to some fictitious person, just as the actions and words of characters in a novel had to be thought up by its author before they could be attributed to the characters. Moreover, it is Kierkegaard who thinks it is worthwhile to present these fictitious writers and their ideas to us for our reading pleasure or perhaps some more serious purpose. Similarly, it is Dostoyevsky who first creates the words and deeds of three very different brothers, Ivan, Dmitri, and Alyosha, and then presents them to us.