Soren Kierkegaard

finished ‘The Discourse of the Fashion Designer.’ I became extremely useful
to him, just by helping him to get beyond the most insignificant of the
items upon which he foundered.”
Levin most definitely had what it took to serve as a satirical assistant of
this sort, for he was well-known as a misogynist, a curmudgeon, and a
drinker, but was also a literary scholar, a writer, and a translator, and he had
edited and published his editions of a number of writers, including Ludvig
Holberg and Johan Herman Wessel .For a number of years he was practi-
cally a fixture at the Student Association, where Johannes Fibiger paints an
extraordinarily inelegant portrait of him: “The world of university students
included a writer well-known to several generations, Israel Levin, a small,
stoutly built, long-armed, flat-footed character with a large head and intelli-
gent features, the very type of his oppressed race .As perpetual students often
do, he tended to seek the company of the youngest students, and with his
tireless eloquence and his experiences of life (which only too often tended
toward what was not exactly noble and sometimes, in fact, toward the cyni-
cal) he was rather entertaining.”
They made quite a pretty pair, those two, the genius and the secretary,
who at any rate shared certain physical prerequisites that enabled them to
work together .Moreover, Kierkegaard knew very well with whom he
was dealing: “Deservedly or undeservedly, Levin is doubtless neither well
regarded nor respected by most people, and he is certainly due for a come-
uppance .If he obtruded some foolish bit of praise upon me, I would re-
main silent .Why? Because his praise could only damage me, bring me into
ill repute, place me in an unfavorable light .On the other hand, if I pro-
tested against him it could be to my advantage, it could earn me the favor
of the many people who would be delighted to seeCand.Levin put
through the mill.”
It was, however, hardly this calculated self-respect, but rather ordinary
bashfulness, that prompted Kierkegaard to decline in February 1845, when
Levin invited him and one hundred and thirty other people to contribute
handwriting samples .Levin planned to publish anAlbum of the Handwriting
of Contemporary Danish Men and Women, for Handwriting Instruction in the
Schools .Kierkegaard had to evade the request: “My good Levin! It simply
cannot be done .I am too old to write in an exercise book for my own sake.
And even considering that my handwriting might serve as an exercise for
young readers, I would not want to write a draft for the sake of the draft—
such writing of drafts [Danish:Kladderie] could easily become daft [Danish:
Kludderie, ‘a mess’].” Kierkegaard apparently sensed that his refusal might
be interpreted as a sign of vanity, for a bit later, when he sent Levin an
honorarium in “compensation for your work and time,” he wrote on the