The Schopenhauer Cure

A Novel

Irvin D. Yalom

To my community of older buddies who grace me with their friendship, share life`s

inexorable diminishments and losses, and continue to sustain me with their wisdom and

dedication to the life of the mind: Robert Berger, Murray Bilmes, Martel Bryant, Dagfinn

Føllesdahl, Joseph Frank, Van Harvey, Julius Kaplan, Herbert Kotz, Morton Lieberman,

Walter Sokel, Saul Spiro, and Larry Zaroff.

39

Fame, at Last

_________________________

Some cannot

loosen

their own

chains yet

can

nonetheless liberate

their

friends.

—

Nietzsche

_________________________

There are few things that Schopenhauer vilified more than

the craving for fame. And, yet, oh how he craved it!

Fame plays an important role in his last

book,Parerga and Paralipomena, a two–volume

compilation of incidental observations, essays, and

aphorisms, completed in 1851, nine years before his death.

With a profound sense of accomplishment and relief, he

finished the book and said; «I will wipe my pen and say,

‘the rest is silence.`”

But finding a publisher was a challenge: none of his

previous publishers would touch it, having lost too much

money on his other unread works. Even his magnum

opus,The World as Will and Representation, had sold only

a few copies and received only a single, lack–luster review.

Finally, one of his loyal «evangelists» persuaded a Berlin

bookseller to publish a printing of 750 copies in 1853.

Schopenhauer was to receive ten free copies but no

royalties.

The first volume ofParerga and Paralipomena

contains a striking triplet of essays on how to gain and

maintain a sense of self–worth. The first essay, «What a

Man Is,” describes how creative thinking results in a sense

of inner wealth. Such a path provides self–esteem and

enables one to overcome the basic vacuity and boredom of

life, which results in a ceaseless pursuit of sexual

conquests, travel, and games of chance.

The second essay, «What a Man Has,” dissects one

of the major techniques used to compensate for inner

poverty: the endless accumulation of possessions, which

ultimately results in one becoming possessed by one`s

possessions.

It is the third essay, «What a Man Represents,” that

most clearly expresses his views on fame. A person`s self–worth or inner merit is the essential commodity, whereas

fame is something secondary, the mere shadow of merit. «It

is not fame but that whereby we merit it that is of true

value.... a man`s greatest happiness is not that posterity

will know something about him but he himself will develop

thoughts that deserve consideration and preservation for

centuries.» Self–esteem that is based on inner merit results

in personal autonomy which cannot be wrested from us—it

is in our power—whereas fame is never in our power.

He knew that ablating the desire for fame was not

easy; he likened it to «extracting an obstinate painful thorn

from our flesh» and agreed with Tacitus, who wrote, «The

thirst for fame is the last thing of all to be laid aside by wise

men.» And he, himself, was never able to lay aside the

thirst for fame. His writings are permeated with bitterness

about his lack of success. He regularly searched

newspapers and journals for some mention, any mention, of

himself or his work. Whenever he was away on a trip, he

assigned this scanning task to Julius Frauenstädt, his most

loyal evangelist. Though he could not stop chaffing at

being ignored, he ultimately resigned himself to never

knowing fame in his lifetime. In later introductions to his

books he explicitly addressed the future generations who

would discover him.

And then the unthinkable came.Parerga and

Paralipomena, the very book in which he described the

folly of pursuing fame, made him famous. In this final

work he softened his pessimism, staunched his flow of

jeremiads, and offered wise instruction on how to live.

Though he never renounced his belief that life is but a

«mouldy film on the surface of the earth,” and «a useless

disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness,” he

took a more pragmatic path in theParerga and

Paralipomena. We have no choice, he said, but to be

condemned to life and must therefore attempt to live with

as little pain as possible. (Schopenhauer always viewed

happiness as a negative state—an absence of suffering—

and treasured Aristotle`s maxim «Not to pleasure but to

painlessness do the prudent aspire.»)

Accordingly,Parerga and Paralipomena offers

lessons on how to think independently, how to retain

skepticism and rationality, how to avoid soothing

supernatural emollients, how to think well of ourselves,

keep our stakes low, and avoid attaching ourselves to what

can be lost. Even though «everyone must act in life`s great

puppet play and feel the wire which sets us into motion,”

there is, nonetheless, comfort in maintaining the

philosopher`s lofty perspective that, from the aspect of

eternity, nothing really matters—everything passes.

Parerga and Paralipomenaintroduces a new tone.

While it continues to emphasize the tragic and lamentable

suffering of existence, it adds the dimension of

connectivity—that is, through the commonality of our

suffering, we are inexorably connected to one another. In

one remarkable passage the great misanthrope displays a

softer, more indulgent, view of his fellow bipeds.

The really proper address between one man and another

should be, instead of Sir, Monsieur,...my fellow

sufferer.However strange this may sound, it accords

with the facts, puts the other man in the most correct

light, and reminds us of that most necessary thing,

tolerance, patience, forbearance, and love of one`s

neighbor, which everyone needs and each of us

therefore owes to another.

A few sentences later he adds a thought that could

serve well as an opening paragraph in a contemporary

textbook of psychotherapy.

We should treat with indulgence every human folly,

failing, and vice, bearing in mind that what we have

before us are simply our own failings, follies, and vices.

For they are just the failings of mankind to which we

also belong and accordingly we have all the same

failings buried within ourselves. We should not be

indignant with others for these vices simply because

they do not appear in us at the moment.

Parerga and Paralipomenawas a great success,

generating several compilations of selections published

separately under more popular titles(Aphorisms on

Practical Wisdom, Counsels and Maxims, The Wisdom of

Life, Living Thoughts of Schopenhauer, The Art of

Literature, Religion: A Dialogue). Soon Schopenhauer`s

words were on the tongue of the entire educated German

public. Even in neighboring Denmark, Kierkegaard wrote

in his 1854 journal that «all the literary gossips, journalists,

and authorlings have begun to busy themselves with S.»

Praise ultimately appeared in the press. Great Britain,

Arthur`s almost–birthplace, was the first to honor him with

a stunning review of all of his work (titled «Iconoclasm in

German Philosophy») in the prestigiousWestminister

Review. Shortly afterward this review was translated and

widely read in Germany. Similar articles quickly appeared

in France and Italy, and Schopenhauer`s life changed

dramatically.

Curious visitors flocked to the Englisher Hof to eye

the philosopher at lunch. Richard Wagner sent him the

original libretto of theRing of the Nibelungs with a

dedication. Universities began to teach his work, learned

societies issued invitations for membership, eulogistic

letters arrived in the post, his previous books reappeared in

bookstores, townspeople greeted him on his walks, and pet

stores had a run on poodles similar to Schopenhauer`s.

Schopenhauer`s rapture and delight were very

evident. He wrote, «If a cat is stroked it purrs; and just as

inevitably if a man is praised, sweet rapture and delight are

reflected in his face, and expressed the hope» that «the

morning sun of my fame will gild with its first rays the

evening of my life and dispel its gloom.» When the eminent

sculptress Elisabeth Ney visited Frankfurt for four weeks to

do a bust of him, Arthur purred, «She works all day at my

place. When I get home we have coffee together, we sit

together on the sofa, and I feel as if I were married.»

Not since the best years of his life—the two years

spent as a child in Le Havre with the de Blesimaire

family—had Arthur spoken so tenderly and contentedly of

domestic life.