Walking the Tightrope

Rudiger Safranski’s book on Nietzsche is one of my favorites. He puts HH into its own perspective. I believe it is a great, independent work that needs to be judged on its own merits rather than simply in context for how it sets up Nietzsche’s mature thought. Safranski highlights what I believe to be the central nature of Nietzsche’s thought at this time. HH itself has several other philosophical threads, however, than the one presented here. That is what makes it such a great work. It is a loose association of indirectly connected things. “Thus, in Human, All Too Human , absolute reality was designated coolly as the logically ‘disclosed essence of the world.’ With this concept, Nietzsche sought to hold himself aloof from ‘religion, art, and morality,’ all of whose presentments, feelings, and states of ecstasy somehow drew him to the mystery of the world. These are illusions, he explained, and with them ‘we are not touching the ‘essence of the world in itself.’’ We remain in the real...

Some of the best scholars of Nietzsche’s work readily place HH in the context of his later, more mature concepts, particularly the Will to Power, which is something we shall consider much later. For now, it is sufficient to note that the foundation for grander ideas all began with this comparatively modest effort. “In Human, All Too Human and in notes of that period – to summarize – Nietzsche sought to explain the following phenomena in terms of the will to power: our tendency to conform rather than realize ourselves; the elevation of gratitude to the status of a virtue; the desire of neurotics – and perhaps also others – to arouse pity; Christian self-abasement; and striving for independence and freedom. Of all these sundry manifestations of the will to power, Nietzsche probably approved only of the striving for freedom.” ( Kaufmann , page 186) “The essential purpose of Human, All Too Human is to explain reality without reliance upon metaphysical ideas, and by explaining it to arriv...

After Sorrento, Nietzsche slowly made his way, traveling largely third-class, back to the Alps. “’It is my kind of nature.’ His impending return to Basel and to teaching evoked ambivalent responses in him. On the other hand, the very thought of returning to Basel was repulsive to him; he wanted now to dedicate himself to his philosophy and his writing. On the other hand, he realized that it was his philosophy that was killing him, and so his teaching obligations appeared to be his salvation. ‘My altogether problematic broodings and scribblings have until now only made me ill; as long as I was an actual scholar , I was also healthy. But then came the nerve-racking music and metaphysical philosophy, cares concerning myriad things that don’t mean anything to me. So, I want to become a teacher again: if I cannot survive it, then I want to perish practicing my craft .’ “Yet something had changed once and for all. Philology now seemed to be a layer of moss smothering plants he genuinely wan...

"On the morning of January 1, 1877, I took a beautiful walk along the seashore alone with Nietzsche, and we sat down on an outcropping of rock that jutted far out into the deep blue sea. The weather was beautiful as a spring morning; a warm breeze was blowing and on the shores gleamed the golden fruits of the green orange-trees. We were both in a peaceful, harmonious mood; our pleasant, meaningful conversations stood in harmony with the auspicious beginning of the year, and we finally agreed that the real goal of life had to be to strive for truth. Nietzsche said that for the real human being everything had to serve *that* purpose, including suffering, and that to this extent he also blessed the past year of his life, in which he had suffered so much. "How mild, how conciliatory Nietzsche was then, how much his kind, amiable nature still held the balance with his analytical intellect. How cheerful he still could be, how heartily he could laugh, for despite all seriousness, ou...

Albert Brenner joined Fritz and Paul Ree at Frl. Meysenbug’s villa. Brenner was a student of poetry at Basel and a great admirer of Nietzsche’s lectures. Brenner was sent to Sorrento “by his worried parents to be cured of adolescent moodiness and fits of suicidal despair.” ( Cate , page 226) Frl. Meysenbug’s home provided a suitable environment for rest and rejuvenation within the context of a “spiritual rationality” nested in the peaceful southern Italian surroundings. “The villa stood on the coast a fifteen-minute walk from Sorrento with a view over the open sea to Naples and Vesuvius. ‘We live…in a quarter in which there were only gardens and villas and garden-houses,’ Brenner wrote to his family. ‘The entire quarter is like a monastery.’ Later Nietzsche himself wrote to Reinhard von Seydlitz, a writer and painter with whom he was acquainted: ‘We lived in the same house and moreover we had all our higher interests in common: it was a kind of monastery for free spirits.’ The ‘secular...

“Nietzsche had anticipated that Bayreuth would put an end to the mistaking of ‘entertainment at any price’ for art. As it turned out, outrageous prices were being charged for food, lodgings, and carriage rides between the city and festival hall. Monarchs, princes, diplomats, and women of ill repute were the center of the attention. These people typically languished during the performances, but perked up at social events. Later Nietzsche wrote about Bayreuth: … ‘more than anything else, I saw how even to the inner circle the ‘ideal’ was not the point, that entirely different matters was considered weightier and more passionate.’” ( Safranski , page 138) Fritz felt that his fourth Untimely Meditation was the cultural highlight of Wagner’s Ring Cycle première at Bayreuth. Wagner, too busy with the social magnitude of the opening, failed to personally acknowledge Fritz’s philosophic attempt to place the high art of the event in a greater context. Suddenly, Fritz realized there was no high...

Fritz’s relationship with his sister was a complex one. Of course, many brother and sister interactions are. Generally speaking they were very close during the period of his life up to 1876 and remained close afterwards though there were increasingly periods of unrest between them. His relations with his mother remained on a more even keel. She continued to lovingly wish the best for her son and to harbor hopes that he might one day return to his lost Christian faith. Franziska stayed in Naumburg for most of Nietzsche’s life. Elizabeth was often with her mother, though she traveled a bit more. Friedrich Nietzsche loved his sister and his mother. For a time, his sister lived with him at his residence at Basel, keeping his modest home in order and attending to various chores. Elizabeth would often take dictation for Fritz when his eyes were too strained to see. She would read to him in the afternoons and evenings. They cohabitated on a very mundane level. Therefore, he opened up to his ...