The Seventh Solitude: Metaphysical Homelessness in Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, and Nietzsche

In these three predecessors of existentialism, all of whom were profoundly influenced by Stendhal, author Ralph Harper finds evidence of that spiritual isolation which leads ultimately to personal solitude and philosophical nihilism. To these negative modes of being he opposes the alternatives embodied by St. Augustine and Proust—the passion for God and the passion for creation.