God is Dead

Oooh. I like two parts-- his deconstruction of morality in On the Genealogy of Morality, and also his story of the eternal return. Back when I was first exposed to Nietzsche, his raging criticism of 'slave morality' was supremely fascinating (although I was and still am unsure how much I understand or agree with it).

On the other hand, the story of the eternal return has really affected my personal philosophy of how I'd like to approach life (again-- not saying I interpret it the way that Nietzsche meant or even that I understand it completely). I've sort of adapted some of what he describes-- 'yes-saying,' 'amor fati,' etc. into a positive life outlook.

I've taken several university classes that have discussed Nietzsche in various forms; interestingly enough, one professor described Nietzsche as a full blown epitome of nihilism, whereas another firmly impressed on us that Nietzsche was absolutely not a nihilist. I'm on the side of the latter; I certainly don't believe anyone ought to take all of Nietzsche at face value, but I also think it can be incorporated optimistically. 

"Among wild cliffs I stood suddenly alone, bleak, in the bleakest moonlight. But there lay a man. And there–the dog, jumping, bristling, whining–now he saw me coming; then he howled again, he cried. Had I ever heard a dog cry like this for help? And verily, what I saw – I had never seen the like. A young shepherd I saw, writhing, gagging, in spasms, his face distorted, and a heavy black snake hung out of his mouth. Had I ever seen so much nausea and pale dread on one face? He seemed to have been asleep when the snake crawled into his throat, and there bit itself fast. My hand tore at the snake and tore in vain; it did not tear the snake out of his throat. Then it cried out of me: 'Bite! Bite its head off! Bite!' Thus it cried out of me – my dread, my hatred, my nausea, my pity, all that is good and wicked in me cried out of me with a single cry....

The shepherd...bit as my cry counseled him; he bit with a good bite. Far away he spewed the head of the snake – and he jumped up. No longer shepherd, no longer human – one changed, radiant, laughing! Never yet on earth has a human being laughed as he laughed! O my brothers, I heard a laughter that was no human laughter; and now a thirst gnaws at me, a longing that never grows still. My longing for this laughter gnaws at me; oh, how do I bear to go on living! And how could I bear to die now!"

"In the Dionysiac dithyramb man is stimulated to the highest intensification of his symbolic powers; something that he has never felt before urgently demands to be expressed: the destruction of the veil of maya, one-ness as the genius of humankind, indeed of nature itself. The essence of nature is bent on expressing itself; a new world of symbols is required, firstly the symbolism of the entire body, not just of the mouth, the face, the word, but the full gesture of dance with its rhythmical movement of every limb. Then there is a sudden, tempestuous growth in music's other symbolic powers, in rhythm, dynamics, and harmony. To comprehend this complete unchaining of all symbolic powers, a man must already have reached that height of self-abandonment which seeks symbolic expression in those powers: thus the dithyrambic servant of Dionysos can only be understood by his own kind! With what astonishment the Apolline Greeks must have regarded him! With an astonishment enlarged by the added horror of realizing that all this was not so foreign to them after all, indeed that their Apolline consciousness only hid this Dionysiac world from them like a veil."