Walking the Tightrope

“I am training myself to get rid of the habit of haste in willing to know; all scholars suffer from that and it is what deprives them of the glorious calm which comes from all insight gained. A simple household, a completely regulated daily routine, no irritating appetite for honors or for society, the life together with my sister (which makes everything around me so Nietzschean and strangely tranquil), the awareness of having most excellent and kind friends, the possession of forty good books from all ages and peoples (and of several more which are not exactly bad), the constant joy of having Schopenhauer and Wagner educators and in the Greeks the daily objects of my work, the faith that from now on I shall no longer lack good students – this is what makes my life at present. Unfortunately there is the added to this my chronic misery, which seizes me for almost two whole days every two weeks, and sometimes longer periods – well, that ought to come to an end one day.” (letter to Carl...

After the initial slow response to The Birth of Tragedy , Fritz was pleased overall with the more immediate reaction to his lectures on education and his first two essays. The polemic on Strauss had garnered much criticism, which - increasingly - came to validate to him his critique of the "pseudo-culture" of contemporary Germany. He humorously labeled his critics "ink- slingers " and "ignoramuses." ( Cate , page 182) He did accept certain criticisms as constructive, however. His long-time academic friend, Erwin Rohde , wrote regarding the piece on history that he failed to develop “his arguments sufficiently, leaving the puzzled reader ‘to find the bridges between your thoughts and your sentences’. He advised his friend to read ‘the finest’ English essayists; for, notwithstanding their ‘dreadful common sense style’, they marvelously understood ‘the difficult art of logical exposition without resort to peremptory insistence’.” (Cate, page 193) Nietzsche’s ...

During the final three months of 1873, Fritz suffered from acute, nauseating headaches. He spent one day out of every three in bed, with the curtains drawn, unable work, teach, read by lamplight, and often unable to write at all. Yet with the assistance of friends he was able to conceive of and largely dictate a new essay which went beyond anything he had written or lectured on to date. The result was " History in the Service and Disservice of Life ", a work which contained the embryonic elements of most of his future philosophical system. He began by proclaiming the fundamental importance of studying history – but only in the context of what it can do for culture in the present. “…we need history, but not in the way the pampered dilettante in the garden of knowledge, for all his elegant contempt for our coarse and graceless needs and wants, needs it. I mean, we need history for life and action, not for the smug evasion of life and action, or even to gloss a selfish life and ...

The final lecture on education never materialized. Nietzsche’s mind drifted to a previously unexplored century of Greek literature and writings. He started blazing a new path, working on a new book on the Greeks with which to follow the by now much criticized The Birth of Tragedy . But work on the book also didn’t last. Fritz’s attention was conflicted between a growing admiration for some unexplored Heraclitus and his desire to critique the “pseudo-culture” and effects of “journalism” on German society. In truth, he was rather at a loss as to what to do next. Cate summarizes the way Fritz questioned himself: “Was Nietzsche’s predestined role simply to be a critic of society, as Socrates had been in Greek antiquity, and Schopenhauer in modern times? Was his role essentially a negative one, compared to the positive creations of the artist? Nietzsche fancied he had found an answer to this troubling question in assigning to philosophy an essentially curative role. Which is why…he spoke ...

In the early months of 1872, just as The Birth of Tragedy was published but before it had yet caused Nietzsche any professional consequences, he held a series of public lectures delivered before packed auditoriums at Basel University on the subject of education in Germany. They were, perhaps, the highlight of his academic career. Professor Nietzsche (indeed this is the title he preferred) delivered these five lectures over the course of about 8 weeks from January to March. A sixth lecture was never completed, perhaps an indication of how the response (or lack thereof initially) to The Birth of Tragedy affected him at the time. What is most interesting to me is not only the ideas presented in these lectures but the fact that Nietzsche places the philosophy inside a story about two young men coincidentally meeting two old philosophers in a beautiful, isolated clearing on a wooded hill overlooking the Rhine River. This is a parable. A parable delivered by Nietzsche orally, telling a dif...

For much of his life, Fritz was ill. The fact he got so much academic work and writing accomplished despite his rather constant cycle of illness and recovery is remarkable. From childhood he had poor eyesight and began wearing glasses at age four. He required stronger glasses as he aged and often experienced severe headaches, even migraines, from long hours reading and writing by poor light. Matters worsened after be became a professor at Basel. “For the first time, he was having stomach problems on top of his other symptoms. Eyestrain, headaches, and vomiting gradually worsened. Minor illnesses such as hemorrhoids and shingles were annoyances. He felt in 1873 that ‘the machine was breaking down.’ It was during this time that he began his dabbling with a multitude of treatments for his symptoms, interspersed with consultations with various physicians. Leeches and cupping were again used as in his Pforta days. Diets, hydrotherapies, physical therapies, electrotherapies, kinds of medicat...

Richard Wagner surpassed everyone Nietzsche had ever met before. Fritz almost worshipped the man and Wagner soaked in the bright young man’s intellect and passion, as perhaps Wagner’s primary disciple. This would not last. But, upon becoming a professor at Basel, Fritz was fairly close to Wagner’s home on Lake Lucerne. When told of his offer of professorship, "Nietzsche was so overcome by his good fortune that he spent an entire afternoon walking up and down the Leipzig promenade humming tunes from Tannhauser - appropriately, since one of the great attractions of Basel was that it was only a stone's throw from Tribschen, Wagner's place of exile." ( Young , page 79) Fritz initially approached Wagner boldy yet in awe and not without some trepidation. "On Saturday, May 15, 1869, interrupting a paddle-steamer trip around the lake, he alighted at the Tribschen pier and arrived unannounced at the Wagners' villa. He stood irresolute outside the house for a time l...