‎"KIERKEGAARD, SØREN.‎
‎Om Begrebet Ironi med stadigt hensyn til Socrates. Af S. A. Kierkegaard. - [A TRULY SPLENDID, COMPLETELY FRESH COPY IN THE DAINTIEST OF THE GIFT-BINDINGS]‎

‎Kjøbenhavn, P.G. Philipsens Forlag, 1841. 8vo. (8), 350 pp. Gift binding of elaborately blindpatterned full cloth with single gilt line-border to boards and single gilt lines to spine. All edges gilt and printed on fine paper. The slightest touch of wear to corners and capitals, but apart from that a complete fresh, clean, bright and tight copy. It looks like it has hardly been opened and seems like it just came from the binder. No markings of any kind. ‎

Reference : 62111

‎A truly splendid copy of the first edition of Kierkegaard's dissertation, being a completely fresh copy in the daintiest of the gift-bindings, presumably one of the two daintily bound copies that Kierkegaard had in his own collection (nr. 2110-11 in the auction catalogue). The copy is with the Thesis, and both the day and the time has been filled in by hand. Kierkegaard's dissertationconstitutes the culmination of three years’ intensive studies of Socrates and “the true point of departure for Kierkegaard’s authorship” (Brandes). The work is of the utmost importance in Kierkegaard’s production, not only as his first academic treatise, but also because he here introduces several themes that will be addressed in his later works. Among these we find the question of defining the subject of cognition and self-knowledge of the subject. The maxim of “know thyself” will be a constant throughout his oeuvre, as is the theory of knowledge acquisition that he deals with here. The dissertation is also noteworthy in referencing many of Hegel’s theses in a not negative context, something that Kierkegaard himself would later note with disappointment and characterize as an early, uncritical use of Hegel. Another noteworthy feature is the fact that the thesis is written in Danish, which was unheard of at the time. Kierkegaard felt that Danish was a more suitable language for the thesis and hadto petition the King to be granted permission to submit it in Danish rather than Latin. This in itself poses as certain irony, as the young Kierkegaard was known to express himself poorly and very long-winded in written Danish. One of Kierkegaard’s only true friends, his school friend H.P. Holst recounts (in 1869) how the two had a special school friendship and working relationship, in which Kierkegaard wrote Latin compositions for Holst, while Holst wrote Danish compositions for Kierkegaard, who “expressed himself in a hopelessly Latin Danish crawling with participial phrases and extraordinarily complicatedsentences” (Garff, p. 139). When Kierkegaard, in 1838, was ready to publish his famous piece on Hans Christian Andersen (see nr. 1 & 2 above), which was to appear in Heiberg’s journal Perseus, Heiberg had agreed to publish the piece, although he had some severe critical comments about the way and the form in which it was written – if it were to appear in Perseus, Heiberg demanded, at the very least, the young Kierkegaard would have to submit it in a reasonably readable Danish. “Kierkegaard therefore turned to his old schoolmate H. P. Holst and asked him to do something with the language…” (Garff, p. 139). From their school days, Holst was well aware of the problem with Kierkegaard’s Danish, and he recounts that over the summer, he actually “translated” Kierkegaard’s article on Andersen into proper Danish. The oral defense was conducted in Latin, however. The judges all agreed that the work submitted was both intelligent and noteworthy. But they were concerned about its style, which was found to be both tasteless, long-winded, and idiosyncratic. We already here witness Kierkegaard’s idiosyncratic approach to content and style that is so characteristic for all of his greatest works. Both stylistically and thematically, Kierkegaard’s and especially a clear precursor for his magnum opus Either-Or that is to be his next publication. In many ways, Either-Or is born directly out of The Concept of Irony and is the work that brings the theory of Irony to life. Part One of the dissertation concentrates on Socrates as interpreted by Xenophon, Plato, and Aristophanes, with a word on Hegel and Hegelian categories. Part Two is a more synoptic discussion of the concept of irony in Kierkegaard’s categories, with examples from other philosophers. The work constitutes Kierkegaard’s attempt at understanding the role of irony in disrupting society, and with Socrates understood through Kierkegaard, we witness a whole new way of interpreting the world before us. Wisdom is not necessarily fixed, and we ought to use Socratic ignorance to approach the world without the inherited bias of our cultures. With irony, we will be able to embrace the not knowing. We need to question the world knowing we may not find an answer. The moment we stop questioning and just accept the easy answers, we succumb to ignorance. We must use irony to laugh at ourselves in order to improve ourselves and to laugh at society in order to improve the world. The work was submitted to the Philosophical Faculty at the University of Copenhagen on June 3rd 1841. Kierkegaard had asked for his dissertation to be ready from the printer’s in ample time for him to defend it before the new semester commenced. This presumably because he had already planned his sojourn to Berlin to hear the master philosopher Schelling. On September 16th, the book was issued, and on September 29th, the defense would take place. The entire defense, including a two hour long lunch break, took seven hours, during which ”an unusually full auditorium” would listen to the official opponents F.C. Sibbern and P.O. Brøndsted as well as the seven “ex auditorio” opponents F.C. Petersen, J.L. Heiberg, P.C. Kierkegaard, Fr. Beck, F.P.J. Dahl, H .J.Thue og C.F. Christens, not to mention Kierkegaard himself. The work appeared in two states – one with the four pages of “Theses”, for academics of the university, whereas the copies without the theses were intended for ordinary sale. These sales copies also do not have “Udgivet for Magistergraden” and “theologisk Candidat” on the title-page. The first page of the theses always contains the day “XXIX” of September written in hand, and sometimes the time “hora X” is also written in hand, but not always. In all, 11 presentation-copies of the dissertation are known, and of these only one is signed (that for Holst), all the others merely state the title and name of the recipient. As is evident from the auction catalogue of his collection, Kierkegaard had a number of copies of his dissertation in his possession when he died. Five of them were bound, and two of them were “nit. M. Guldsnit” (i.e. daintily bound and with gilt edges). These two copies were obviously meant as presentation-copies that he then never gave away. The gift copies of the dissertation were given two types of bindings, both brownish cloth, one type patterned, the other one plain, and some of them have gilt edges, but most of the plain ones do not. There exist two copies on thick vellum paper – one being Kierkegaard’s own copy, the other being the copy for H.C. Ørsted, discoverer of electromagnetism and then principle of the University of Copenhagen. “As already implied, two works of the authorship stand out in the sense that Kierkegaard sent his presentation-copies to a special circle of people: The dissertation from 1841...” (Posselt, Textspejle, p. 91, translated from Danish). Most of the copies were given to former teachers and especially to people who, due to leading positions, personified the university. “For this circle of initiated we can now, due to registered copies, confirm that Kierkegaard gave copies with handwritten dedications to the headmaster of the University H.C. Ørsted (printed on thick paper), Kolderup-Rosenvinge and to J.L. Heiberg. It is granted that Sibbern, Madvig and F.C. Petersen were also given the dissertation as a gift,... but these copies are not known (yet).” (Posselt, Textspejle, pp. 93-94, translated fromDanish). (N.b. We have since handled the copy given to Petersen and can thus confirm that it exists). Only a few months after Kierkegaard died (11th of November 1855), at the beginning of April 1856, his books were put up for sale. The sale was an event which created stir among scholars all over Denmark, and the event drew large crowds. Everyone wanted a piece of the recently deceased legend, and bidding was lively. The average price for the single items was nearly a rix-dollar, a very high price for that time. As the old Herman Lynge wrote in a letter on the 22nd of May (The Royal Library, Recent Letters, D.), to the famous collector F.S. Bang, “At the sale of Dr. Søren Kierkegaard’s books everything went at very high prices, especially his own works, which brought 2 or 3 times the published prices”.” (Rohde Auction Catalogue, p. LVIJ). Many authors, philosophers, and scholars were present in the auction room, which was completely full, as was the Royal Library, who bought ca 80 lots. “Many of the books, not only his own, were paid for with much higher prices than in the book shops” (In Morgenposten no. 99, 30. April 1856, written by “P.”, translated from Danish). ""Some books were bought by libraries where they still are today, others were bought by private people, who sometimes wrote their names in the front of the books and thus, indirectly, stated that they came from Kierkegaard’s book collection… The edition (of the auction catalogue, 1967) registers all books from Kierkegaard’s book collection that it has hitherto been possible to identify – either in public or in private ownership… All in all, nearly a couple of hundred volumes – i.e. ca. 10 % – of the Kierkegaardian book collection is said to be rediscovered…"" (Rohde). Thus, today, books from Kierkegaard’s library are of the utmost scarcity. Only very few are still possible to acquire, and they hardly ever appear on the market. Himmelstrup 8‎