The miles seem interminable in this godforsaken stagecoach – only an Abraham could believe it otherwise! – and Kierkegaard’s fellow passengers look as wretched as he feels. But who knows, perhaps each one of them is, this very moment, giving thanks to God in silent prayer – for we can never see another person’s inward labour, nor know all the joys and sorrows stirring in another soul. Kierkegaard, for his part, is stiff, sore and shattered, and prays only that the coach will soon reach Stralsund.

This passage is an example of Clare Carlisle’s travel narrator technique she deploys in Philosopher of the Heart. It’s a literary technique I’ve not come across in biography before. “Travel narrator” is also a made up phrase. I just made it up.

Back to the passage:

It dips between present and past tense. It briefly explores the inner-life. And if you sit back and imagine, you can picture Kierkegaard on the coach while the narration plays in the background.

Carlisle, Clare. Philosopher of the Heart: The Restless Life of Søren Kierkegaard. United States, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020. pg42