Word: kierkegaard
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...great and gloomy Dane, Soren Kierkegaard, has turned up in many strange guises. The philosophy of the once-obscure 19th century theologian has been abused to label everything from "existentialist" hairdos to literature, and his troubled probings of Man, God and Infinity have inspired a modern philosophical fad as well as the "crisis theology" of contemporary Protestantism. Last week Kierkegaard appeared in music. His musical interpreter: U.S. Composer Samuel Barber, 44, who studied Kierkegaard for a decade, and made him the subject of his first major composition in four years...
Many contemporary composers seem to be reaching for words to go with their music, and for religious themes. Barber's 20-minute work used as its text none of Kierkegaard's intricate philosophizing, but some simple and often beautiful prayers which Composer Barber culled from the preacher's writings. The work begins with plain chant, moves on to orchestral fortissimos. a restrained soprano solo, joyous choral passages and occasional Dies Irae trumpet blasts. But the overall effect is quiet, without either the sweetness or the grandeur expected of religious music. It is clean rather than austere...
Madeleine is Rickie's wife. She is also a prim and proper neo-Victorian with a habit of regarding duty and pleasure as synonymous. Dinah is an apostle of self-expression, always dressing and undressing her mind to suit the latest intellectual fashion, from Picasso to Kierkegaard. "On visits and at her Bohemian parties, she makes an impression on Rickie. Pretty soon, Rickie's business engagements are mostly monkey business. Torn between his obligations to Madeleine and his two young sons, and the emotional release he feels with Dinah, Rickie's conscience and his stomach both begin...
...transferred verbatim to his notebooks. Like most authors, Wilder hates to write. Sometimes he plays hooky in the Yale library ("I flip through an archaeological journal and read a piece about a new excavation in Herculaneum. I even read medical journals"). He "does" Finnegan's Wake, pores over Kierkegaard, works at his hobby of dating the plays of Lope de Vega, strums on the piano, or reads a score of a Palestrina Mass. After lunch he usually takes a long nap. After 5, visitors come ("I like bustle after 5"). Then, pacing about his living room, consumed with...
Thomas refused to go through the ordeal of answering audience questions. Why? Because, he said, they always follow the same vapid pattern: "Are the young English poets really psychological?", or "I always carry Kierkegaard in my pocket. What do you carry...