ABSTRACT
In the six months that it took me to research and write this chapter, I have had a persistent feeling that it is an arrogant act on my part to write about arrogance, and therefore to presume that I know more about the subject, and that you, the reader, would be interested in what I have to say. Where does this feeling come from? Am I insecure about my qualifications? Maybe, to a certain extent, but that insecurity has never surfaced to this degree before. And definitely not in this form. Perhaps it has to do with the subject itself. Has reading, writing, and thinking about arrogance made me more aware of my own? Possibly, even probably, so. Certainly, there could be a “priming” effect. But if so, it appears to be specific for this subject. I am not (consciously) ashamed about my chapter on “Shame” (2015), and do not regret writing about “Regret” (2017). What then is it about arrogance that lends itself so easily to reflection and apparent replication?
