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A Study of Kierkegaard's Motif for Psychological Experiment
The Journal of Aesthetics and Science of Art
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This treatise is a study of Kierkegaard's motif for the psychological experiment. The psychological experiment is a category of indirect communication to represent a view of life. In 1841, Kierkegaard broke up with Regine Olsen, in a religious collision, which directly motivated indirect communication. Numerous variations on stories of unhappy love related to a broken engagement attest to its influence. One of the most representative works among them is a psychological experiment, “‘Guilty?’/’Not Guilty?’” by a pseudonymous author Frater Taciturnus. The purpose of this study is to summarize the four central motifs for indirect communication encompassing psychological experiments and to develop a discussion step by step from historically proven motifs to beneath-the-surface motifs. Part 2, Section 1, “Satisfaction,” starts by considering Kierkegaard's will to dedicate the entire authorship to his former fiancée Regine. Section 2, “Fear and Trembling,” discusses how he became an author after his disengagement. Section 3, “Inclosing Reserve,” deals with Kierkegaard's relationship with his father and his unhappy love with Regine. Section 4, “Confession,” argues that the experiment itself by Taciturnus, who wrests a sigh from Quidam's inclosed soul, is Kierkegaard's confessional act breaking his enclosing reserve. Chapter Ⅲ, “Vocalization,” attempts to interpret the six thematic, titled pieces inserted in “‘Guilty?’/ ‘Not Guilty?’”. These pieces help Quidam-Kierkegaard's inclosing reserve to vocalize. A key conclusion of the whole discussion lies in Part 2, Section 4, “Confession.” Here the dialectical motifs of both self-encloser and transparency of confession are revealed.
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