mentioned case, but also in the more general sense of the associations that
dogged the heels of the wandering student and imprinted on his experience
of nature a whole series of cultural signs: The sighing of the trees is con-
nected to Valdemar Atterdag’s hunt, the rushes bring to mind blonde maid-
ens—indeed, even Mozart and Weber are summoned to assist with the
descriptions. Not far from Hellebæk he climbed Odin’s Hill, which offered
a lovely view across the Sound with Kullen in the distance, but no sooner
had he reached the top than he noted: “The view has been much praised
and discussed, which regrettably causes much of the impression to disap-
pear.” And, he continued, on a somewhat indignant note: “If only people
would tire of running around so officiously, pointing out romantic settings
(for example, K——at Fredensborg).”
Might the mysteriously parenthetical “K——” be Kierkegaard himself,
distancing himself with weary irony from his own busy search for romantic
situations in Fredensborg and environs?
“To Find the Idea for Which I Am
Willing to Live and Die”Most of the nearly twenty entries Kierkegaard made in his green, cloth-
bound journal during his stay are dated and tell us something about one or
another specific geographical location. There is a three-page entry, for July
29, which gives a brisk impressionistic sketch of Kierkegaard’s walking tour
from Gilleleje Inn, via Black Bridge, and thence across empty fields along
the coast to Gilberg Head, a hundred-foot cliff that is the northernmost
point of Zealand: “This spot has always been one of my favorite places. And
so when I stood here one quiet evening; when the sea sounded its song
with deep but quiet solemnity; when my eye did not encounter a single sail
on that enormous surface, while the sea bounded the heavens and the heav-
ens the sea; when, at the same time, the bustle of life’s affairs fell mute and
the birds sang their vespers—then the few dear departed ones would often
rise from the grave before me, or rather, it seemed to me as if they were
not dead. I felt so much at ease in their company. I rested in their embrace.
It was as though I were out of my body, floating with them in a loftier
ether. Then the cry of the gulls reminded me that I stood there alone. It all
vanished before my eyes, and with a mournful heart I reentered the teeming
world, though without forgetting such blessed moments.”
Upon closer inspection, however, the sequence of many of the journal
entries is unreliable, and their dates of composition are equally uncertain.