Enjoy fast, free delivery, exclusive deals, and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime and start saving today with fast, free delivery

Kindle
$14.95

Available instantly

Hardcover
$20.30 - $49.00

Paperback
$13.58 - $18.00

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns

FREE delivery Friday, April 5 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35

Select delivery location

In Stock

$$18.00 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Ships from

Amazon.com

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.

Read full return policy

Payment

Secure transaction

Payment

Secure transaction

We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more

Details

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery Thursday, April 4 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35. Order within 2 hrs 14 mins

Select delivery location

Used: Acceptable | Details

Sold by Josephcook

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Other Sellers on Amazon

Added

Not added

$20.31
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: ---SuperBookDeals

Image Unavailable

Image not available for
Color:

To view this video download Flash Player

Follow the author

Friedrich Nietzsche

Follow

On the Genealogy of Morality

by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (Author), Maudemarie Clark (Translator), Alan J. Swensen (Translator)

126

See all formats and editions

There is a newer edition of this item:

Nietzsche: On the Genealogy of Morality and Other Writings (Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought)
$97.99
(71)
Only 1 left in stock (more on the way).

{"desktop_buybox_group_1":[{"displayPrice":"$18.00","priceAmount":18.00,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"18","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"00","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"tke2ueqQypkGTFQcFrU4EltN%2Bc0o8CTJJUZQBBEnXlHlzgI9dVq8gIWbmBQMPLG1rxk%2BACOgTdUHzindoWhc%2FBKOsUUF8fl3sadWbEzhqoVtk%2BpiOmIkBFKnCYe9HT%2BZn8qDVtf9Klw%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0}, {"displayPrice":"$13.58","priceAmount":13.58,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"13","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"58","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"tke2ueqQypkGTFQcFrU4EltN%2Bc0o8CTJ2%2Bfm2bUv2cgJDKSIEFBTfy8vRPdPsvtDufkxtWalROB0ra3fWlZbP%2BYDOJqyghaZJyb5FbKmvgIGfScsL6engd77ISAmQ2wk8tSZiU4uSAQaU71289YKFtcGLLFHceqtObCOfcsyUBaPqgeBIK%2B17pjReC2LZBo%2B","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":1}]}

Purchase options and add-ons

This new edition is the product of a collaboration between a Germanist and a philosopher who is also a Nietzsche scholar. The translation strives not only to communicate a sense of Nietzsche’s style but also to convey his meaning accurately―and thus to be an important advance on previous translations of this work. A superb set of notes ensures that Clark and Swensen's Genealogy will become the new edition of choice for classroom use.

ISBN-10

9780872202832
ISBN-13

978-0872202832
Publisher

Hackett Publishing
Publication date

October 1, 1998
Language

English
Dimensions

5.25 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
Print length

177 pages
See all details

Frequently bought together

$18.00

Get it as soon as Friday, Apr 5

In Stock

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

+

Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals: with On a Supposed Right to Lie because of Philanthropic Concerns (Hackett Classics)

$12.50

Get it as soon as Thursday, Apr 4

In Stock

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

+

$7.00

Get it as soon as Wednesday, Apr 3

In Stock

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Try again!

Details

Added to Cart

Choose items to buy together.

Friedrich Nietzsche
698
Paperback
106 offers from $1.99
Friedrich Nietzsche
400
Paperback
141 offers from $1.98
Karl Marx
495
Paperback
133 offers from $9.00
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
125
Paperback
43 offers from $7.79
Immanuel Kant
513
Paperback
94 offers from $2.26
Mary Gregor
337
Paperback
44 offers from $6.78

Editorial Reviews

Review

Hackett's On the Genealogy of Morality (we now have even the correct title!) may very well change the entire climate for reading Nietzsche in English--especially if read in conjunction with their equally splendid Twilight of the Idols. . . . Competing translations of Nietzsche’s late, utterly influential masterpieces have often made them a chore, rather than a delight, to read; and their introductions generally obscure, rather than illuminate, the texts’ situations. Clark and Swensen (and Polt and Strong) have made the Genealogy and Twilight accessible and exhilarating--while leaving them, as they are, enigmatic and problematic. Finally, readers of Nietzsche in English can--begin!--William Arctander O'Brien, University of California, San Diego

This unique collaboration of an internationally renowned Nietzsche commentator and a scholar of German language and literature has yielded the finest existing edition of Nietzsche’s book in English. The translation itself strikes an intelligent balance between fidelity to the German and readability in English. It is especially welcome for bringing an historically and philosophically sensitive appreciation of Nietzsche to bear on translation issues. (The decision to translate Mitleid consistently as 'compassion,’ instead of 'pity'--thus emphasizing for the English-language reader Nietzsche’s opposition to Schopenhauer’s moral philosophy--is but one of many examples.) The Introduction is the most philosophically substantial guide to the Genealogy in any edition, and will be of value to both student and specialist. Most remarkable of all are the notes on the text: the wealth of biographical, historical, philosophical, and literary detail makes the volume the most informative and reader-friendly edition of Nietzsche's work to date. The notes will also prove fascinating for the scholar, as the editors have tracked down the numerous contemporary scholarly sources on which Nietzsche relied in writing the Genealogy.--Brian Leiter, University of Texas at Austin

This is an excellent translation. The copious and detailed endnotes will make it easy for a beginner to grasp Nietzsche's thought--Fred Clark, Colorado State University

About the Author

Maudemarie Clark is Professor of Philosophy, Colgate University. Alan J. Swensen is Associate Professor of German, Colgate University.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0872202836
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Hackett Publishing (October 1, 1998)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 177 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780872202832
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0872202832
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 7 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.25 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #68,617 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #34 in Genealogy (Books)
- #71 in Modern Western Philosophy
- #213 in Philosophy of Ethics & Morality

Customer Reviews:
126

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5

126 global ratings

How customer reviews and ratings work

Reviews with images

See all photos

Sort reviews by

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Joelle Glidden

Nietzsche's most helpful and insightful book

Reviewed in the United States on May 20, 2017

Verified Purchase

Very good translation of Nietzsche best and perhaps only essential book.

Not only is it his most accessible and systematic book, it contains his most original and important insight: that western morality has its origins in the historical dynamic between the noble and common classes. The Christian ethics of humility, chastity and hard work, is the result of a post-ancient "slave revolt" whereby the priestly class took over European society in the Middle Ages. Postmodern philosophers such as Deleuze and Foucault have noticed that this very moral system laid the foundation for the bourgeois or Capitalist ethics of productivism: the notion that one's moral value depends on their constant labor for human society. At the heart of this book is a powerful and original conception of debt relations as the engine of this morality, or the apparatus by which humans are instilled with a bad conscience to work as much as possible. Just as the Christian God is the symbol of the infinite guilt His subjects feel (starting with the doctrine of original sin and culminating in the bankruptcy of the self-forgiven debt that is the crucifixion of God), capital-money is the infinite debt we are all born into - the need for money to live and the need to work constantly for it.

Great book for those who want to understand the world and who are sick of feeling ashamed for the joy that comes with that understanding. Nietzsche's analysis of Western society helps us identify the "ressentiment" that lies behind our desire to be good people, so that we may avoid it and seek to be better people for the honor and self-satisfaction instead. In that sense, this book is a good, if very dark, supplement to Spinoza's Ethics.

9 people found this helpful

Helpful

Linda Rodriguez

Good Price

Reviewed in the United States on February 5, 2021

Verified Purchase

My Nephew likes this Book. The price was right on.

Reviewed in the United States on February 5, 2017

Verified Purchase

My niece recommended it. A bright brute.

Reviewed in the United States on December 23, 2014

Verified Purchase

as advertised

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Mindful

The book does a great job of documenting how and when morality came about

Reviewed in the United States on February 1, 2018

Verified Purchase

The book does a great job of documenting how and when morality came about, just a tough read for remembering all the facts.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Kimberly A. E. Garcia

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on November 4, 2014

Verified Purchase

mint

One person found this helpful

Helpful

B. Dryz

Three Stars

Reviewed in the United States on December 13, 2016

Verified Purchase

Worked well for my philosophy class

Reviewed in the United States on June 10, 2017

Reading and understanding much of Nietzsche's work requires broad based knowledge in history, physiology, comparative religion, and philosophy.

However, you can read as a layman and get the general gist of what Nietzsche is up to. There's a sublime poetry to his work. Even if you do not see the world as he does, you will still be taken and transported by his madness and genius.

Everyone should read the third part of this book, a rousing broadside against Christian morality, which he likens to a sickness. He says the denial of the self and the desire for capital letter Truth has held mankind back for millennia. It's beautiful writing, building and building to an exciting crescendo.

It sounds odd to our ears and eyes today to come across someone who thinks misunderstanding, artifice, cruelty and radical subjectivism are the things that make the human animal great and unique. It's when we begin to feel bad about what we have created that causes man to fall away from his destiny. Nietzsche would have been nauseated by our dependence on science and our desire to understand reality beyond its surface. He says that it is taking away our meaning and our will to live.

Nietzsche praises values of the lords and despises the values of the serf or slave. The noble have the courage and the lust to mold reality in line with a vision that loves itself as causa sui.

There is a certain internal logic to the idea that things like kindness would not exist if not for vindictiveness and cruelty. He says that kindness was permitted for the strong as rest from oneself. This is the central theme of the first two parts of the book. As I said in the beginning of this review, it is helpful to understand something about Nietzsche's literary references as he makes his case. But it would take the dedication of a lifetime to fully understand the picture that he paints in his books. I'm having a heck of a time doing a summary right now. There's a richness to the work that I'm not capable of really explaining to you. You just have to experience it for yourself and come away with your own interpretation. Be careful, because Nietzsche is easy to misunderstand.

Charges of being the grandfather of Nazism are misplaced(he was a fierce critic of the Germanic people and Europeans in general), and it is false that he is an anti-Semite. If you read carefully, he has reverence for Jews and their angry god. It's Christians that he can't tolerate.

There are ironies that cannot be ignored while reading this, especially if you know something about Nietzsche's life. He was sick most of the time during his productive years, an opium addict, and a spurned lover. One gets the sense that Nietzsche writes about power the way he does because he lacked it.In a way, he does admit this, that he is not the superhuman he wants to come forth. He's the heralder, sketching out what the new man freed from what we call morality would look like. He also freely admits (in another book, Beyond Good And Evil) that philosophy is a confessional on the part of the philosopher. Nietzsche believes in atheism, yet admires the gods of antiquity.

At times, Nietzsche is unreadable when he talks about things like race and sex. The relative inferiority of this group or that are stupid prejudices passed off as noble privilege. Beware of his work if you can't get past this.

Nietzsche's work is rather destructive in general, and he's not shy in describing it as such. This is philosophy that stings and challenges your values. You will either come out with your convictions stronger than ever, or find yourself suddenly adrift with no meaning in your life.

Me, I'm happy I'm a modern man. The fondness for atheism and distaste for Christianity is something I have in common with Nietzsche, but I think his love for power and deception are all wet. I don't feel sick because I believe in the transformative power of goodness and inquiry. For me, that is how we become the supermen, men that can save the world from wretchedness. I'm not too concerned about the history of my values, and furthermore I am the causa sui of the ones I hold. There is plenty of meaning in understanding the truth about reality, however evasive it might be. We overcome our animal selves in this manner. That is not sickness, everything we know today is awe inspiring, not depressing as Nietzsche tries to argue. It's exciting to be alive when we know so much, and know that there is yet more discovery to come. And it belongs to everybody, not just a select few.

So I disagree with Nietzsche's characterization of people like me. I don't subscribe to his more atavistic ravings. But if you love words and like to be challenged, you will be hard-pressed to find anything like Friedrich Nietzsche. Five stars for the incredible reach of this work even if its conclusions are appalling at times.

6 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Don Berry

Passionate, provocative, profound

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 5, 2013

Verified Purchase

'On the Genealogy of Morality' marks the culmination of Friedrich Nietzsche's critique of the Judeo-Christian moral framework shared by his late nineteenth century contemporaries, and extends many of the themes of his earlier works such as the history of this conventional moral schema and of moral feeling itself, the roots of our belief in God, the scientific drive towards truth at all costs, and what he takes to be the ultimately perspectival nature of all truth. Written in 1887, when Nietzsche was at the height of his intellectual powers, he sets aside his characteristically eclectic and aphoristic style in order to systematically pursue a variety of topics related to morality by constructing an historical narrative across three polemical essays.

The first essay locates the origins of contemporary moral values - which centre on humility, chastity, compassion and piety - as the outcome of an historical struggle between two groups: a weaker slave class who identify with this ideology, and a stronger ruling class who are associated with Rome and with the heroes of Ancient Greece, and whose values are dominated by a respect for strong, dominant, ambitious individuals who are successful in battle. Dissatisfied with their situation, the weaker subjugated class inculcate their own ideals under the influence of a third group - which Nietzsche refers to as the 'priestly caste' - in order to exact a kind of spiritual revenge upon their natural rulers.

In the second essay Nietzsche gives another historical narrative, this time following the development of our moral consciousness and feelings of bad conscience, which can ultimately be traced back to primitive creditor-debtor relationships in prehistory, before they are transformed and internalised by a series of contingent developments. Lastly, in the third and final essay he explores what he refers to as the 'Ascetic Ideal', wherein the good life is conceived as one of self-denial, abstinence from physical pleasures, and chastity. The success of this ideal is due to its being the only means to find meaning in life that has been invented hitherto: even a scientific drive towards truth is seen to be an extension of this ideal, rather than its antithesis as often thought.

In Nietzsche's view, his predecessors since the Enlightment had rested content with simply providing more explicit articulations and attempted rational justifications or 'groundings' of the moral beliefs they had inherited from their culture and which had been inculcated into them since childhood. But for Nietzsche the philosopher must attempt more than this; the value of these moral beliefs must itself be brought into question, and evaluated by their effectiveness in enhancing life's expansive energies and in promoting the development of what he took to be the ideal type of person: strong, cultured, creative individuals such as a Goethe, Shakespeare or Beethoven. More than rational argument is needed in effecting such a self-criticism, as the roots of these beliefs lie far deeper than the surface rationalisations we provide for them, and are not easily available for conscious inspection: hence Nietzsche uses a variety of literary and rhetorical strategies in order to strip away our preconceptions by force. Consequently the style is highly engaging and entertaining.

The Genealogy is a book that has influenced generations of scholars and students, especially in the so-called 'Continental' philosophical traditions, and I would recommend it for anyone who is able and willing to take a self-critical view of their own most cherished beliefs and to challenge the ideals and values they have inherited from society. This particular translation by Clarke and Swensen is both accurate and readable, in my view preferable to both the Cambridge and Oxford editions, and the introduction is excellent and up to date.

3 people found this helpful

Angel

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 16, 2014

Verified Purchase

Excellent.

Algypop

How did morality evolve

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 12, 2013

Verified Purchase

As always N writes to confuse. He appears to condemn "morality", as if he were an ethical nihilist, but this trades on an ambiguity, as by this expression he means conventional morality. It is abundantly clear from this book and other textual material that N had values, his own, which he simply presents. Since these are rather undemocratic, they will not have general appeal, but his endorsement of "high" culture and beauty will engage some.

There is much in this work that interestingly anticipates Freud - particularly the idea of "Resentiment"- which relates to suppressed drives finding an outlet. As to the fundamental thesis that a slave revolt by the Jews against the Romans lead to the development of conventional morality - it is bonkers.

Amazon Customer

Swift delivery, thanks!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 13, 2017

Verified Purchase

Will be an interesting read!

See more reviews

Return this item for free

Other Sellers on Amazon

Image Unavailable

Follow the author

On the Genealogy of Morality

There is a newer edition of this item:

Purchase options and add-ons

Frequently bought together

More items to explore

Editorial Reviews

Review

About the Author

Product details

Videos

About the author

Friedrich Nietzsche

Customer reviews

Reviews with images

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Amazon Prime includes:

Buy new: $18.00$18.00 FREE delivery: Friday, April 5 on orders over $35.00 shipped by Amazon. Ships from: Amazon.com Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used: $13.58

Other Sellers on Amazon

Follow the author

On the Genealogy of Morality

There is a newer edition of this item:

Purchase options and add-ons

Frequently bought together

More items to explore

Editorial Reviews

Review

About the Author

Product details

Videos

About the author

Friedrich Nietzsche

Customer reviews

Reviews with images

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Buy new:

$18.00

FREE delivery: Friday, April 5 on orders over $35.00 shipped by Amazon.

Ships from: Amazon.com

Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used:

$13.58