternal validity.""

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Reviews

""Richard McCombs works his way to Kierkegaard's understanding of the Christian life as being contemporary with Christ by presenting a variety of lifestyle alternatives, often presented by Kierkegaard in the form of novel-like characters. These include reflective hedonism, politically correct morality, Stoic resignation, and Socratic questioning. These are presented on their own terms and evaluated by their own criteria. The result is an insightful and easily accessible account of the whole of Kierkegaard's thought, free of technical jargon and full of fresh insight."" --Merold Westphal, distinguished professor emeritus of philosophy, Fordham University ""Once again Richard McCombs refreshes our understanding of Kierkegaard and unearths new levels of how the great thinker's work is relevant today. As opposed to scholars who reveal how Kierkegaard intends to disturb readers into a sense of anxiety, despair, and the sufferings of religious life, McCombs depicts a Kierkegaard who gives us hope, possibility, even the potential for everyday heroism, all without sacrificing the integrity of self-awareness or a passion for truth."" --Anthony Eagan, Santa Fe Institute ""This wonderfully lyrical, edifying, and thoughtful book elucidates Kierkegaard's use of literary strategies to clarify the contours and dynamics of divergent ways of living. Most importantly, it outlines Kierkegaard's effort to show how a life of heroic moral and spiritual earnestness can be lived in the midst of mundane circumstances. McCombs's poignant style reflects Kierkegaard's endeavor to evoke in the reader a sense of the attractive beauty of such a life."" --Lee Barrett, Stager Professor of Theology, Lancaster Theological Seminary ""Appearing in virtually all his works, the Poet and the Hero are ideal types for Kierkegaard. Elegantly written and choc-a-bloc with interpretive insights, McCombs's study will prove valuable to advanced scholars and beginners alike. McCombs's nuanced reading of Kierkegaard's Either/Or and Fear and Trembling provide a matchless guide to these complicated texts which in many ways anchor Kierkegaard's entire authorship."" --Gordon Marino, professor emeritus of philosophy, St. Olaf College

Author Information

Richard McCombs teaches at St. John's College in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is the author of The Paradoxical Rationality of Sören Kierkegaard and Art and Praise in Kierkegaard's Works of Love.

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