The Birth of Tragedy/The Genealogy of Morals

by Friedrich Nietzsche

Alternate Cover Edition
ISBN13: 9780385092104

Skillful, sophisticated translations of two of Nietzsche's essential works about the conflict between the moral and aesthetic approaches to life, the impact of Christianity on human values, the meaning of science, the contrast between the Apollonian and Dionysian spirits, and other themes central to his thinking.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Classics, Religion, College, German Literature, Literature

299 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1887

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

[Tim Pendry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This American translation brings together the first and last of Friedrich Nietzsche's great rants against the social reality of his time - 'The Birth of Tragedy' (1872) and 'The Genealogy of Morals' (1887). It is instructive to compare them.

'The Birth of Tragedy' was his first published book. One can understand why it was not well received by his academic colleagues since it is an extended fantasy on what the Greeks should have been like rather than necessarily what they were like.

There is a paradox (quite in keeping with Nietzsche's entire modus operandi) of having a thinker whose instinct was to attack all forms of socialised essentialism adopting a highly essentialised view of the classical world.

But one suspects that, by this point, the young Nietzsche no longer gave a damn about classical philology and simply saw an opportunity to plunder it to make entirely other points about society, politics and philosophy - a sort of 'breaking free' in its earliest stage of development.

The famous Apollonian-Dionysiac conflict (expressed surprisingly like Hegelian dialectic at one point) may have been sincerely meant but it was also a means to a psychological end still in the process of formulation.

There is an air of sustained hysteria throughout. The models for emulation, the mentors, are Schopenhauer and Wagner. Music and drama (and music drama) are presented in high-flown romantic terms as part of an aesthetic view of life and morality.

Germany is presented emotionally as the potential heir of the Greeks. A reference to 'dwarves' probably means the small minds of those who see the world in closely parsed academic terms but could also reference back to Wagner's Alberich and that could lead us to see them as the Jews.

So, in 1872, we have an angry young man, still in thrall to his mentors and the national-racist and pessimistic revolutionary culture of the period, trying to burn his boats, consciously or subconsciously, with the academic community that had nurtured him so far.

The rant allows him to explode not only at that community ('killing daddy') but also start his excoriation of the entire culture around it as decadent and not worthy of the potential for himself, his nation and the species. The ideas are ill-formed as yet but the seeds of the future are there.

Fifteen years later, the ranting methodology has not gone but now he has a market for it. He can say what he really thinks and, boy, does he do so. But he has also changed a great deal in the meantime - not in his core (which is integral) but in jettisoning what had held him back in 1872.

He has totally ditched his mentors. Not only is Wagner rejected but his aesthetic and antisemitism are damned, the first as inauthentic and the second as absurd. Schopenauer has been left behind as a pessimistic nay-sayer who could not see that the Will has to be directed outwards - to Life.

Instead, we now get three essays, not always perfectly coherent, which go straight to the jugular of Christian posturing in the closed-in culture of nineteenth century Europe and he slashes at that jugular without mercy. He clearly wants to kill the beast.

The rating should be five stars for this book but only three stars for the 1872 rant so we end up squaring the circle at four stars but be in no doubt that 'The Genealogy of Morals' is of devastating importance to Western culture as it was to develop over the subsequent decades.

What Nietzsche did (much as he had done in the previous book) was to create a simplistic mythic version of history (one that must upset any serious academic) and then weave out of this myth some remarkable psychological truths that are capable of completely rewiring the reader's mind.

I do not for a moment take seriously the notion that the 'Greeks' thought 'like that' in 'The Birth of Tragedy' nor would I accept the highly simplified account of pagan-Christian relations and history as other than a gross simplification of a complex reality.

However, just as 'The Birth of Tragedy' allows the reader to glimpse the possibility of revolt against the habits imposed on us by an unthinking socialisation, so 'Genealogy of Morals' brilliantly shatters the self-image of society as good rather than evil. It postulates another way of thinking.

Nietzsche's writing, the writing of an aggressive ego, states radical things but the rewiring of the brain comes from the realisation, at a much more subtle level, that, whatever the absurdity of his analyses at this point or another, what he says is psychologically and socially true.

The rewiring comes from a shock tactic, the only way we can ever get out of our habitual ways of thinking. Simple logical argument that takes us from A to B to C might 'persuade' us intellectually but Nietzsche's approach hits a deeper emotional level where change actually happens.

Intellectual persuasion just layers us with another variation of the world into which we are habituated but emotional shock can change how we see that world altogether. If our perception of reality changes, we change.

We have, of course, to throw ourselves backwards in time to the Central European (indeed Western) culture of the 1880s (before Freud) in order to understand just how shocking some of Nietzsche's 'bestial' claims about its moral foundations and social presumptions were.

Nietzsche's influence grew after his death. Although most people now would probably avoid or evade Nietzsche's understanding of our situation, all the 'diseases' he identified are with us still. They are embedded in our species yet our culture is fundamentally different because of him.

Not just our culture - the way individual minds work in the West has been affected consciously or unconsciously by him much as we have been changed by the pre-existence of Descartes, Hume, Darwin or, later, Freud.

The achievement of Nietzsche was to look at the parallel worlds of science and morality and point out that both were secondary. We had become decadent (even if we might see them as necessary for survival) under their domination. We were potentially greater than either but had forgotten this.

Science and morality are useful but they are not necessarily 'true' when it comes to asking the central questions about what is it to be a human being in the world (a theme that Heidegger would take up with more rigour several decades later).

The 'shock' lies not any 'flat earth' denial of science (science is not denied, merely made secondary, which is, in itself, uncomfortable for positivists) but in an undermining of moral claims where they are imposed outside ourselves on us as individuals for the benefit of others.

The central claim of the book is famous, or infamous if you prefer - that Christian morality has insidiously destroyed us as a species, turning the strong into slaves serving slaves who are corralled into their slavery by an insidious priestly class.

Nietzsche goes where few have dared to go and where most, even his admirers, would not go today. His attack on 'compassion' as a virtue would shake most people as cruel and yet it is logical within a much wider critique of the cruelties involved in our own willing repression of ourselves.

His deeper point is that the contingent imposition on us by habit of the morality expressed in unemotional impositions from outside for a greater good do irreparable harm to our own selves - he prefigures Freud in some respects.

Worse, those who are the alleged beneficiaries of this morality are, in fact, its greatest victims, unable to develop themselves to their fullest as livers of a full life with all their animal emotions intact.

The emergence out of our university class of a world of natural victims, intersectionality, activism (the new presbyters), self-imposed liberal middle class guilt, self censorship and submission would have been recognised as the 'eternal return' of the slave culture he excoriates.

I have always thought that Nietzsche's polemic detaches itself here from his own reality. He has to make his point but his breakdown over the flogging of that horse in Turin indicates a man who was not without compassion and that this 'hardness' was as much towards himself as others.

He wanted to gain Life in a society that was built to say 'nay' to every pleasure. And, of course, the English philosophers of the late seventeenth and eighteenth century would have easily allowed good sentiments and paganism to co-exist - but Nietzsche lived in Kaiserine Philistia.

In this paradox of saying one thing and being another, he reminds me of De Sade who sees truths about our species no one else is willing to see, takes those truths to their logical conclusion but, ultimately, and desperately, wants a world where he is wrong about our condition.

The question with Nietzsche is always whether we are prepared to accept the truth he expresses or find a better argument against him. Most critics have not done so without appealing to various forms of magical thinking. We are left with the necessity to reject truth-telling to live in society.

The classic liberal mind finds this very difficult because it has been trained to see the truth as good and that the good is true. To discover (which is the case) that existence is 'beyond good and evil' and that the good is constructed by men out of their circumstances is often too much to bear.

But there is another way of looking at this. That the search for the truth must lead inevitably in unpalatable directions but that, once we are led there and have it, it really no longer matters any more. All that mattered was to discover it and the discovery of it implies no need for meaning.

Meanwhile, the process of creating our own good is a series of choices related to our true selves (such as we make them). Social morality is best created (invented) by us and not by priests. We do not need to rely on either habit or moralists.

Compassion (distinguishable from the patronising Buddhist version or the psychic vampirism of Christian social relations) might re-emerge on a more solid base as the natural magnanimity of the person in full control of themselves with no desire to harm others, ready to assist from strength.

The risk, of course, is that it doesn't - that the reader of Nietzsche is a sociopath (many sociopaths have taken their cue from him). And so we are back to the inevitability of a repressive socialisation where Nietzsche merely enables the salvationary idea of rebellion against its oppressions.

Even today, 'The Genealogy of Morals' remains well worth reading. It strips away our assumptions that the world we have been given is in any way connected to the 'truth of things' and it helps us choose those half-truths necessary to hold things together regardless.

Christianity survives and prospers to this day because it is a sufficient half-truth to hold things together for many individuals and some societies but anyone who reads Nietzsche and does not 'have faith' (magical thinking) at least knows the true basis of its utility and can come to a view.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nietzsche’s first book could be read as a work of metaphysics (or as a comment on the metaphysics of the ancient Greeks), but it is more a work of philology (Classics studies) than of philosophy. To be precise, about the first third of this book is about the birth of tragedy; the second third is about the decline and death of tragedy in Classical Greece, and the last third of the book is about the rebirth of tragedy in the late nineteenth century.

Nietzsche argues that tragedy comes out of the spirit of music, which latter he associates with the Greek god Dionysus (and the term “Dionysian” has come to be associated with rock concerts, spring break—drinking, dancing and excess). At the time the book came out, the philological authorities (with the exception of Erwin Rohde) criticized the book for its lack of classical references and conventional methods of proof; the modern general reader may find that the classical references Nietzsche does mention (Archilochus, Pindar, Anaxagoras, for example) get in the way of his argument.

After he had written several more books, Nietzsche became critical of this early work and particularly the way it reflected the influence of the composer Richard Wagner and the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer on his thought (and indeed, the latter half of the book, which is about Wagner, is less satisfying than the first half).

The significance of this book with reference to Nietzsche’s later work is his emphasis here on the will, which would become a dominant theme of his philosophical writing. (And although Nietzsche himself later distanced himself from his thesis, his distinction between Apollonian and Dionysian art has proved useful and has influenced later thinkers and artists.)

The Genealogy of Morals gives some idea of how far Nietzsche moved away from his earlier, Schopenhauerian thinking. There are many passages in this later book that remind me of how far ahead of his time Nietzsche was--and how even for the modern age, Nietzsche remains something of a receding horizon.

Acquired the copy I am currently using 1986
Cheap Thrills, Montreal, Quebec

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This review is only for The Birth of Tragedy Out of the Spirit of Music, which forms the first half of this book. The second half is The Genealogy of Morals, which I will put off reading for the time being.

Friedrich Nietzsche is like the butcher who rests his heavy thumb on the scales as he weighs his meat. In Greek tragedy, he detects two strains, the Apollonian, which is all light and reason, and the Dionysiac, which is more concerned with the terror, mystery and immanence of life. When he weighs the Dionysiac elements, Nietzsche positively leans on the scale. This results in some strange judgments, particularly when he attacks Euripides and Socrates as corrupters of the tradition perfected by Aeschylus and Sophocles and the old Greek religion.

The author hails recent developments (in his day) in Germany, with Kant, Schopenhauer, and especially Wagner. What we know and Nietzsche did not was that his Dionysiac love fest ended in National Socialism and the horrors of World War II. His patent hatred of French and Italian art and culture gives his philosophy a purely intramural reach -- one which had later repercussions in the century to follow.

My own feeling is that the Apollonian and Dionysiac both represent different attitudes toward life which are equally valid and perhaps necessary. If by his emphasis on Wagner's Liebestod, Nietzsche deprived himself of the joys of Cosi Fan Tutte and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and only hurt his own argument. Life contains both light and darkness, in roughly equal measure.

On the other hand, I think Nietzsche created a fascinating dichotomy that has multiple uses that we have only begun to see in criticism and even politics.

[Mekay · Rating 3 out of 5]

I would like to thank Dr. Rupp for ruining my 2007 Christmas break by luring me toward Friedrich Nietzsche. Of course I say this jokingly and with much admiration for Dr. Rupp. I spent my 2007 break pouring myself over this book only to discover it is truly a book that one should digest in small bites. To ingest too quickly is to miss the flavor and on some days almost choke. Individual sentences are touching themselves and overall the mind of Nietzsche is mysterious.

[Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Birth of Tragedy (1872)

The Birth of Tragedy is Nietzsche’s first work. It describes the differences between the Apollonian and the Dionysian impulses in art and how the relationship between the two played out in ancient Greece. The Apollonian impulse, associated with Apollo, the god of light, is associated with the visual arts and epic poetry. Since the Apollonian impulse is representational , it is more closely tied to reason, whereas the Dionysian is more emotional and is primarily expressed through lyric poetry and music. The Apollonian is about self-control and self-knowledge, while the Dionysian is about the loss and self in union with nature. Both characteristics are essential to tragedy.

The Dionysian transcendence of the self puts us in touch with the wildness of nature that is normally repressed in civilization:
“The satyr, as the Dionysiac chorist, dwells in a reality sanctioned by myth and ritual. That tragedy should begin with him, that the Dionysiac wisdom of tragedy should speak through him, is as puzzling a phenomenon as, more generally, the origin of tragedy from the chorus. Perhaps we can gain a starting point for this inquiry by claiming that the satyr, that fictive nature sprite, stands to cultured man in the same relation as Dionysian music does to civilization. Richard Wagner has said of the latter that it is absorbed by music as lamplight by daylight. In the same manner, I believe, the cultured Greek felt himself absorbed into the satyr chorus, and in the next development of Greek tragedy state and society, in fact everything that separates man from man, gave way before an overwhelming sense of unity that led back into the heart of nature. This metaphysical solace (which, I wish to say at once, all true tragedy sends us away) that, despite every phenomenal change, life is at bottom indestructibly joyful and powerful, was expressed most concretely in the chorus of satyrs, nature beings who dwell behind all civilization and preserve their identity through every change of generations and historical movement.

With this chorus the profound Greek, so uniquely susceptible to the subtlest and deepest suffering, who had penetrated the destructive agencies of both nature and history, solaced himself. Though he had been in danger of craving a Buddhistic denial of the will, he was saved through art, and through art life reclaimed him.”

The Genealogy of Morals (1887)
This book is a series of three essays. The question addressed in the first essay is: “Under what conditions did man construct the value judgments “good” and “evil?” And what is their intrinsic worth? Have they benefited or retarded mankind?” Nietzsche distinguishes the dichotomy of "good and evil", which he associates with modern morality, from the dichotomy between "good and bad", which defined classical morality.

The modern European concept of “goodness" is based on treating weakness as morally superior. The weaker members of society have decided that their aristocratic superiors are evil so their achievements, ambitions and luxuries must also be evil. This is where the ethic of puritanism comes from; the lower classes resent the rich and so they decide that the lifestyle of the rich is corrupt. The lower classes can’t experience the same kind of happiness that the rich can, so they settle for the “drugged tranquility” that religion provides. They lack the power to overthrow their superiors, so they console themselves with the idea that obedience is a virtue and that God will eventually punish their wicked masters on Judgment Day, vindicating their sense of moral superiority.

Nietzsche traces this view of goodness to early Jewish criticism of the Roman Empire. Christianity has inherited this view of good and evil, which inverts the classical ideal that associated goodness with nobility and strength and badness with the weakness of social inferiors. According to Nietzsche, the classical ideal was temporarily revived during the Renaissance. But the egalitarianism of the French Revolution asserted the superiority of common morality again, returning to Jewish and Christian ethics.

In the second essay, Nietzsche writes about the origins of punishment and guilt. He identifies a similarity between the German words for “guilt” and “debt,” suggesting that guilt originally had nothing to do with moral responsibility, but simply indicated that a debt needed to be paid. Punishment was originally meted out not on the basis of guilt, but simply as a reprisal. If someone broke a promise, for example, they were in debt to the person they let down, and could balance the debt by submitting to punishment. Punishment was harsher since it was openly acknowledged that the purpose of punishment is to let the victim of the crime enjoy the suffering of his enemy as compensation for what he has lost. Nietzsche suggests that this is still the main purpose of punishment, even though people are now more reluctant to say so explicitly. In earlier societies, this conception of punishment meant that there were no hard feelings between creditor and debtor after a debt was paid. Because of these Nietzsche characterizes these societies, despite their cruelty, as more cheerful than ours. Nietzsche argues that as the harshness of punishment has declined, man has increasingly relied on the emotion of guilt “in order to hurt himself, after the blocking of the more natural outlet of his cruelty."

The third essay explores the purpose of asceticism. Nietzsche argues that philosophy was born of and depends on ascetic ideals. The contemplative, skeptical mood of philosophy ran counter to ancient morality, and must have been mistrusted. In order to dispel this mistrust, philosophers used the practice of asceticism to inspire fear and awe from society. What has made asceticism such an influential ideal is that it explains the meaning of suffering - it says that we suffer because of sin.

Nietzsche says that asceticism and scientific inquiry have the same root: they share a fundamental belief in truth and a commitment to detachment. Art, on the other hand, is “far more radically opposed to the ascetic ideal than is science. In art, the lie becomes consecrated, the will to deception has good conscience at its back."

The ascetic ideal signifies “a will to nothingness, a revulsion from life, a rebellion against the principal condition of living.” But human beings would rather embrace nothingness as their purpose than be devoid of purpose. He goes on to say: “I have great respect for the ascetic ideal as long as it really believes in itself and is not merely a masquerade.” It’s worth quoting the rest of this passage:

“But I have no patience with those coquettish dung beetles who are so eager to smell of the infinite that, before long, the infinite comes to smell of dung. I have no patience with those who try to mimic life, with worn-out, used up people who swathe themselves in wisdom so as to appear objective, with histrionic agitators who wear magic hoods on their straw heads, with ambitious artists who try to pass for ascetics and priests and yet are, at bottom, only tragic buffoons. And I am equally out of patience with these newest speculators in idealism called anti-Semites, who parade as Christian-Aryan worthies and endeavor to stir up all the asinine elements of the nation by that cheapest of propaganda tricks, a moral attitude. (The ease with which any wretched imposture succeeds in present-day Germany may be attributed to the progressive stultification of the German mind. The reason for this general spread of inanity may be found in a diet composed entirely of newspapers, politics, beer, and Wagner’s music. Our national vanity and hemmed-in situation and the shaking palsy of current ideas have each done their bit to prepare us for such a diet.)"

I just found an interesting series at the Guardian that has a detailed look at The Genealogy of Morals, written by Giles Fraser. I've just started reading it, it starts here:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisf...

[Josh Anderson · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a wild ride it's been! You can't not admire the attacks on Socrates, after all, he is thought to be so important according to history, we divide classic philosophy into two categories, pre-socratic and everything that came after that. Surely, Plato had a plan when writing the dialogues of Socrates. Just as the Pauline New Testament was no accident, so the Platonic dialogues. Since Nietzsche's main target here is The Church, he simply must go after Platonic ideals and Socrates' dialectic as possible, nay probable, reasons for the state of things as we see them in the Institution.

The state of things here in the U.S. would utterly disgust Nietzsche. Words have meaning to the masses only as corporations ascribe meaning to them. Sexuality and true Freedom are in such disarray that people are ultimately afraid of the concept of an objective truth. We hear through the channels that casual sexual encounters are rampant, yet most of us are scared as ever to have a healthy sex life. Most of us choose a TV show far before we ever consider picking up a book, much less going down rabbit trails of Indo-European philology. That's the problem. We are trapped inside a crystal palace of language that means very little to our spirit. Language has become a technology to the modern man, not a map that leads backwards, and in this spirit of tool-wielding, "the history of language is the history of a process of abbreviation." And so have we backed ourselves into a corner. But instead of teaching Latin and the classics, we teach that language is always subjective, that some words might offend others, nay whole ideas and philosophies may offend others, so it's best to not philosophize at all.

"Be ashamed of your heritage, the one that had the will to power" is what I hear from the ones that don't want anyone to suffer. Life is the will to power, and I will not be ashamed to be alive.

[Luc Dantes · Rating 3 out of 5]

Had I known that The Birth of Tragedy was in the context of ancient Greek theater, I might not have bought the book. It was an impluse buy at my favourite secondhand bookstore. That being said, while I considered not finishing the book mulitple times, I am glad that I have read it through; for the few lines that I could understand have made such a great impression on me. How Nietzsche tackles the necessity of tragedy, a pure expression of the will through music and the birth of morals, as well as guilt, have caused me to reconsider much in my own life.

Here is one of my favourite excerpts from The Genealogy of Morals.

"... everywhere a deliberate misinterpretation of suffering as guilt, terror, and punishment; everywhere, flagellant's lash, the hair shirt, the sinner stretching himself on the rack of his sadistic conscience; everywhere, dumb torment, agonizing fear, the spasms of an unknown bliss, the cry for redemption. No doubt such a system of procedures, once instituted, made short work of the ancient depression and tedium."

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brilliant and challenging. I especially appreciated Nietzsche’s analysis of the Apollonian and Dionysian concepts. His influence on subsequent thinkers is clear and on full display in these texts. I feel Nietzsche levels an excellent critique of his own understanding of Buddhism - however this understanding misses the mark of the ultimate metaphysics and doctrine of, at least, most schools of Mahayana Buddhism. Nietzsche also is quick to viciously criticize Stocisim throughout and then criticize the helpless attitudes of the so called “sick” (not particularly meant in a physical sense here) who could most benefit from studying Stoic thinkers and become something closer to ‘well.’ Overall an excellent analysis and an attack on those who would deny the Will to Power, and the joy to be had in life, and in exercising one’s true nature - an assertion of Man’s inherent rights to a full life. The implications are many, and some may find them objectionable. I found a lot of value here, but I feel Nietzsche’s over reliance on the affirmation of the Ego, and his reliance on many assumptions that are not proven to my satisfaction in his arguments, do not stand up well to lived experience. Ultimately this exaltation of the Ego falls apart for anyone who has experienced an Ego death (even temporarily, for to never recover the Ego would be to go mad). It would be interesting to know what Nietzsche’s thoughts may have been on the matter after a strong dose of Dionysian DMT or psilocybin. Many of the weakest arguments are those against altruism, which are dealt with from an opposing angle by thinkers like Peter Kropotkin and more contemporaneously Richard Dawkins in ‘The Selfish Gene.’ Overall a great and provocative read that serves much food for thought.

[Larry James · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a double book, the first, "The Birth of Tragedy" was kind of a slog. A lot of history and comparison between the Dionysiac and Apollonian artistic expression. i personally got a lot more from the second book, "The Genealogy of Morals" though he did go on quite a bit about the ascetic ideal. Early on there was good discussion about the value judgements of 'good' and 'bad'. This was interesting, but seemed a little short. All told, a mixed bag. Good quote at the end, "Man would sooner have the void for a purpose than be void of purpose." Recommended.

[Michael Kress · Rating 4 out of 5]

I checked this out at the public library in Spring Hill, TN. The Birth of Tragedy was interesting but difficult to understand because I'm not familiar enough with Greek tragedy, as Nietzsche obviously was. This kind of stuff always leads me to read stuff that the writer talks about. Nietzsche outlines how Greek literature went through a change, from "alpha" to "nerdy." It would be interesting to deep dive into that literature and witness that change for myself. The Genealogy of Morals, my favorite of the two books in this volume, is quite dark. It outlines a change similar to that of the Greeks, when humans developed morality. It would be more difficult to do a deep dive into this; one would have to use their imagination.

[Douglas Wilson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ick.

[George Dallas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Both excellent works which bookend Nietzsche's writing.

Birth of Tragedy shows the beginnings of his thoughts philosophy, albeit disguised in his concept of 'Apollo vs Dionysus' when talking about Greek tragedy. Apollo represents reason, structured thinking, writing, law making - everything that separates man from nature. Dionysus represents passion, music, fear, the unconscious, animal instincts - everything that grounds man in nature, making us no better than beasts. According to Nietzsche the two need to intertwine and make great art, and that this only happens rarely in a contemporary setting, mainly through music.

Genealogy of morals is the end of his thoughts, and he attempts to lay out a more rigorous grounding. The first essay 'good and evil' develops the nobleman/slave binary that is a core tenant of his. 'Guilt, bad conscience' lays out his reasoning for the origins of these feelings, locating it in the debtors guilt in the creditor/debtor relationship, and 'what do ascetic ideals mean?' takes aim at the role of philosophers and Christianity, unpacking why ascetic priests are common across different cultures. All essays are packed full of ideas and definitely worth a re-read.

Nietzsche constantly tries to tear down existing thought structures and simultaneously build new ones, and it can easily be argued that he is much more effective at the tearing down than the rebuilding. His criticisms of philosophy, religion and reason are blistering, and it's worth reading just for that. However the philosophy he builds is full of contradiction and conjecture. He says that philosophers are really writing autobiographies, yet in no philosopher is this more apparent than him. When he says stuff like:

'The real danger lies in our loathing of man and our pity of him. If these two emotions should one day join forces, they will beget the most sinister thing ever witnessed on earth: man's ultimate will, his will to nothingness, nihilism.'

It's obvious he's speaking about his own inclinations, you could easily argue the opposite of what he's saying. His philosophy is almost like a house of cards, where you have to buy into a lot of his very tenuous assumptions in order to follow his thought process, but if one of those assumptions isn't true the whole thing will fall down.

However the more you read the more it becomes clear that this is his intention all along. His scathing criticisms are about how objectivity is a sham, how a 'disinterested perspective' is a myth - but given this, where does that leave him? What's his role as a philosopher? If he is to follow his criticism, he has no right to propose an objective truth:

'It is of the greatest importance to know how to put the most diverse perspectives and psychological interpretations at the service of intellection. Let us, from now on, be on our guard against the hallowed philosphers' myth of a "pure, will-less, painless, timeless knower"; let us beware of the tentacles of such contradictory notions as "pure reason," "absolute knowledge," "absolute intelligence". All these concepts presuppose an eye such as no living being can imagine, an eye required to have no direction, to abrogate its active and interpretative powers - precisely those powers that alone make seeing, seeing something. All seeing is essentially perspective, and so is all knowing. The more emotions we allow to speak in a given matter, the more different eyes we can put on in order to view a given spectacle, the more complete will be our conception of it, the greater our "objectivity"'

His role is therefore to offer 'different eyes' to 'view a given spectacle'. He's allowing his emotions to speak on the matters of good and evil, morals etc. to give us a more complete conception of it, not to claim that his perspective is the absolute truth. So he doesn't need to care too much about contradicting himself or not being logical because he's not aiming for the heights of objectivity, just to put forward his view. Once you start reading him in this way it becomes much more enjoyable, as you realise that you're there for the ride, not the destination. His ideas really are different and original, and he definitely does offer fresh perspectives on a range of things. But I enjoy him most by not getting too attached to his ideas, to let them wash over me and to keep the ones that I like and to forget the ones I don't.

[Ning-Jia Ong · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very difficult read. Nietzsche's "The Birth of Tragedy" and "The Genealogy of Morals" represent pivotal points in his philosophical evolution. "Birth of Tragedy" introduces the Apollonian vs. Dionysian duality in Greek art, portraying reason and passion's symbiosis. Nietzsche suggests this harmony is rare in contemporary settings, particularly manifesting through music.

"The Genealogy of Morals" marks Nietzsche's mature reflections. The first essay explores the nobleman/slave binary, foundational to his philosophy. The second delves into guilt's origins, rooted in the debtor/creditor relationship. The final essay scrutinizes ascetic ideals, critiquing philosophers and Christianity's role, unraveling why ascetic priests are prevalent across cultures. Nietzsche dismantles existing thought structures, criticizing philosophy, religion, and reason vehemently. Yet, his philosophy, fraught with contradiction and conjecture, invites readers to question assumptions.

Nietzsche's intentional dismantling aligns with his critique of objectivity as a sham. He challenges the myth of a "pure knower" and advocates for diverse perspectives. His role, he asserts, is not to claim absolute truth but to offer different eyes for a comprehensive understanding. Embracing Nietzsche involves appreciating the journey over fixating on a destination, allowing his ideas to provoke thought without absolute attachment.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Actually two-and-a-half stars). This book consists of two widely divergent works by Nietzsche, and represents for me a sort of re-entry into attempting to grapple with the philosopher after a break of many years. I read The Will to Power at a young age and not very well, and Thus Spake Zarathustra a bit later and more carefully, and then went on to other things, always with a sense that I should return to Nietzsche some day. Honestly, now that I have, I’m not certain it was worth the effort, but perhaps these works (or the translations) were not the best place to begin.

The first of the texts is “The Birth of Tragedy,” a fairly early work Nietzsche wrote about Greek drama and its relationship to contemporary trends in German culture. The translator is at some pains to point out the flaws in this less mature sample of Nietzsche’s thinking, and the edition begins with an apologia by the author himself. Perhaps the most obvious issue, to a non- Nietzsche scholar such as myself, is that this work begins with a dedication to the genius of Wagner, who obviously was still a major influence on Nietzsche at this time, although he later broke with him and may have been embarrassed by his earlier Wagner worship.

The text itself is a discussion of rather more than “the birth” of tragedy as a dramatic expression. It is more of a discussion of tragedy as an art form, its impact and relevance, all examined through the lens of an Apollonian-Dionysian dynamic, which Nietzsche saw as central to Greek culture (and thus as important to “Western” culture). The Apollonian spirit, so far as I understand it here, represents the rational, controlled side, while the Dionysiac is based in euphoria and joyous chaos. Although in a sense Nietzsche seemed to favor the Dionysian, this may be because he viewed modernity as slipping too far toward the Apollonian side, and in need of a corrective for the purposes of balance. He certainly did not make the mistake here of demonizing the Apollonian current and rejecting it, indeed, he argued that tragedy would have been impossible without it.

At one point in the text (a part he specifically apologized for in the introduction) he presents an extensive quote from Schopenhauer. Ironically, I experienced my one true “a-ha” moment in reading this from this quotation. Schopenhauer argued that music is different from other art forms, because, unlike all other art forms, it does not attempt to re-create nature or reality, but rather to transcend it. Musicians don’t try to emulate bird song, or noises they hear in the street, they try to create something original, which is more beautiful than the sounds we hear when music isn’t playing. As such, Schopenhauer claims it is a “pure” expression of the will. Obviously, he was writing before the popularity of abstract art, but I get what he was saying here, I think better than I get most of Nietzsche’s argument.

Music comes into this because the original tragedies were wholly or partly sung (the chorus sang its lines, at least). With this, Nietzsche tried to link opera and Greek tragedy, but I’m not sure how far he succeeded. In part, it seems to me at times that Nietzsche claimed to know more about what Greek drama was and how it worked on its audience than is possible, based on the small amount of evidence that has survived. I don’t really know enough to refute him, but I’m cautious about accepting his arguments on faith. The translator, writing in 1956, argues that some of his premises are now commonly accepted by scholars, but that may have changed in the intervening 50+ years.

In spite of those criticisms, I did like “The Birth of a Tragedy” much better than “The Genealogy of Morals.” This book was written as a critique of morality and religion, and it seems to me that a professional philosopher should have been able to do much better. Much of the argument is based on a-historical speculations about what “man in his natural state” is like. Nietzsche falls on the side of Hobbes, that life was nasty, brutish, and short, and then proceeds to use this as an argument against the social contract. He then postulates that “ascetic priests” came about because they were “sick” and sick people have a drive to create more sick people. “Healthy” people, in his world, do not care for the sick, they avoid them and try to stay among their own kind, lest they become infected (so much for the famous “that which does not kill me” line).

All that would be bad enough, but the book is laced throughout with anti-Semitism, German nationalism, male chauvinism, anti-democratic elitism, and other forms of ignorance. It’s hardly fair to “judge” Nietzsche in terms of the Nazis, but it’s easy to see where Nazis were able to pick and choose passages from this book to support their program. Much of the first third is focused on how Jews are “the priestly, rancorous nation par excellence,” suggesting that the entire book is essentially a criticism of their influence on German life. I don’t think that this book is where he introduced his erroneous “herd mentality” concept (which obviously reflects his own biological ignorance about herd animals) but it is referenced a few times.

Towards the end of the book, he includes anti-Semitism and listening to the music of Wagner among the weaknesses of the German people. Doubtless he meant only a "crude" form of anti-Semitism (since he had indulged so much more sophisticated a form) and obviously this book came out after his famed break with Wagner. The work doesn’t show much positive consideration of how a “healthy” society can interact to minimize harm to its members, nor even a very interesting criticism of Christianity (which is what was promised on the back cover). Mostly, it is just rancor and back-biting, a bile-filled attack on the things he didn’t like. I expected much more.

[Danyael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Birth of Tragedy was very hard to understand, but it is very great! Nietzsche's genealogic method is very great in the second book, but I must comment that when he openly spoke about the genealogy of morals in the cases of debtor-creditor relationship, he is not very aware of the inexistence of morality in cats, but the females do practice debtor-creditor relationship with regards to their maternity. Besides that, I agree with his points, especially the Dionysiac spirit, the brutality of law throughout history, and Christanity's reversing of the Aristocratic ideals by praising asceticism.

[Madison Machala · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would recommend everyone read this at least once. He takes a unique approach on life I had never seen before. He talks about life in the forms of Slave and Master morality. Although I don’t necessarily agree with what he is saying he makes an interesting argument based on social dynamics.

[Marko]

I have two different engish editions for the Birth of tragedy + 1 german edition.

[Angela Castille · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed the first book better as its focus is on Greek gods and philosophers. The second book was ok but focused too much on Nitetzsche dislike of his contemporaries and culture.

[Neah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Crazy for this one Fred, quite eccentric

[Joe H · Rating 4 out of 5]

first nietzche book i read and i think it served as a good starting point to read the rest of his works

[Andy Long · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not understand anything from this book other than that Nietzsche is a genius and I am not.

[Ilyass Mofaddel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good stuff, but broski gotta stop trash-talking on Plato. Ngl feel like it's racism against non-athenian people.

[Vanessa M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting combination of Nietzsche's works in one volume. I read this to accompany a book blogger's Greek tragedy read-along in 2022.

[Kenneth M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review for "The Genealogy of Morals," by Kenneth M. Shultz


To those whom accuse Nietzsche of being an anti-Semite:

I can see where this confusion is found, however, it does not seem Nietzsche's goal to make attacks strictly on the Jewish people. In the Genealogy of Morals, he in fact commends the Old Testament:

"I have the highest respect for that book. (the Old Testament) I find in it great men, a heroic landscape, and one of the rarest things on earth, the naivete of a strong heart." (pp. 281)

This is not to say that Nietzsche holds no contempt for the modern Jewish people. Nietzsche finds pleasure in transforming the unquestioned opaque truths (eventually challenging truth itself) into papery translucent facades. In his time, religious dogma was a primary source of unquestioned opaque truth (while still a source today, it is more readily question by many), making Judaism (as well as Christianity) his most common recurring motif. Consequently, he has been scrutinized as an anti-Semite.

In the third essays, however, Nietzsche is as critical and destructive to himself as he had previously been to religious dogma. This is most apparent in his criticism of the modern scholar and modern philosopher with respect to the ascetic idea (the end of the third essay). As this third essay unravels, Nietzsche begins to turn on himself (it is unclear as to if the turn is intentional or not) and then abruptly changes his focus to the wretched unoriginal historian (chapter XXVI). Soon after, he offers his final conclusions and the reader is left with a feeling that the author, once a predatory hawk, has all along been his own prey, a lamb.

Regardless of its peculiar idiosyncratic hypocrisies and contradictions, the work is profound and should be read, if at all, by a readied mind. When approaching this text, do so without presumption and be prepared to accept uncomfortable and at times audacious claims (if at least for the sake of argument); if you cannot do so, and still decide to read the material, you will be wasting you time.

[Justin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This edition brings together two of Nietzsche's writings, the former one being his first book and the latter one being one of his last. The Birth of Tragedy mainly focuses and compares Apollonian and Dionysian art, and the reasons for the popularity and eventual 'death' of tragedy. In The Genealogy of Morals Nietzsche deals with the origins of morals and its terminology, such as 'good and evil' and 'good and bad'.

This was a tough read to start the challenge (PBT Subdue the Shelf Challenge) with. Trying to read it in a day didn't help me to understand a lot of what Nietzsche was arguing. Also, I know I would have been better off if I knew more about ancient Greek history. Even though a lot of his writing his powerful, poetic and commanding, Nietzsche still appeared to have many quaint views, which is understandable since these works were written in the late 1800s.

In some parts of this book I was just reading without understanding, but there were times I was able to grasp what Nietzsche was arguing even if I didn't always agree with it. For example, in The Birth of Tragedy he mentions Euripides and the Euripidean prologue which would "have a character appear at the beginning of the play, tell us who he is, what preceded the action, what has happened so far, even what is about to happen in the corse of the play." A book I'm reading at the moment, Skippy Dies, partially does this. I was intrigued finding out the origins for such a technique, and the possible reason they were used in this book.

[Matteen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have been thinking of reading Nietzsche especially because a philosopher poet from India has often been linked to him. I wanted to know how the ideas of Nietsche could have influenced this very much orthodox Muslim from South Asia. So far I have found nothing of the sort that would indicate a positive influence, I feel more like Iqbal's mind may have had a narcissistic (not individual but community narcissism) reflection on encountering Existentialist thought.

Geneology of Morals: As an evolutionary biology student, I find it interesting that Nietzsche is influenced or has a notion of evolution. Although it has been interpreted as Lamarckian I read it as a better interpretations than many non-biologists of even the 20th century. What he is talking about is a cultivational and cultural influence, which can very well be true in a sense. If we forgive him for not being accurate to the essence of Dawinian idea, he is not entirely wrong. His book seemed to me like a natural followup of the theory of evolution. I enjoyed it like all the other Nietsche books I have read.

[Sagely · Rating 2 out of 5]

My first foray into Nietzsche, and I'm not sure how to interpret it.

The two works in this volume read very differently from one another. This is no surprise, as BoT is Nietzsche's first work, published in 1872. It reads as a strong foray by a relatively young scholar. His opposition of the Dionysian and Apollonian outlooks, both confronted by the Euripidean/Socratic turn in Greek culture, provides a workable interpretive parallel to the Enlightenment turn of which he lived in the latter days.

Honestly, I found this an enjoyable read, quick, easy, understandable.

GoM was published 15 years later. Wikipedia hails it as Nietzsche's finest, most sustained work. Maybe I should blame a bad translation, but I found GoM alienating and gratuitous. (Maybe that means I read it right ... probably it means I'm not the kind of reader Nietzsche's looking for.)

I'll muddle on through the other scattered Nietzsche I've accumulated. The man was brilliant--that can't be denied. But it's the brilliance of a dark, sickly age. That's my impression.

[Miles · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was a very dense and frustrating read. It was like a really stormy day that has moments of brilliant and refreshing sunlight, but is mostly just muddy and cold.

As a whole, I feel like both of these essays don't really hold up. There are so many contradictions, hypocrisies and wild tangents, too many to make the arguments feel cohesive and strong. Additionally there are a lot of really obnoxious, outdated rants about the "weak," the "sick," the "Jews" that really take away from the effectiveness of his points. The German Nationalism stuff is also horrid.

However, both essays are also highly quotable and unarguably brilliant. The flashes of true, bold intellect are there and they are striking. Lots of good thoughts about aesthetics and ethics here. This guy was truly a great thinker, great and terrible.

[Matt · Rating 1 out of 5]

Horrible translation. The texts are interesting, of course, and provocative and guaranteed to set your impression of the world on its head.

But- if you are to read Nietzsche you've just got to do it with a translation by Walter Kaufmann. I have no German, but I've never read anything which is as vibrant and severe and powerful as his editions. Actual philosophy professors have said as much to me, too.

Trust me on this.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Before he was a controversial philosopher, he was a philologist. The Birth of Tragedy shatters the preconceptions of our modern views on the development of ethics. Many accuse him of anti-semitism (debatable) and mysoginistic idiocies (true), and much of his work has been reduced to aphorisms, but like other artists whose personal lives are a complete shambles, he proved capable of producing great ideas within the scope of his work.