“In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o’clock in the morning, day after day.”

Among F. Scott Fitzgerald’s last publications was a series of short essays published in Esquire from 1931 to 1936. The titular piece, The Crack-Up, relates to the disillusionment he felt about his life up to that point, at age 39, just four years before his death.

As someone who had known enormous fame and success at a young age, but then came a day when all his books were out of print, The Crack-Up can be read as a social commentary, emphasizing the shallowness of the reckless hedonism and materialism that characterized that era. Fitzgerald examines the high social expectations and his struggle to maintain the image of a successful man.

Fitzgerald documents the breakdown he felt and how it made him feel less of a person. A breakdown like a crack in a pitcher, something that renders it practically useless, except for storing various objects, while you end up putting the flowers in a glass instead. There are breakdowns, as the writer notes, that are obvious (sudden changes, such as an illness or an injury), and there are breakdowns that happen without us realizing it, and these are the underground ones, the ones that truly bleed you dry.

Continue the Journey

Explore The Library →

Subscribe to receive future issues.

Subscribe now

If you’d like to support the work behind Monday Steps, you can buy me a coffee.

Support Monday Steps ☕

“We swallow greedily any lie that flatters us, but we sip only little by little at a truth we find bitter.”

We are in pre-revolutionary France. This book is not published when it is written, but only a few years later, after Goethe translates it.

Equality is not a given in that era. People of various talents and gifts find themselves in the unfortunate position of having to choose between dignity and food.

It’s simply that some were chosen to be better than us. We observe the limits of the establishment’s futile struggle to repel external influences. Of course it cannot and of course you cannot. It’s not that you lack talent, it’s that you cannot transform it into bread.

You meet a supposed philosopher in Café de la Régence, one of the trend spots of the time. He measures your character, keeps asking you questions, and quizzes you about your virtue. Obviously, he (the philosopher) cannot refute the fact that life is extremely unjust for you and that many people in this world cannot hold their heads high. Still, he advises you according to his own standards and recommends that you behave like Diogenes. But you choose to follow your own path.

We are talking about a fascinating and satirical dialogue about art and morality. The eccentric nephew of the famous composer Jean-Philippe Rameau appears deeply distrustful of humanity, yet willing to sell himself for a plate of lentils.

And yet, he is so honest that it is impossible to consider him fake or a fraud. Together with the philosopher he converses with, sometimes even you don’t know how to react to his attacks, you might laugh, you might be outraged. Even today, there are many such young people.

And even the supposed philosopher (Diderot himself, perhaps?) doubts, gets confused, and wonders whether he is the one thinking wrongly, or whether the new generation has no hope.

Continue the Journey

Explore The Library →

Subscribe to receive future issues.

Subscribe now

If you’d like to support the work behind Monday Steps, you can buy me a coffee.

Support Monday Steps ☕

In 1940, Europe was being ravaged by the Second World War, with the nightmare of Nazism advancing. Zweig and other writers of the time went into exile in Central and, primarily, South America.

However, what this particular man was experiencing became unbearable for him, until, tragically, he decided to end his life, together with his wife, in Brazil, where they had sought refuge, in February 1942.

His final work, a masterpiece, to be precise, was Chess Novella. In it, we find ourselves aboard a ship sailing from New York to Buenos Aires. There, the passengers discover that the world chess champion is among them, although he appears to be rather distant and solitary: Mirko Czentovic.

As they gradually lose every chess game they play against the champion, one passenger, Dr. B., finds the courage to interrupt them and offer them advice for their next game. And somehow, their luck begins to change.

The magic lies in this man, and in the moment when he begins to describe how he acquired this skill at chess and at what cost.

Through his account, I literally lived in 1940s Vienna, read one of the most comprehensive indictments of Nazism, and, naturally, developed a profound respect for this ingenious game.

After reading the book, I tried to learn how to play and I am still trying to this day.

Moreover, if you surrender yourself to the author’s words, you begin to experience a battle with time, as well as with yourself. And I come to the following conclusion:

Material possessions, travels, and so on are all wonderful. But when a person communicates in this way, when they make you think, it is the greatest gift they could possibly give you.

Continue the Journey

Explore The Library →

Subscribe to receive future issues.

Subscribe now

If you’d like to support the work behind Monday Steps, you can buy me a coffee.

Support Monday Steps ☕

That’s exactly what Socrates did in front of his judges, and he finished them off once and for all.

Let me add the appropriate soundtrack as well.

In 404 BC, the Athenians lost the Peloponnesian War, and for eight months they were ruled by the Thirty Tyrants, imposed upon them by the Spartans after their victory. After democracy was restored, the Athenians searched for a scapegoat to help them relax. And what did they think of? To target someone theoretically weak.

Socrates was a ragged-looking figure who held endless dialogues every day in Athens with the youth of his time. In other words, he didn’t give them lessons; he engaged in conversations. He spent all day trying to inspire young people to care about great values and virtues, not about money and material goods. Hmm, that reminds me of something today.

Thus, the wisest citizen of the city was accused of corrupting the youth and not worshipping the ancestral gods of the time (the Athenians were quite, if not very, religious), but instead introducing new ones. So, he was summoned to make a defense speech in court.

He was found guilty and sentenced to death by hemlock, while he himself counter-proposed as his penalty free meals at the Prytaneum for the rest of his life. This was a distinguished honor reserved for benefactors of the Athenian state. He was given the opportunity to flee, both before and after his trial, but he refused. After all, he was innocent—why should he run?

The most democratic city in history (theoretically) murdered its most worthy citizen. So, even back then, it was not a time for people who think. Today, I wonder: has a comparable Socrates been born, or will one be born? And if so, how would we treat him?

We thus have a striking case where democracy attacks, unable to tolerate criticism. Socrates is guilty of having expanded his mind and taught his discoveries to his students. This was the reason for his execution: the thirst for free thought, the pursuit of knowledge, and the questioning of social establishments.

Continue the Journey

Explore The Library →

Subscribe to receive future issues.

Subscribe now

If you’d like to support the work behind Monday Steps, you can buy me a coffee.

Support Monday Steps ☕

Montaigne’s Essays

I wouldn’t call it the best book, but it’s the book in which the author truly lives through the text. It feels like he’s speaking directly to you. So if I had to choose, it would be this one. It’s also huge, around 1,900 pages, and in many places you’ll agree, disagree, argue, or do whatever you’d do with a person over coffee.

Really, when I first opened it and read the early pages, it was like meeting someone who slowly became a friend, a best friend, everything. You learn everything about him, from what he ate to how he went to the toilet [when I say everything, I mean everything].

Especially during stressful periods, Montaigne was a rock, a helper, a companion.

At some point, I simply enjoyed putting on my favorite music from that time, John Coltrane & Duke Ellington, In A Sentimental Mood. Pure love.

I’d sit in the armchair, just read, converse with the book, and then go tell my wife what we’d “discussed,” where I’d disagreed, and so on. Crazy moments…

And just when you thought it was tiring you, because it jumps from topic to topic mercilessly, I realized something:

Through the Essays, Montaigne managed to turn ordinary, logically mundane life into art. It’s incredible how beautiful he presents all of this.

That’s also where I understood, or at least found, the level of self-knowledge I’ll try to reach (though probably never will). Montaigne shows us that we shouldn’t fear change; on the contrary, we should embrace it. One moment he’s a fanatical Epicurean, the next a Stoic, and he ends up as a devout Christian.

And that’s probably how it is, that’s how we all are. No single label can define any human being.

Most likely, if you ever start reading it, know that we’re talking about a book you’ll return to for a whole lifetime, and about a person you’ll probably come to regard as a friend (I hope).

Continue the Journey

Explore The Library →

Subscribe to receive future issues.

Subscribe now

If you’d like to support the work behind Monday Steps, you can buy me a coffee.

Support Monday Steps ☕

I believe it is a book about freedom, and ultimately about the cost of our choices.

Some sentences stay with you long after you finish a book. For me, this was one of those sentences.

The older I get, the more I believe Thoreau was not referring to poverty or unhappiness. He was pointing to something more subtle. A life that slowly takes shape around us until, one day, we realize we never consciously chose it. A life lived on autopilot.

This was another sentence that stayed with me: his answer wasn’t more productivity or ambition, but simplification. Not as deprivation, but as liberation. The removal of unnecessary burdens and the deliberate choice of what deserves to remain.

This may be the single most valuable idea in the book. Most things are not paid for with money. They are paid for with time, attention and energy.

Every purchase is also a decision about how we will spend a portion of our life.

Thoreau offers a different definition of wealth. A wealthy person is not necessarily the one who can acquire the most. A wealthy person is someone who depends on the fewest things.

Where I Agree

Freedom often increases as dependence decreases. Thoreau understood something that remains true today:

the more things we need to feel content, the more our lives depend on factors beyond our control.

The fewer things we need to feel content, the more freedom we preserve when circumstances inevitably change.

Where I Disagree

Thoreau withdrew from society for two years. Few of us have that option. Community, family, friendship, and responsibility are also part of a good life.

The challenge isn’t to abandon society but to remain independent while living within it.

Before acquiring anything new, ask yourself:

Not just money, but time, attention, and freedom. Because freedom is the first thing we give away.

Question to Consider

What in your life today costs more time, energy, and attention than the value it gives back?

Continue the Journey

Explore The Library →

Subscribe to receive future issues.

Subscribe now

If you’d like to support the work behind Monday Steps, you can buy me a coffee.

Support Monday Steps ☕