Fragment 59

The most important aspect of this fragment is that Heraclitus has found another thing that can be described in seemingly contradictory terms. "The way ... is crooked and straight." Exactly what that thing is has been disputed. The text I have given is what the manuscripts have, and Robinson translated it as, "The way of writing is crooked and straight." When you write across a page, in one sense you are going straight across ... but in another sense you are going up and down and back and forth depending on what letters you are writing. Some do not find this satisfactory, and emend the text to many different things in an attempt to understand what Heraclitus was talking about. I see no reason not to accept the original manuscripts.