I have decided to begin a series of "Appreciations" of selected texts when I return home, where my books are [save, of course, for my complete set of the works of Marx and Engels in German, and my collected books on the philosophy of Kant, both of which grace my shelves here in Paris, together with one copy each of every edition and translation of every book I have published -- roughly seventy volumes in all]. I think I will start with Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragments. The brief Preface to that short work is, page for page, my favorite work of philosophy in the entire Western corpus. I cannot read the last lines of it without tears coming to my eyes. I shall try to do Appreciations of all of the titles listed recently on this blog, and then perhaps some others besides. We shall see. The aim is not to produce scholarly discussions of the texts -- in many instances, I am utterly unfit to attempt such a thing -- but rather to encourage my readers to explore these works for themselves.
It was my older son, Patrick, the famous International Chess Grandmaster, who first suggested that I try my hand at a blog. It was an inspired suggestion. I have found the perfect format in which to continue my lifelong career as a teacher, while in retirement [or "en retrait," as the French say, which is to say, "In retreat"!]
