"What is a
poet?" asks Kierkegaard in his book Either/Or
"An unhappy person who conceals profound anguish in his heart but
whose lips are so formed that as sighs and cries pass over them they sound like
beautiful music".
Kierkegaard regarded himself as a religious
poet. In Fear and Trembling he held that he cannot imitate the action of the hero Abraham
but what he can do is give them words and glory, that is the task and fate of
the poet. But poetry is not an ideal for Kierkegaard who thinks that a poetic
relationship with real life is an escape from responsibility.
