Mostly things are not that way, that simple and pure, with so much focus given to each syllable of life as life sings itself. But that kind of attention is the prize. To be engrossed by something outside ourselves is a powerful antidote for the rational mind, the mind that so frequently has its head up its own ass—seeing things in such a narrow and darkly narcissistic way that it presents a colorectal theology, offering hope to no one.

Authoritarian regimes are being elected all over the world, and the present risk is that the histories of oppressed peoples will be driven further underground, despite - or dare one say, because of - the radical left.

As important as it is to build platforms on social issues, the bullying tactics of the left run the risk of alienating even fair-minded people. Imitation cannot win the day, and when intellectuals get praised for their ‘courage’ - that is, for merely saying what they think - then one realises that panic-driven pandering has become the new norm! In his inimitable style, it was Nietzsche who said, “Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.

In Civilisation and its Discontents, Freud argues that the civilisational setup is antithetical to human happiness: the individual quest for freedom - specifically, the discharge of the sexual and aggressive drives - is thwarted repeatedly by societal demands for conformity. And yet, despite identifying easily with two sources of our suffering - the awesome power of the natural world and the hopeless fragility of the human constitution - we are less inclined to concede as the third, and main, source of that suffering the lockstep marching of state and society. In Freud’s view, “When we start considering this possibility, we come across a contention which is so astonishing that we must dwell on it. This contention holds that what we call our civilisation is largely responsible for our misery, and that we should be much happier if we gave it up and returned to primitive conditions. I call this contention astonishing because, in whatever way we may define the concept of civilisation, it is a certain fact that all the things with which we seek to protect ourselves against the threats that emanate from the sources of suffering are part of that very civilisation.

For Proust, a man’s interior inverse comprises a miracle, an infinity that never ceases to amaze us. But that is not what amazes Kafka. He does not ask what internal motivations determine man’s behaviour. He asks a question that is radically different: What possibilities remain for man in a world where the external determinants have become so overpowering that internal impulses no longer carry weight? Indeed, how could it have changed K.’s destiny and attitude if he had had homosexual inclinations or an unhappy love affair behind him? In no way.

Kirilov kills himself because he is forced to it by very clearly defined interests, carefully delineated intrigues. His act, however mad, is rational, conscious, meditated, premeditated. Kirilov’s character is based entirely on his strange philosophy of suicide, and his act is merely the perfectly logical extension of his ideas.

Dostoyevsky grasped the madness of reason stubbornly determined to carry its logic through to the end. The terrain Tolstoy explores is the opposite: he uncovers the intrusions of illogic, of the irrational. That is why I mention him. The reference to Tolstoy places Broch in the context of one of the great explorations of the European novel: the exploration of the role the irrational plays in our decisions, in our lives.