Thus Spake Zarathustra A book for all and none , livre ebook

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339 pages

English

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"Zarathustra" is my brother's most personal work; it is the history of his most individual experiences, of his friendships, ideals, raptures, bitterest disappointments and sorrows. Above it all, however, there soars, transfiguring it, the image of his greatest hopes and remotest aims. My brother had the figure of Zarathustra in his mind from his very earliest youth: he once told me that even as a child he had dreamt of him. At different periods in his life, he would call this haunter of his dreams by different names; "but in the end," he declares in a note on the subject, "I had to do a PERSIAN the honour of identifying him with this creature of my fancy. Persians were the first to take a broad and comprehensive view of history. Every series of evolutions, according to them, was presided over by a prophet; and every prophet had his 'Hazar,'-his dynasty of a thousand years.

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Publié par	Pub One Info
Date de parution	27 septembre 2010
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9782819920991
Langue	English

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INTRODUCTION BY MRS FORSTER–NIETZSCHE.
HOW ZARATHUSTRA CAME INTO BEING.
"Zarathustra" is my brother’s most personal work; it is thehistory of his most individual experiences, of his friendships,ideals, raptures, bitterest disappointments and sorrows. Above itall, however, there soars, transfiguring it, the image of hisgreatest hopes and remotest aims. My brother had the figure ofZarathustra in his mind from his very earliest youth: he once toldme that even as a child he had dreamt of him. At different periodsin his life, he would call this haunter of his dreams by differentnames; "but in the end," he declares in a note on the subject, "Ihad to do a PERSIAN the honour of identifying him with thiscreature of my fancy. Persians were the first to take a broad andcomprehensive view of history. Every series of evolutions,according to them, was presided over by a prophet; and everyprophet had his 'Hazar,'—his dynasty of a thousand years."
All Zarathustra’s views, as also his personality, were earlyconceptions of my brother’s mind. Whoever reads his posthumouslypublished writings for the years 1869–82 with care, will constantlymeet with passages suggestive of Zarathustra’s thoughts anddoctrines. For instance, the ideal of the Superman is put forthquite clearly in all his writings during the years 1873–75; and in"We Philologists", the following remarkable observationsoccur:—
"How can one praise and glorify a nation as a whole?—Even amongthe Greeks, it was the INDIVIDUALS that counted."
"The Greeks are interesting and extremely important because theyreared such a vast number of great individuals. How was thispossible? The question is one which ought to be studied."
"I am interested only in the relations of a people to therearing of the individual man, and among the Greeks the conditionswere unusually favourable for the development of the individual;not by any means owing to the goodness of the people, but becauseof the struggles of their evil instincts."
"WITH THE HELP OF FAVOURABLE MEASURES GREAT INDIVIDUALS MIGHT BEREARED WHO WOULD BE BOTH DIFFERENT FROM AND HIGHER THAN THOSE WHOHERETOFORE HAVE OWED THEIR EXISTENCE TO MERE CHANCE. Here we maystill be hopeful: in the rearing of exceptional men."
The notion of rearing the Superman is only a new form of anideal Nietzsche already had in his youth, that "THE OBJECT OFMANKIND SHOULD LIE IN ITS HIGHEST INDIVIDUALS" (or, as he writes in"Schopenhauer as Educator": "Mankind ought constantly to bestriving to produce great men—this and nothing else is its duty.")But the ideals he most revered in those days are no longer held tobe the highest types of men. No, around this future ideal of acoming humanity—the Superman—the poet spread the veil of becoming.Who can tell to what glorious heights man can still ascend? That iswhy, after having tested the worth of our noblest ideal—that of theSaviour, in the light of the new valuations, the poet cries withpassionate emphasis in "Zarathustra":
"Never yet hath there been a Superman. Naked have I seen both ofthem, the greatest and the smallest man:—"
All–too–similar are they still to each other. Verily even thegreatest found I—all–too–human!"—"
The phrase "the rearing of the Superman," has very often beenmisunderstood. By the word "rearing," in this case, is meant theact of modifying by means of new and higher values—values which, aslaws and guides of conduct and opinion, are now to rule overmankind. In general the doctrine of the Superman can only beunderstood correctly in conjunction with other ideas of theauthor’s, such as:—the Order of Rank, the Will to Power, and theTransvaluation of all Values. He assumes that Christianity, as aproduct of the resentment of the botched and the weak, has put inban all that is beautiful, strong, proud, and powerful, in fact allthe qualities resulting from strength, and that, in consequence,all forces which tend to promote or elevate life have beenseriously undermined. Now, however, a new table of valuations mustbe placed over mankind—namely, that of the strong, mighty, andmagnificent man, overflowing with life and elevated to hiszenith—the Superman, who is now put before us with overpoweringpassion as the aim of our life, hope, and will. And just as the oldsystem of valuing, which only extolled the qualities favourable tothe weak, the suffering, and the oppressed, has succeeded inproducing a weak, suffering, and "modern" race, so this new andreversed system of valuing ought to rear a healthy, strong, lively,and courageous type, which would be a glory to life itself. Statedbriefly, the leading principle of this new system of valuing wouldbe: "All that proceeds from power is good, all that springs fromweakness is bad."
This type must not be regarded as a fanciful figure: it is not anebulous hope which is to be realised at some indefinitely remoteperiod, thousands of years hence; nor is it a new species (in theDarwinian sense) of which we can know nothing, and which it wouldtherefore be somewhat absurd to strive after. But it is meant to bea possibility which men of the present could realise with all theirspiritual and physical energies, provided they adopted the newvalues.
The author of "Zarathustra" never lost sight of that egregiousexample of a transvaluation of all values through Christianity,whereby the whole of the deified mode of life and thought of theGreeks, as well as strong Romedom, was almost annihilated ortransvalued in a comparatively short time. Could not a rejuvenatedGraeco–Roman system of valuing (once it had been refined and mademore profound by the schooling which two thousand years ofChristianity had provided) effect another such revolution within acalculable period of time, until that glorious type of manhoodshall finally appear which is to be our new faith and hope, and inthe creation of which Zarathustra exhorts us to participate?
In his private notes on the subject the author uses theexpression "Superman" (always in the singular, by–the–bye), assignifying "the most thoroughly well–constituted type," as opposedto "modern man"; above all, however, he designates Zarathustrahimself as an example of the Superman. In "Ecco Homo" he is carefulto enlighten us concerning the precursors and prerequisites to theadvent of this highest type, in referring to a certain passage inthe "Gay Science":—
"In order to understand this type, we must first be quite clearin regard to the leading physiological condition on which itdepends: this condition is what I call GREAT HEALTHINESS. I knownot how to express my meaning more plainly or more personally thanI have done already in one of the last chapters (Aphorism 382) ofthe fifth book of the 'Gaya Scienza'."
"We, the new, the nameless, the hard–to–understand,"—it saysthere,—"we firstlings of a yet untried future—we require for a newend also a new means, namely, a new healthiness, stronger, sharper,tougher, bolder and merrier than all healthiness hitherto. He whosesoul longeth to experience the whole range of hitherto recognisedvalues and desirabilities, and to circumnavigate all the coasts ofthis ideal 'Mediterranean Sea', who, from the adventures of hismost personal experience, wants to know how it feels to be aconqueror, and discoverer of the ideal—as likewise how it is withthe artist, the saint, the legislator, the sage, the scholar, thedevotee, the prophet, and the godly non–conformist of the oldstyle:—requires one thing above all for that purpose, GREATHEALTHINESS—such healthiness as one not only possesses, but alsoconstantly acquires and must acquire, because one unceasinglysacrifices it again, and must sacrifice it!—And now, after havingbeen long on the way in this fashion, we Argonauts of the ideal,more courageous perhaps than prudent, and often enough shipwreckedand brought to grief, nevertheless dangerously healthy, alwayshealthy again,—it would seem as if, in recompense for it all, thatwe have a still undiscovered country before us, the boundaries ofwhich no one has yet seen, a beyond to all countries and corners ofthe ideal known hitherto, a world so over–rich in the beautiful,the strange, the questionable, the frightful, and the divine, thatour curiosity as well as our thirst for possession thereof, havegot out of hand—alas! that nothing will now any longer satisfyus!—"
"How could we still be content with THE MAN OF THE PRESENT DAYafter such outlooks, and with such a craving in our conscience andconsciousness? Sad enough; but it is unavoidable that we shouldlook on the worthiest aims and hopes of the man of the present daywith ill–concealed amusement, and perhaps should no longer look atthem. Another ideal runs on before us, a strange, tempting idealfull of danger, to which we should not like to persuade any one,because we do not so readily acknowledge any one’s RIGHT THERETO:the ideal of a spirit who plays naively (that is to sayinvoluntarily and from overflowing abundance and power) witheverything that has hitherto been called holy, good, intangible, ordivine; to whom the loftiest conception which the people havereasonably made their measure of value, would already practicallyimply danger, ruin, abasement, or at least relaxation, blindness,or temporary self–forgetfulness; the ideal of a humanly superhumanwelfare and benevolence, which will often enough appear INHUMAN,for example, when put alongside of all past seriousness on earth,and alongside of all past solemnities in bearing, word, tone, look,morality, and pursuit, as their truest involuntary parody—and WITHwhich, nevertheless, perhaps THE GREAT SERIOUSNESS only commences,when the proper interrogative mark is set up, the fate of the soulchanges, the hour–hand moves, and tragedy begins…"
Although the figure of Zarathustra and a large number of theleading thoughts in this work had appeared much earlier in thedreams and writings of the author, "Thus Spake Zarathustra" did notactually come into being until the month of August 1881 in SilsMaria; and it was the idea of the Eter