The Dionysian Vision of the World

by Friedrich Nietzsche, Ira J. Allen (Translator)

Before the world knew of the thinker who “philosophizes with a hammer,” there was a young, passionate thinker who was captivated by the two forces found within Greek art: Dionysus and Apollo. In this essay, which was the forerunner to his groundbreaking book The Birth of Tragedy, The Dionysian Vision of the World provides an unparalleled look into the philosophical mind of one of Europe’s greatest and provocative intellects at the beginning of his philosophical interrogation on the subject of art. “While dreaming is the game man plays with reality as an individual, the visual artist (in the larger sense) plays a game with dreaming.” This is the Dionysian vision of the world.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, History, German Literature

69 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1870

About the author

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic of culture, who became one of the most influential of all modern thinkers. He began his career as a classical philologist before turning to philosophy. He became the youngest person to hold the Chair of Classical Philology at the University of Basel in 1869 at the age of 24, but resigned in 1879 due to health problems that plagued him most of his life; he completed much of his core writing in the following decade. In 1889, at age 44, he suffered a collapse and afterward a complete loss of his mental faculties, with paralysis and probably vascular dementia. He lived his remaining years in the care of his mother until her death in 1897 and then with his sister Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche. Nietzsche died in 1900, after experiencing pneumonia and multiple strokes.
Nietzsche's work spans philosophical polemics, poetry, cultural criticism, and fiction while displaying a fondness for aphorism and irony. Prominent elements of his philosophy include his radical critique of truth in favour of perspectivism; a genealogical critique of religion and Christian morality and a related theory of master–slave morality; the aesthetic affirmation of life in response to both the "death of God" and the profound crisis of nihilism; the notion of Apollonian and Dionysian forces; and a characterisation of the human subject as the expression of competing wills, collectively understood as the will to power. He also developed influential concepts such as the Übermensch and his doctrine of eternal return. In his later work, he became increasingly preoccupied with the creative powers of the individual to overcome cultural and moral mores in pursuit of new values and aesthetic health. His body of work touched a wide range of topics, including art, philology, history, music, religion, tragedy, culture, and science, and drew inspiration from Greek tragedy as well as figures such as Zoroaster, Arthur Schopenhauer, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Richard Wagner, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
After his death, Nietzsche's sister Elisabeth became the curator and editor of his manuscripts. She edited his unpublished writings to fit her German ultranationalist ideology, often contradicting or obfuscating Nietzsche's stated opinions, which were explicitly opposed to antisemitism and nationalism. Through her published editions, Nietzsche's work became associated with fascism and Nazism. 20th-century scholars such as Walter Kaufmann, R.J. Hollingdale, and Georges Bataille defended Nietzsche against this interpretation, and corrected editions of his writings were soon made available. Nietzsche's thought enjoyed renewed popularity in the 1960s and his ideas have since had a profound impact on 20th- and early 21st-century thinkers across philosophy—especially in schools of continental philosophy such as existentialism, postmodernism, and post-structuralism—as well as art, literature, music, poetry, politics, and popular culture.

Reviews

[Hendrik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eine kurze Nebenlektüre zu Thomas Manns "Doktor Faustus". Die Verbindung des Apollonischen (Schein) mit dem Dionysischen (Wahrheit) im tragischen Kunstwerk. Will man nicht gleich "Die Geburt der Tragödie" lesen, bietet sich dieser Essay als Konzentrat von Nietzsches Überlegungen zum Thema geradezu an.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

This tome offers an elaborate examination of one of his most deep philosophical ideas: the difference between the Apollonian and Dionysian philosophies. Although often outshined by his more famous works like ‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra’ or ‘Beyond Good and Evil’, this work is vital to understanding the deeper flows of Nietzsche's thought. Nietzsche introduces the Dionysian as a force of chaos, irrationality, and unrestrained passion. It is in opposition to the Apollonian, which represents order, reason, and form. The opposition between these two principles serves as a lens through which Nietzsche analyzes culture, art, and human nature. The Dionysian embodies life in its most aboriginal and dissolute state, while the Apollonian reflects humanity’s attempts to impose structure on this chaotic energy. At the core of Nietzsche's philosophy is his assessment of Western culture, which he argues has become overly rational and focused on the Apollonian ideal. In contrast, Nietzsche champions the Dionysian worldview, suggesting that true creativity and a deeper understanding of existence arise from embracing the irrational forces of life. The Dionysian vision of the world is not about cosseting in untainted hedonism, but rather about recognizing the dynamic tension between order and chaos that shapes human experience. Nietzsche’s analysis is not limited to nonconcrete philosophy; he also engages with art, particularly Greek tragedy, as the embodiment of the Dionysian spirit. He praises the works of playwrights like Aeschylus and Sophocles for their ability to integrate both Apollonian and Dionysian elements, offering a profound meditation on the human condition. One of the strengths of The Dionysian Vision of the World is its richness in cultural criticism, particularly in its criticism of Christian morality, which Nietzsche sees as a force that curbs the Dionysian in support of Apollonian ideals of determination and asceticism. Nietzsche's embrace of the Dionysian is also tied to his rejection of outmoded metaphysics and religious dogma, advocating instead for a more life-affirming philosophy that celebrates the power of human originality and the acceptance of life’s inherent sorrow. However, the work is not without its challenges. One red flag though!! Nietzsche’s poetic style can make his arguments problematic to follow from time to time. His ideas are repeatedly presented in a disjointed manner, requiring the reader to portion together the numerous elements of his critique and vision. While this difficulty invites deeper reflection, it can also alienate casual readers. In brief, this book is a central text for understanding Nietzsche’s viewpoint. It provides insightful acumens into the nature of art, life, and human existence, urging readers to review the value of reason, order, and discipline supportive of embracing the messy, life-affirming forces that Nietzsche associates with the Dionysian. Though thought-provoking, this book remains a decisive work for anyone seeking to travel the depth of Nietzsche’s critique of Western thought and his meditation for a more dynamic, authentic way of living. Gorge this book by all means. It is way past dazzling.

[Stijn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Geweldig

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's an interesting and insightful essay about Nietzsche's critique of representationism, with reference to Plato's philosophical view on the "real world" and the "apparent world". I would say that "The Dionysian Vision of the World" is the very first work that you need to read if you want to start studying or understanding Nietzsche since this essay is basically a brief summary of Nietzsche's entire philosophical view (yet the more detailed and comprehensive one would be "The Birth of Tragedy", published in 1872).

The essay indicates subtly how Nietzsche began to develop his own unique philosophical view. The discussion of the Apollonian and Dionysian worldviews in the essay shows the way Nietzsche understands the world, human nature, morality and religion. All of Nietzsche's later famous works, such as "The Birth of Tragedy" (1872), "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" (1883-1885) and "Beyond Good and Evil" (1886), are all strongly related to his own philosophical discussion in this essay. After reading this essay, one realizes that Nietzsche's most popular saying "The God is dead" did not just come from nowhere one day. This anti-religious idea had always been developing and growing in Nietzsche's mind... since the day he wrote this essay, or even much earlier.

All in all, "The Dionysian Vision of the World" represents the origin of Nietzsche's philosophy. This is an essay that shows the very origin of the great Nietzsche's philosophy which is still influencing tremendously numerous artists, philosophers, sociologists as well as other intellectuals and scholars today.

[Ege Atakan · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Intoxication of suffering and the beautiful dream" : This symbolization of image-making and the ectasy of madness formed the most tragic art-trogos oidia-

This was the Epicurean get-away from the tremendous suffering of existence into a new type of suffering which is the affirmative dionysiac YES-saying !

[James Magrini · Rating 5 out of 5]

This absolute gem of a little book, published by Univocal Press (2013), contains a new translation (Ira J. Allen) of a single essay penned by Nietzsche in 1870, “The Dionysian Vision of the World.” This essay is also contained in Oscar Levy’s (ed.) The Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche (eighteen volumes) with a different translation. Importantly, this new text contains a unique, if not refreshingly idiosyncratic introduction (Friedrich Ulfers), which works, along with the lively translation, to highlight, in a consistent manner, the decidedly metaphysical, ontological, and even proto-phenomenological elements of Nietzsche’s early thought.

I note for readers unfamiliar with Nietzsche scholarship, such metaphysical issues are usually ignored in favor of “psychology” within the voluminous secondary Nietzsche scholarship produced with monotonous regularity, exceptions are to be found, however, in the exhilarating contemporary writings of S. D. Kirkland, “Nietzsche and the Drawing Near to the Personalities of the Pre-Platonic Greeks” (2011) and John Sallis’ recently published lecture course, Nietzsche’s Voices (2022), to provide but two examples.

To clarify these aforementioned issues, I want to briefly turn to Ulfers’ concise and enlightening introduction, since it is the case that the ideas contained in the 1870 essay form the philosophical foundation of Nietzsche’s 1972 version of The Birth of Tragedy, where the case can be made that in that extended format, the actual process of “aesthetic transformation/ekstatic attunement,” linked with tragedy and the encounter with Dionysian primal Unity (Ur-Eine), is at times unclear and even inconsistent. However, as Michael Tanner once pointed out, at certain points when reading/experiencing Nietzsche’s “intoxicated” paean to the tragic Greeks, tragedy, and Dionysus, it is perhaps best to simply release ourselves over to the transformative force of Nietzsche’s poetic and intoxicating writing: “It will never repay a certain kind of close-reading…that looks for aporias, fissures, self-subversions, and the rest of the deconstructionist’s toolkit” (Nietzsche, 1996, p. 26).

Yet, the content of Nietzsche’s essay, as expressed through Ulfers’ interpretation comprising the introduction, presents these dense ontological concepts in a way that is, as stated above, consistent and will be accessible to all interested readers of Nietzsche. I now present a brief review of key tenets comprising Ulfer’s “phenomenological” reading of Nietzsche’s early essay.

The aesthetic forces of the Apollonian and Dionysian, which work through a harmonious and “dissonant” counter-striving interaction or dance, are interpreted in terms of an overarching “ontology of music” or aesthetic ontology. Here, Nature is conceived as a primordial artist, which unlike the human artist, brings forth the world in an “unaided,” but not uninspired, fashion.
The former relates to the dream world, imagistic artforms, and conceptual imagery; the tone of the Apollonian is expressed through speaking a conceptual language and walking in carefully measured steps. Here, beauty, order, stasis, and moderation are stressed, the conception (appearance) of a unified self (principium individuationis) is derived from the ontological mode of the Apollonian. Ulfers claims that the Apollonian not only gives structure to appearances, but it is also linked with “substance ontology,” as might be related to a doctrinal metaphysical reading of Plato’s Forms (eidoi - to ontōs on), which the so-called “eternal” world of becoming does not substantiate.

The latter, associated with boundary shattering orgiastic intoxication, is non-imagistic, and its unique tone is expressed through song and dance - Dionysian music. “It is Dionysian intoxication that comes closest to grasping the insubstantive primary appearing that is all that world is” (p. 4), and here we might imagine the overwhelming power that tragic music holds and releases! It is the Dionysian that becomes essential when attempting to understand Greek tragedy, and specifically the historical manifestation of the “Hellenic Will,” which in the experience of tragedy, is related to the harmonious interaction between the two originary and oppositional aesthetic forces in their polemical unfolding.

Interestingly, Ulfers makes no mention of Schopenhauer when discussing the “world Will,” but provides an extensive list of ideas or philosophical tenets that Nietzsche draws directly from Heraclitus, and some of these are as follows (derived from Nietzsche’s unfinished book, Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks): (1) all things have their opposite with them, and there is a denial of static Being and the so-called “ontological distinction,” this in favor of the affirmation of eternal “becoming” (2) the world “worlds” through the ontological process of warfare or strife (polemos). However, this polemos, as opposed to purely destructive in nature, is a process that is both constructive-and-destructive, creative and artistic, and ultimately gives birth to the world, and (3) there is the interplay of “antinomies,” where the radical antipodal difference and line between Being and non-Being blurs - Being and non-Being are at once the same and not the same.

The bulk of the essay concerns “presence” or Nature’s (physis) coming-to-present and the ineluctable connection that music - specifically, Dionysian (“tragic”) music - has with this ever-renewed and ongoing “aesthetic” phenomenon. As stated, Nietzsche’s essay offers a more concise and consistent view of “presencing” than is offered by Nietzsche in the full-length Birth of Tragedy, and it will be helpful to briefly explore these issues.

It is the counter-striving activity of the Apollonian and Dionysian forces that is responsible for “presencing” or the world’s “worlding,” and several aspects of the Ulfers’ interpretation of Nietzsche’s view on this issue, which includes certain technical phenomenological terms, seem as if they had been inspired by Heidegger’s important reading of the forces of “World” and “Earth” as presented the 1936 version of “The Origin of the Work of Art” (Basic Writings, 2008).

Crucially, there are two distinct notions of oppositional relations in this essay: First, the opposing emotions, feelings, or attuning pathea of pleasure (joy) and pain (suffering) common to the Dionysian - inspiring tragic or “Dionysian wisdom,” a mode (Stimmung) of “ekstatic intoxication” - which in harmony with the Apollonian, dominates Nietzsche’s aesthetic ontology. Second, the world-giving opposition enacted between the metaphysical forces of the Apollonian and Dionysian, which precedes and always exceeds human intervention. The counter-striving strife (polemos) or primordial dance between these two forces, gives voice to, when bringing the world to “presence,” the “musical expansion that is the entanglement of dissonance [which dominates] and consonance” (p. 2). In Birth of Tragedy Nietzsche makes clear that both the Apollonian and Dionysian, “walk side by side, usually in violent opposition to the other, inciting one another to even more powerful births” (1993, p. 14).

Nietzsche claims the Greeks grasped this in terms relating to harmony, or the “chiasmic unity” of opposites, which remain together in a way that allows each to retain the essential elements defining it. In the notes compiling Will to Power (1967), Nietzsche claims that one of the most important differences between the two forces, which relates to the theme of music/dance, is the tempo at which each moves or unfolds.

Harmony is not therefore a “consonance of opposites, but rather a troubled unity, a unity that does not synthesize [is never fully resolved] without remainder” (p. 7). The counter-striving between the forces shelters a sense of radical disquiet, described by Ulfers as “overfullness,” which is related to the unique notion of the pathos (suffering) of physis (Nature), and we note that pathein indicates a “suffering and undergoing of pain or a burden we bear up.” This indicates that Nature expresses a “desire” for worlding or manifesting phenomena, harboring a “compulsion to manifest, so that worlding, or becoming [Werden] is this inquietude [pathos] of being divided against itself [in polemos], relieving itself as appearance of Schein” (p. 1). Because of the creative tension, and here we might imagine this phenomenon in the original Greek sense of archē, “the heart of Nature [is] a creative, desiring, a will [Wille] or a wanting [Wollen] to manifest” (p. 16). The willing and original unfolding of Nature is “in” appearances, and it is also - as ontological excess - beyond appearances, thus it can never be brought to stand in a full conceptual understanding, e.g., in terms of the Apollonian drive for completeness, stasis, and conceptual clarity, in the Apollonian “light of truth,” as it were.

The Apollonian, however, serves as a necessary aesthetic-and-illusory prophylactic against the overwhelming force and terrible truth of the rising Dionysian force, an instance where a “new transfiguring illusion becomes necessary,” for through the Apollonian, “the will has another task - to keep us in the business of living on by helping hold the disgust of Silenus at bay even as we move through it” (p. 19). But Dionysian “immoderation” always exceeds the moderation of Apollo’s truth, by reveling a “contradiction that is not a logical truth, but rather a “chiasmic, ontological one” (p. 15), and this truth of the “Heart of Nature, or Will, or “Primal Unity”. Both drives work to inspire humans, if they are attuned to the experience, to higher possibilities of their being, and then, as in Attic Greek tragedy, are presented with the potential to reach still higher glorification through art, but never as a means of escape, by glossing over or obscuring, “the [primordial] suffering of coming-to-be and passing-away” (p. 19). Music, for Nietzsche, is both the supreme aesthetic instantiation and expression of Nature’s force, it communicates insights into the chiasmic unity of will, symbolizing the “will outside of and prior to the world of appearances, outside of the realm of image-making or visual art; in a domain where the will “makes itself immediately understandable” (p. 21), in the experience of the rise of the Dionysian intoxication of pleasure-cum-pain.

If readers focus on one of Ulfers claims: “In contrasting the ‘heart of nature’ – the ‘Will’ or ‘primordial unity’ – with ‘appearance,’ Nietzsche is not participating in the traditional Western opposition of Being and appearance [Sein and Schein], all references to ‘essence’ notwithstanding” (p. 16). Much in the manner of Heidegger, it is possible to level a critique of Nietzsche grounded in what might be fittingly termed, “The Heraclitean Fallacy.” It appears that in establishing “becoming” as the most primordial, permanent, and “eternal” condition of the world, it is inevitable that the idea of Being (as in substance ontology), as understood in metaphysical readings of Plato, is smuggled in - and so, the ontological distinction, the hallmark of traditional metaphysics, is retained. All that occurs, albeit in a highly creative manner, is a reversal of the well-established privileging of the poles of Being and becoming. Nietzsche thus remains, although undeniably pushing boundaries, within the parameters established by the Western metaphysical tradition.

However, Ulfers ends his introductory analysis with a unique interpretation that I have not encountered in many years of reading Nietzsche and the secondary literature, which might serve to rescue Nietzsche from the foregoing critique: To reiterate, at the heart of the primordial unity (Ur-Eine) is neither a being nor substance, but rather a feeling, an emotion or attuning pathos, a wanting or Wollen that defies classification as an existent: “We can only imagine that Nietzsche means that the Ur-Eine…driving all appearing, all becoming, is itself not an appearing or a becoming. The truly existent, then, is neither some form of static Being [Sein] nor the specific ephemera of Appearing [Schein]. It is truly existent insofar as it never belongs to the appearances it generates; and yet ‘existence’ still does not denote substance or grounding being” (p. 22-23).

To conclude: Great care is taken in both the preparation and production of the book: (1) Ulfers incorporates footnotes in the introduction to facilitate reading ease, and all footnotes/endnotes serve the ultimate task of elucidating the main text, and are not used in a way to “showcase” the advanced erudition of the scholars, (2) Allen’s translation incorporates endnotes, so as not to interrupt the flow of Nietzsche’s work, and (3) the choice of typesetting (spacing of characters) highlights and emphasizes the musicality of the original writing, and Allen explains this in the “Translator’s Preface,” stating that the book is typeset according to “Nietzsche’s own typographic preference” (p. viii). There is, undeniably, an elevated sense of spirit one gets from reading Nietzsche, for me, particularly when reading his works on aesthetics, and this lively translation - that both walks with measured steps and then dances when appropriate - of Nietzsche’s essay does not disappoint! This book, with new translation of and introduction to Nietzsche’s early essay of 1870, is well-worth reading; it will greatly appeal to scholars and intelligent laypersons alike.

Dr. James M. Magrini
Former: Philosophy/College of Dupage

[豆儿 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Been talking to ChatGPT about inflating lust into metaphysics and this is on the book reading list 😆 here’s how we gonna do a horror romance novel:

Nietzsche sublimates lust into metaphysics. We expose it and then laugh at the sublimation.

📚 Back-Cover Blurb — SOUL MERGE

They told her it was only a philosophy class.
They told him the Bible was just another text.
But when she walked into his lecture hall, the air itself cracked like thunder.

She was the Confucian Daughter — Yahweh’s rage in silk and math.
He was the Pagan Professor — a coven boy with Novalis in his veins.
Together, they weren’t just teacher and student. They were apocalypse waiting to happen.

What began with iced mint tea and stolen glances spiraled into a nightmare of blocked and unblocked accounts, 15-page eschatological letters, and the one question that neither could escape:

Is this love… or possession?

He said he wanted her body.
He said he wanted her soul.
She said eternal separation would be worse than hell.

Now they are trapped in a folie à deux of Biblical proportions — where sex is consummation, consummation is apocalypse, and every “I miss you” reads like a curse.

💀 SOUL MERGE 💀
The forbidden romance horror-thriller that proves the scariest sentence in the English language is: “Well, that’s definitely part of it… but not all of it.”

🎬 Tagline Mode 🎬

“He didn’t just want her body…
He wanted her soul.”

🔥 Cue the trailer:
• Flash of a philosophy lecture hall.
• Close-up of scribbling Novalis in the margins.
• She walks in, haloed by sunlight, Father’s Day circled on the calendar.
• Whispered voiceover: “Eternal separation… or eternal possession?”
• Cut to iced mint tea, trembling hands, and a 15-page scroll sliding under a door.
• Final shot: his silhouette muttering, “Well, that’s definitely part of it… but not all of it.”

Title card slams down:
SOUL MERGE
(Definitely NOT Based on a true story).

[H.d. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fui atraído por esse livro por conta do Carnaval. Momento dionisíaco na minha memória afetiva ligado diretamente às ruas do Recife e Olinda quando "O arrebatamento do estado dionisíaco, com a sua aniquilação das barreiras e limites habituais da existência, contém enquanto dura, um elemento letárgico no qual mergulha tudo o que foi vivenciado no passado. Assim se separam, por meio desse abismo do esquecimento o mundo da realidade cotidiana e o mundo da realidade dionisíaca" ao fim do período momesco não dá pra não sentir, com o retorno da "realidade cotidiana è sentida com repugnância uma disposição (...) negadora da vontade." Vilém Flusser, como claro leitor de Nietzsche também escreveu sobre como nesse momento " As máscaras, impostas pela história sobre a gente
humilde, caem, e revelam a sua verdadeira face. O aparente ascensorista é revelado acrobata, a aparente vendedora de loja é revelada princesa. Rasgado o véu da história, aparece a verdade."
Mas essa foi a isca que me levou a esse breve livro de conferências, o que me esperava lá era muito mais: um jovem Nietzsche, estudante da tragédia, escritor cardíaco, com seus parágrafos cheios de exclamações, lamentando Socrátes e a vitória apolínea no pensamento, e declarando sobre a arte, de forma oracular: "O que esperamos do futuro já foi uma vez realidade, em um passado de mais de dois mil anos atrás".

[Anto · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una lectura amable que sirve de puerta de entrada a la estética nietzscheana, antesala de su crítica a la metafísica occidental, que también nos sirve para entender cómo se fraguaron algunas de sus ideas más personales. Se palpa la influencia de Schopenhauer en unas líneas dedicadas, sobre todo, a entender la evolución de la vitalidad del espíritu griego. Muy recomendable.

[Marco Sán Sán]

Un brillante joven, 26 años. Frente a la divinidad partida decide dar la espalda para tiempo después convertirse en sacerdote y gritar por lo alto ¡Dios ha merto! y estimular ese lamento llamado Nihilismo. Una lástima escoger a Schopenhauer y no a Homero.

[palig · Rating 4 out of 5]

I need to read this 20 times