A 211. birthday: Kierkegaard of Denmark and the World –an event dedicated to the life and work of Søren Kierkegaard

Monday, May 6th
17:00
Culture Club Salong

On the 5th of May 1813, just as the Danish state goes bankrupt in the wake of the Napoleonic wars, Søren Kierkegaard is born. Instead of following in his father’s footsteps as a sock merchant, and despite dying at the age of 42, the melancholy, guilt-ridden and profound “Søren Sock” becomes one of the great European philosophers of his century, also known as the “father of existentialism”.
For his birthday, we will look at his life and work from different angles. At the University of
Tartu, Igor Ahmedov is writing his PhD on the topic of Kierkegaardian Theology of Education,
where he explores the idea that God is Education in the work of Søren Kierkegaard. American poet, translator, and Kierkegaard admirer Ilya Bernstein will read not from Kierkegaard’s ‘Repetition’, but from his own eponymous prose poem. Bernstein’s Danish translator and Danish language lecturer at the University of Tartu, Mie Mortensen, will introduce Kierkegaard’s role in Danish identity and the forms of repetition and education inherent in translation. The discussion will be held in English, moderated by Øyvind Rangøy.

The event is organised within the framework of the event series Café Norden by The Nordic Council of Ministries office in Estonia in cooperation with Tartu University’s Department of
Scandinavian Studies (Skandinavistik).