What is ‘An Existential Contribution’?

Article

Abstract

[In English]

What does Kierkegaard – or his pseudonym Johannes Climacus – mean when he announces, in the Postscript’s subtitle, that the book will provide “an Existential Contribution”? The varied history of ‘existential philosophy’ no doubt erupts from
this casual end to a subtitle. Rather than look at the contents of Kierkegaard’s books for an answer, I look at their strange and unsettling titles, subtitles, and author-attributions. "ey give important evidence for my claim that an existential contribution is a Socratic contribution. "e contents of these books arrive in distinctive ‘wrappings’ that foreshadow and e#ect a subtle Socratic, existential contribution.