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10 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
An Excellent Translation of a Transitional Work, October 20, 2000
This review is from: Unfashionable Observations: Volume 2 (The Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche) (Paperback)
Sometimes, as I channel surf past some WWF goon belting another with a chair, I can't help but feel that we suffer from the opposite of the problems Nietzsche discussed, and that a little more suffocating bourgeoisie-Christian 'good culture' couldn't hurt. But that's neither here nor there. I believe this book is considered transitional Nietzsche, having been written after _The Birth of Tragedy_ but before _Beyond Good and Evil_, _The Genealogy of Morals_, et cetera. It consists of four essays: on David Strauss, history, Schopenhauer, and Wagner respectively. In my opinion the 'history' essay is the most interesting; Nietzsche asserts that too much awareness of history enervates the mind, robbing it of the raw vigor he considered so important. Not en entirely original thought, perhaps, but knowledgeably and poetically argued. This translation seems to be clearly the best of the three I perused in the bookstore: the vocabulary is sharp, forceful, and true to what I know of the German. I don't think this is the place to begin one's study of Nietzsche, but if Walter Kaufmann's collections (The Portable Nietzsche, The Basic Writings of Nietzsche) don't give you your fill, you could certainly pick up this one next.
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3 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Timely and Unfashionable: the Truth, March 25, 2000
I take my title for this review from the final sentence of Nietzsche's essay on "David Strauss the Confessor and the Writer." Nietzsche was finding himself in a troubling position, commenting on a work which was as subjective as it was without objective proof, while he was just an individual trying to make himself heard against the entire world, in order to adorn us with one more feather, "For as long, that is, as what was always timely -- and what today more than ever is timely and necessary -- is still considered unfashionable: speaking the truth." (p. 81) This masterly translation removes an element of contradiction which has tripped up those who used the title, "Untimely Meditations" for this book, as if we, of all people, didn't need to read it. Walter Kaufmann did not translate this early work by Nietzsche into English. While Kaufmann is widely recognized as having provided translations which were superior to what was previously available, Nietzsche in the original German ought to be considered better than any English version, and the truth with which Nietzsche was concerned in his essay on Strauss might have been particularly painful for any scholar who would like to remain at a high level in the esteem of his peers, for the insults in this work win every argument. From the first words of the first section, "Public opinion in Germany," (p. 5) Nietzsche displays a worry about "defeat -- indeed, the extirpation -- of the German spirit for the sake of the German Reich." (p. 5) Perhaps Kaufmann was never comfortable enough with the English language to make himself credible in a work that ends with a section on style: "perhaps Schopenhauer would give it the general title 'New Evidence for the Shoddy Jargon of Today,' for we might console David Strauss by saying . . . indeed, that some people write even more wretchedly than he does. . . . We do this because Strauss does not write as poorly as do the vilest of all the corrupters of German, the Hegelians and their crippled progeny." And Strauss of course, in Germany in 1873, was famous for providing the Germans with a guide to their beliefs and culture, much like the works of Walter Kaufmann on Goethe, Hegel, Nietzsche, etc., provide today's Americans with a view of individual self-control which seeks to guide public opinion above all, or over all, or whatever. Perhaps, given our current status as civilizers of Europe, Nietzsche might even maintain a view of the Americans who study his work in accord with what he said of Strauss, he "would by no means be dissatisfied if it were a bit more diabolical." (p. 20) This is only frighteningly inappropriate for those who see nothing but manipulation in matters of public opinion, which remains about as far from the truth as it can be stretched, and who are afraid of these things snapping back all over the place. I certainly think they are.
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4 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
The Real F.W. Nietzsche would never, January 25, 2002
This review is from: Unfashionable Observations: Volume 2 (The Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche) (Paperback)
The Real F.W. Nietzsche would never argue against dissent of his views. He, unlike Wagner, wanted no disciples. He wanted critical commentary, and above all, he wanted to be challenged. The reality is that he was challenged everyday to write, even in extreme pain and half blind. This translation is an admirable effort, but it does fall short in emphasis on what Nietzsche tried to (really) say. His odd, broken, and subtle humor has been lost in many English translations. In truth nothing other than the original German, read by an accomplished student of the language, can really give insight into his mind. This is the same problem that exists in Carl Jung's writings. In my humble opinion Kaufmann is still one of the best German/English translations available. Kaufmann dispels many previous myths associated with Nietzsche especially when it comes to National Socialism, and Darwinism, both of which Nietzsche himself despised. One last note on Nietzsche: His opinion of Noble Morality vs Slave Morality is true even more today.
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