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Friedrich Nietzsche

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Occasionally a book is published that daunts the reviewer's attempts to do justice to its subject--in this case, the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)--and to the book's content. Curtis Cate's new biography is such a work.

Cate chronicles Nietzsche's life and works in "quantitative detail," from his birth in Ro(e)cken, Germany, on Oct. 15, 1844, until his mental collapse in Turin, Italy, in Jan. 1889, and his death in Weimar on Aug. 25, 1900. One marvels at how minutely Cate narrates the year-by-year, month-by-month, and week-by-week events in Nietzsche's life.

Cate describes Nietzsche's many friendships, from his early school years at Pforta, Wilhelm Pinder and Gustav Krug, and later with Paul Deussen, Carl von Gersdorff, Erwin Rohde, Franz Overbeck, Dr. Paul Ree, Malwida von Meysenbug, Heinrich Romundt, Albert Brenner, Heinrich Koselitz (Nietzsche's loyal disciple, whose musical pseudonym was "Peter Gast"), and, above all, his relationships with a beautiful and extremely intelligent 21-year-old Russian woman, Lou Salome, and with the Richard Wagner and Wagner's wife, Cosima.

Over a period of three years, Nietzsche made 23 visits to Tribschen, the home of Richard and Cosima Wagner near Lucerne, Switzerland. And over the period of seven years, Nietzsche wrote close to eighty letters to Cosima, the daughter of Franz LIszt.

Cate points out that Nietzsche's books are a sustained attack on metaphysical and religious beliefs. Nietzsche argued, writes Cate, that "the attention focused on otherworld fantasies had kept human beings from dealing in an honest, healthy way with the everyday realities that are of the most immediate concern to their well-being. . . . [His] whole philosophy was aimed at achieving a 'higher and nobler' degree of culture."

In a letter to his busybody sister Elisabeth, who so often, during his life and especially after his death, meddled in his affairs, Nietzsche wrote: "Do we in our research seek repose, peace, happiness? No, solely the Truth, even if it be exceedingly deterring and ugly. . . . Here men's ways diverge. If you wish to aspire to peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you wish to be the disciple of the Truth, then search."

Against philosophical and religious "seriousness," Nietzsche wrote, "I would believe only in a god who knew how to dance. Come, [with our laughter] let us kill the spirit of gravity."

Cate shows that Nietzsche's philosophy was profoundly personal, rising as it did out of deep existential struggles: "Of all that is written I like only that which one has written with one's blood. Write in blood and you will find that blood is spirit. A book that has no fire in it deserves to be burned."

Nietzsche argued that, because of the inexorable advances of science, which, he believed, showed the world to be ungottlich, unmoralisch, and unmenschlich ("non-divine," "non-moral," and "non-human"), Europe was now plunged into a grave spiritual crisis, the crisis of nihilism.

In the opening pages of his posthumously published work, The Will to Power, Nietzsche wrote: "Nihilism stands at the door. When comes this uncanniest of all guests? . . . What does nihilism mean? That the highest values devalue themselves. The aim is lacking; 'why?' finds no answer." It is a will to nothingness, in which a hopeless despair adjudicates everything to be valueless and worthless, without goal, meaning, or purpose.

Nietzsche's central philosophical project was to "live through nihilism" to its bitter end and, hopefully, with the creation of new values, emerge on the other side. That he failed in this project seems evident, but never has a philosopher struggled so valiantly and courageously in wrestling with the demon of nihilism, of staring for a long time into the abyss.

Cate writes, "Nietzsche conceived of his mission as a thinker to be that of the herald of a new 'dawn' in philosophical thinking, the prophet of a new, more honest, less visionary morality, purged and purified of a vast accretion of moral, political, social, and metaphysical prejudices and misconceptions, which had reduced the vast majority of his contemporaries to a collective condition of sheep-like stupidity."

Georg Brandes, a Danish professor and one of Nietzsche's early admirers (he delivered a series of lectures on Nietzsche's philosophy at the University of Copenhagen) described the German philosopher's basic stance as being "aristocratic radicalism." Nietzsche responded with appreciation and hearty approval, saying that Brandes' _expression "aristocratic radicalism" was the "cleverest word" he had ever read about himself.

Indeed, Nietzsche's elitism exalted everything that was noble, distinguished, and excelling, and derogated all forms of mediocrity, mendacity, and anti-intellectualism, including anti-Semitism (Nietzsche was an anti-anti-Semite) and the saber-rattling stupidity of a jingoistic German nationalism.

At the very heart of Nietzsche's philosophy, writes Cate, is "resistentialism." This means that "it is not what assists Man that strengthens and ennobles him, but, quite the contrary, what resists his slothful inclinations and prejudices." His philosophy calls us grow up and become men in our thinking, rather than remaining dependent children, to reject the comfort, safety, security, and certainty of the herd and become an "free spirit" who dares to travel our own paths. "This is my way," wrote Nietzsche; "where is yours? The way doesn't exist."

A key motif of Cate's biography is his chronicling of Nietzsche's illnesses. All of his adult life, Nietzsche was plagued by debilitating migraines that often kept him bedridden for days, by acute negative reactions to metereological changes, causing him to wear dark glasses and become a wanderer throughout Germany, Switzerland, France, and Italy in search of a climate conducive to his health. He suffered frequently from stomach upsets, nausea, fits of vomiting, and acute nervous seizures.

Cate's numerous accounts of Nietzsche's struggle with ill health, scattered repeatedly across hundreds of pages, are impressive in their details, impressing on the us the long, hard struggle Nietzsche to lead the semblance of a normal life. And, although Cates only hints at the idea, one wonders if Nietzsche's "yea-saying," affirmative philosophy and his embrace of "amor fati" (love of fate) was not a defense mechanism against the perennial threat of a spirit-crushing pessimism into which he could have fallen because of his prolonged suffering.

After five weeks of giving diligent attention to Cate's masterful biography, I conclude that it will take its place alongside Walter Kaufmann's Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist as one of the best--indeed, in some respects, the best--biographies of Nietzsche available in the English language. This is a distinguished volume. I recommend it most highly.

Roy E. Perry of Nolensville, Tennessee, may be reached at rperry1778@aol.com

(Note: Curt Paul Janz's excellent three-volume German biography of Nietzsche has not yet been translated into English.)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Curtis Cate is the author of acclaimed biographies of Antoine de Saint-Exupery, George Sand, and Andre Malraux as well as several other books of non-fiction. He holds degrees from Harvard (History), Ecole des Langues Orientales (Russian), and Oxford (Politics and Economics). He was the European Editor for The Atlantic Monthly for eight years (1958-1965) and has written articles for the New York Times Book Review, the New York Times Magazine and the New Republic. He resides in France.

This book is criticized because it has too much biography, and not enough of Nietzsche's philosophy. And then...vice versa, too much philosophy. I have always been interested in Nietzsche the man, and this book provides the reader with a good rounded view of him. Fortunately there is an extensive amount of correspondence available to provide the biographer with the essential information necessary to construct an informative picture of both Nietzsche and those who figured prominently in his life.

No, Nietzsche did not live an "exciting" life, but that's never a criterion I use in choosing to read a biography. If it's thrills you want may I suggest reading the memoirs of, perhaps, a Navy Seal. When I finished this biography I felt I knew "Fritz". I became appreciative of the extreme difficulties he faced with perpetual ill health. I found the details of his friendship with the anti-Semitic composer Richard Wagner to be quite fascinating. And yes he did travel about a lot, and maybe, at times, his mobile meanderings aren't much more interesting than reading a railroad timetable. Yet these are facts of his life.

Whenever Nietzsche publishes a book Mr. Cate spends five or more pages discussing the philosophy contained in the book. For a book that is not touted as an "intellectual" biography I found this to be a good balance in acquainting the reader with Nietzsche's thoughts. This smattering of philosophical interpretation helps in understanding how the Nazis distorted his views, and made him a national hero (Hitler visited Nietzsche's sister Elisabeth several times). It also provides some understanding of his falling out with Richard Wagner. I am not an academic, although I have read a trifling amount of philosophy. In my opinion the philosophical sections were presented in a lucid manner, and should pose no challenge to the reader. I am assuming, of course, that anyone picking up a biography of Nietzsche has at least some interest in philosophy. The author does drop some heavy weight words on us occasionally, and these were in the biographical material. I don't think I've ever encountered the word "propadeutic" before, and this word occurs twice in the text.

I enjoyed this book very much, and am grateful for the insight into Nietzsche's life. One reviewer suggests that you read books of his thoughts instead of this biography. Well, I already have those, but they don't tell me much about the man who produced them. While Friedrich Nietzsche didn't live an exciting life he still was an extraordinary man. This biography got that message across to me.

This book is extremely well researched and well written. The reader will come away with a rich understanding of Nietzsche's life and philosophy. Curtis Cate really did his homework on this one.

About three-quarters to four-fifths of the content of the book is biographical. The remaining one-fifth to one-fourth, interspersed throughout the biography, is an examination of the primary themes of Nietzsche's philosophy.

Again, I want to reiterate that the book is quite readable. The target audience appears to be people who are college educated, but not specialists in Nietzsche's philosophy.

This is a work of great significance. One cannot understand modern and postmodern Western culture without understanding Nietzsche, and this book provides a solid foundation for such an understanding.

The biography is fluently written, and although Cate carries a heavy load of exposition his clarity of style makes it easily accessible to the "ordinary" reader. It is 576 pages long. Actually this is a blessing, as Cate is a pleasure, even a delight, to read. You will want to spend some time with this outstanding book; to return to each sitting with a keen sense of interest and anticipation.

Before my reading I was casually familiar with Nietzsche's philosophy, which is at core the proclamation that "God is Dead" and nihilism is becoming (has now become) the real substance of Western culture. The great cathedrals of the West are "museums" and the flock of the faithful are just `going through the motions." If you read this biography you will confront the life and mind of the greatest narrator and critic of Western culture from the French Revolution to the present times.

The daily details, thoughts and actions; the immediate concerns and ultimate concerns of Friedrich Nietzsche's entire life are recorded by Curtis Cate with utmost accuracy. If Cate cannot find verifiable text it is not written here. From other less meticulous sources one may find wild rumors about Nietzsche, many malicious and many salacious. None of this rubbish is even mentioned by Cate.

Early on, Nietzsche emerges as a very human and likeable person. He loves nature, walks, and is very studious. He has a goodly number of friends who share his interests in Philology, Philosophy, and classical music. As he progresses through school it becomes clear that his mind is more than just brilliant, but exceptionally brilliant. His memory and intellect are way above average.

Throughout the work Cate does a comparative exposition between the ideas of Nietzsche and those of Kant, Spinoza, Hegel, Judaism, Christianity, Aristotle, Descartes, Hume, Leibniz, Marx, Schopenhauer, Darwin, Democritus, Epicurus, Plato, Socrates and others too numerous to mention. Cate shows how Nietzsche's concepts became formulated and differentiated as his great mind encountered the intellectual heritage of the West.

In 1868 at the age of 24, "Fritz" was appointed to the Chair of Classical Philology at Basel (the youngest individual to have held this position). But he was forced to resign in 1879 due to health problems (poor eyesight, headaches, seizures) that plagued him the rest of his life. For the next ten years he was an independent philosopher, living on a small pension and traveling throughout Europe and especially the European Alps, which he loved. In addition to his critique of religion, Nietzsche probed and exposed the individual and social illusions of our age. His aphoristic style and his insights were brilliant and stunning, and are still relevant for 21st Century readers.

Cate gives comprehensive coverage of the Nietzsche-Wagner friendship and falling out. This portion of the book is finely drawn, and of special interest to those interested in Wagner. Unfortunately it is too complex to cover in this review. The same is true of Nietzsche's encounter with the intellectual femme fatale of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, Lou Salome.

In 1889 Fredrich Nietzsche went insane, living out his remaining years in the care of his mother and sister until his death from a heart attack in 1900. The vivid description of his last days is shocking and saddening. His devious sister collaborated with Hitler in misinterpreting some of his ideas so that they could be incorporated into Fascist ideology.

Upon finishing the book one is overcome with a sense of tragic awe and bewilderment.

List of Nietzsche's works which are elucidated by Cate:

The Birth of Tragedy (1872)
On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense (1873)
The Untimely Meditations (1876)
Human, All Too Human (1878; additions in 1879, 1880)
The Dawn (1881)
The Gay Science (1882)
Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883-1885)
Beyond Good and Evil (1886)
On the Genealogy of Morality (1887)
The Case of Wagner (1888)
Twilight of the Idols (1888)
The Antichrist (1888)
Ecce Homo (1888)
Nietzsche contra Wagner (1888)
The Will to Power (unpublished manuscripts edited together by his sister)

This is a fascinating book on Nietzsche. If you know anything about his philosophy, and want to read something about his life, this book is wonderful.
It gives you an insight into the man himself, and a good deal of information about his friendship with Richard Wagner. You can't help but feel a bit sorry for him, what with his headaches, bad eyes, and what seemed to be a host of psychosomatic illnesses, and wonder if he went mad due to his thoughts, venereal disease, or some other mental condition.
His work is enjoyable to read even if you don't agree with him. He wrote mostly in nice witty little aphorisims and was quite amusing.
I think for the most part, he was taken out of context, and his sister ruined him by connecting him with Nazi propaganda and thoughts.
Alas, poor Fritz - all too human.

The world requires no more rhapsodies concerning Nietzsche's importance to the philosophic canon. Even his detractors admit the unindelible influence his thought had on the violent and frightening 20th century. That said, most read about Nietzsche rather than dip into his own often bombastic and sometimes impenetrable works. This is too bad, because direct reading of his own words remains one of the most highly satisfying experiences in alternative and critical thinking, challenging though it is. But where does one start in exploring this now ubiquitous and often romanticized enigma? Curtis Cate's "Friedrich Nietzsche" would not represent a good starting place. Many introductions that don't carry 600-page commitments exist. In fact, this book even looks intimidating. It would probably sink the Titanic if it struck its spine. As such, this book exists for those who want details; for those who want to dig beneath the numerous surface biographies that litter today's shelves. Dedicated readers of this tome will get to know Nietzsche like never before. His friends, his family, his hopes, his travels, his diseases all come alive via a virtual jungle of 39 chapters, each very readable in a single sitting. Not only that, alongside the details of his life sit summaries of his books and of his philosophy. We discover that he gave Lou Salomé his "Schopenhauer as Educator" Untimely Meditation as an exposition of his thought. We also learn about his complicated emotional and intellectual relationship with that younger "free spirit." That episode helped to inspire his "Zarathurstra." Such delineations of his personal situations surround delineations of his books throughout. This puts his thought in context not only personally but also geographically. The book often reads like Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities" in its vivid descriptions, both the author's and Nietzsche's, of the numerous cities that spawned thoughts that did eventually split the history of philosophy in two. In fact, one gets a sense that Nietzsche never had a real home, but lived largely as a vagabound (due largely to his health). Mountainous Sils-Maria figures prominently as does Turin, Genoa, Naumberg, Leipzig and Pforta. Cities and landscapes penetrate Nietzsche's work and knowledge of them adds a further dimension to his thought. All of his loved and hated cities are here as is his delicate constitution. Headaches, vomiting, dizziness and other unimaginable symptoms reoccurred sometimes daily. No one has explained these, but the theory that many were psychosomatic, particularly when he was waiting for proofs from his publisher, receives analysis here. Syphillis, the other theory behind his ailments, only appears a few times in this volume. And of course his relationship with the ultra-romantic composer Richard Wagner appears here with rich detail. Tribschen comes alive. Their eventual and inevitable fallout doesn't seem as dramatic here as in other sources. Perhaps it's often overstated? His also unexplained descent into madness gets a more cursory than detailed exposition. The final ten years of his life are compacted into the final chapter and the epilogue. But what's there remains a sad testimony to how far and completely he fell. His sister Elisabeth is the target of much editorial comment by the author (as are a few others throughout). Not to say she doesn't deserve it, but some passages don't allow the reader to draw their own conclusions. Cate simply lets us know exactly how he feels. Also, Cate at times appropriates Nietzsche's own bombastic style. Though none of this detracts from this very readable biography, they do provide for a few disorienting moments. All in all, those looking for some nitty gritty details about the life of an extremely influential philospher will have their wills sated in this boat anchor of a book. Make sure to set aside plenty of time.

I wish I could change the title of this book to "Friedrich Nietzsche: A Biography." For me, it contains much too much biographical detail ("steep-roofed burgher houses, some adorned by ascending rows of mouse-eyed dormer windows." Did I really want, or need, to know that? )

The book sometimes reads like a travel guide for the German Rhineland, and it has a fatal flaw. As some wag remarked, "Every human life may well be sacred, but not every life is interesting." Here, you may learn that the schoolboy Nietzche brushed his teeth over a common basin with dozens of other boys, until the school finally installed individual basins. It's his life, but it's not fascinating: Nietzsche was a timid, bookish man who dreaded women and fantasized about his male Supermen --- those tough, virile, amoral creatures who were infinitely superior to the rest of us, "the bungled and botched." As you can figure out, Nietzche would not have made a very good American. He finally went insane, and I guess you can decide whether that "counts" or not.

If you don't want to slog through 689 pages of this biographical tedium, but are interested in Nietzche's philosophy, you can get a good beginning from Bertrand Russell's A History of Western Philosophy, or from Copleston's History of Philosophy, Volume 7 (Modern Philosophy). Looking at these will give you the added advantage of a Jesuit perspective and an atheist perspective. (Their conclusions are very similar.) After this, I am not really qualified to advise you, but Walter Kaufmann's Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist is well-known.

Up to you! I find that Rousseau and Nietzche resemble one another: the more time I spend with them, the more time I feel I have wasted.

Nietzsche was perhaps the most important thinker in modern times. He understood that Western Mankind labored under a terrible burden, a burden forged by idealistic philosophy and biblical religion which substituted a world of timeless ideals for the reality in which men and women really exist. This burden had once been a boon of sorts but with the decline of religious faith and the growth of mass society it became heavier and more inhuman. Nietzsche's own experiences, his own difficult life, especically his German ethniciity, all these contributed to his unique sensibility and genius. But Curtis Cate's decision to explain Nietzsche's unsystematic philosophy through his life is a tedious mistake and failure. In almost 600 pages we suffer every physical, emotional, spiritual, and psychological onslaught faced by Nietzsche, all in the narrow and narrowminded world of German academia and Wagnerian romanticism, yet this exposure does not really do as much for our understanding as fifty pages of clear exposition of his thought would have done. Granted that Nietzsche's thought is necessarily untidy and contradictory, since it is anti-systematic and untraditional, but to expect the reader to understand it by reliving Nietzsche's life puts far too much of a burden on a writer's life. And Nietzsche's life is not really all that interesting when compared to his thought. Biography has it place -- but perhaps not so well in the discussion of a provincial professor like Nietzsche. His brain was far better than his feeble body, and his thought rose far above the petty events and puny individuals with whom he came into contact. Except for the saintly historian Jakob Burckhardt and the mystigogue of music and culture Richard Wagner, most of the people Nietzsche was condemned to know and deal with were not worth the dust on his sandalstraps. In this biography one necessarily therefore spends a lot of time with people one could well do without, like Lou Salome for example. No, biography is not the road to understanding Nietzsche.

This is a truly boring treatment of Nietzsche but I can't really blame the author; Cate has an obvious mastery of the material and writes well. The bottom line is: Nietzsche's life was not very interesting and thus makes for a dull biography. Nietzsche's accomplishments were in his ideas. As a result, the biography resorts to dwelling on minute details of N's travels and correspondence.

There is some value in the book as it helps to make connections between his personal life and the evolution of his ideas but these rewards are just not worth the effort of plowing through the book. Plus, it is not as accessible to the non-academic as the author claims it to be. The Nietzsche-neophyte will quickly become lost in the digressions into various philosophical issues.

Ultimately, the fault with this book lies with its subject matter and not the author. If you're looking for context to understand N's ideas, there are better books out there. If you're interested in his philosophy, then read his actual works (and yes, I have read them all so don't go there). Biographies of boring people seem somewhat pointless...

Not recommended.