ABSTRACT
Béla Brandenstein's analysis starts with the introduction "Man as Paradox", where anthropology is mainly substituted with psychology, including rather humorous presentations of the protagonist's clownish, sometimes even morbid features. Brandenstein's renewed attempts properly to understand Søren Kierkegaard's writings from a psychological angle resulted in several shortcuts in the interpretation. The references to Kierkegaard's works imply an in-depth familiarity with the oeuvre, and the references to the secondary literature are impressive. The psychological and biographical approaches are opposed to the philosophical, theological, or at least literary ones. Brandenstein's conclusion was that Kierkegaard's main controversy originated in the tension between his "strong spirit in a weak body". He focuses on Kierkegaard as a disturbed mind and life that lost control in attacking the church. In spite of Brandenstein's seemingly sympathetic remarks about Kierkegaard, the Danish thinker was defined as a "private-Christian" and blamed for "not being able properly to appreciate the role of the Church".
