In this tender portrait, philosopher Jürgen Goldstein explores his lifelong fascination, Nick Drake, who died young and yet became immortalised through his music. He embarks on a journey through time and space to Drake’s grave and places of activity and tries to track down his genius of restraint. He knows that even he will not be able to get to grips with the real: ‘We will not be able to fathom a person, but have to keep the image of them in limbo. The facts of their life that can be ascertained must not degenerate into weights that keep our imagination grounded in the facts.’ So he sets out to learn to understand passion, devotion and fandom, to fathom why one feels inexplicably drawn to a thing, a person, a music – and to approach the riddle of life and music.
“Drake's music, for all its depth and sometimes harshness, is tempered in a very English way. It avoids drama and ecstasy. It remains as restrained as the landscape from which it originates. And it strikes a note that opens up the presence of the past through the present.”
Non-fiction
Jürgen Goldstein, born 1962, is a professor for philosophy at the University Koblenz-Landau. His books deal with the emergence of modern subjectivity, the political philosophy of 20th century and the history of nature perception. For his book Georg Forster. Zwischen Freiheit und Naturgewalt, he received the Leipzig Book Fair Prize in the non-fiction/essay category in 2016. Most recently, Matthes & Seitz Berlin published 2024 Menschlichkeit. Vom Plan der Humanisierung der Welt (2024).
