So I really enjoy Nietzsche's aesthetics and his viewpoints on this topic and if there's one thing you'll notice about him is that his taste in English fiction is very limited. He loves Shakespeare and rightly so.

But as far as the Georgian and Victorian period, I haven't come across any positive comment about the writers of this period, except for one and that is Lord Byron. When it comes to the "philosophers", put your seat-belt on because Fritz really lays it down on them. Hume, Locke, Spencer, Hobbes, Mill, etc...

It makes me wonder how Nietzsche would fare in London, at the time the city of Disraeli, Dickens, and Darwin.

Understandably, I think he would have fared better in Paris, I mean he already lived in Provence for a bit and spoke fluent French.

What is Nietzsche's problem with these stiff Englishmen? I mean they're not the most Dionysian folks. Victorian London really leaves a sour taste in your mouth if you appreciate a pathos of beauty, a grand passion for elevated joys like Lord Byron did.

Is this really the key problem with the English for Nietzsche? They're too stiff and boring?

Reading the gay science for the first time, I came across this quote essentially saying that the "common rabble" is happy to be enslaved so long as the person enslaving them looks the part but they'll revolt if their taskmasters look too common . That made me think of the good-looking big Hollywood moviestars in our day who are idolised rather than critisized for their exorbitant paychecks for relatively simple work while elon musk is consistently critisized by the left for being a billionaire, despite earning the money through great innovation even in environmentally progressive industries but He's average looking. (Post is not about Elon specifically He's just an example, take that sonewhere else)

The commonest man feels that nobility is not to be improvised, and that it is his part to honour it as the fruit of protracted race-culture,—but the absence of superior presence, and the notorious vulgarity of manufacturers with red, fat hands, brings up the thought to him that it is only chance and fortune that has here elevated the one above the other; well then—so he reasons with himself—let us in our turn tempt chance and fortune! Let us in our turn throw the dice!—and socialism commences.

Please feel free to speculate as there likely isn't one correct simplified answer.

I'd love to see some novel and interesting views that you may hold personally, don't worry if there's no hard evidence as we can't know for sure. However I'd like to see your reasoning as long as framed as a hypothesis and not a hard truth.

Thank you!

Quick bit of context: I've read excerpts of Nietzsche's writing before and I'm familiar with some of his ideas. However, I haven't read any of his works in full and I want to change that. I haven't figured out which works to start with yet (suggestions are welcome), but generally the choice of translation is proving to be more of an issue for me.

I know Kaufmann is the classic translator but I'm also aware of his attempts to present Nietzsche in a softened light in his footnotes. While I may be wrong, I would suspect that this tendency might've also manifested in the translation itself (gut feeling).

I want to avoid this coloration of the original work in translation to the maximum extent, and would prefer a translation that best maintains the accuracy of Nietzsche's concepts and verbiage but doesn't become overly wordy and literal in the process, thereby losing the flavor of the prose.

If I'm wrong and the translations are fine, please let me know. Besides Kaufmann I was considering both the Cambridge and Stanford editions, but I'm unsure as to which are preferable.

If i'm off the mark on these and there's other options that are just generally more palatable or personally significant to you for whatever reason, please let me know. Thanks.

Before you kill me i want to say ty because without you (in this subreddit) i wouldnt understand some things about Nietzsche or some of the things he says or why he says these things. You are really smart cookies! but i really believe its a waste of time not only nietzche but more or less everyone.

When I say “enjoyable” I mean, both the literal enjoyment derived from the act of reading (i.e. the prose, metaphor, imagery, etc…) and the psychological/philosophical insights gained from the exposure.

Having recently finished all of his major works, I would say that “On the Genealogy of Morals” (OGM) was simultaneously profound/insightful and pleasurable/poetic. For some reason, the ideas he lays out, the systematic approach and structure mixed with the explosive imagery was just striking to me.

The actual subject matter was directly applicable to my own life, cultural climate, and general environment. It felt as if my own thoughts, my own inclinations, or even (to be more Nietzsche-ian) my own “instincts” were being examined, analyzed and distilled in a more efficient manner than I could ever dream of. So many open ends, loose threads, distant disturbances of conscience, were brought to light in OGM.

In specific, his thoughts and descriptions of “bad conscience” were especially potent. The way he described the phenomena, the way he detailed the origin, the motive that gave birth, to the idea was more striking, more compelling than anything else I have read (in general, not just from Nietzsche).

What are your thoughts? What work in specific from Nietzsche struck you most, compelled you most? Are there any specific ideas, or analyses of ideas from Nietzsche that elevated themselves to you?

The translation is rough because I red the quote in spanish. What book is this quote from? Thanks!

The preface of "Human, All Too Human" is the best preface among Nietzsche's works, and I also consider it one of the most beautiful things ever written by a human being. If you have a chance of listen to it in a audio book with a human voice, you will see why he is the big genius of the art of writing.

I know what is his taste in music was like, but what painters did he like? Does anyone know?

I don't know how to read and People told me that Nietzsche books helps one truly read. So I pick up BGE but couldn't even read the first word of the preface. Is Nietzsche to hard for illiterates? Should I pick up a easier book by him?

because shop-an-hour

To require of strength that it should not express itself as strength, that it should not be a wish to overpower, a wish to overthrow, a wish to become master, a thirst for enemies and antagonisms and triumphs, is just as absurd as to require of weakness that it should express itself as strength.

- The Genealogy of Morals

I'm really confused by this. It seems to me that a 'wish to overpower' can only stem from a sense of weakness, not strength. You wouldn't 'wish to overpower' if you felt that you had already overpowered. Similarly, if you felt like a master already, you wouldn't feel the need to become one.

So the Nietzschean "strength" is a will to power... which can only stem from a sense of powerlessness, weakness.

But then, how strong can you really be when you feel powerless? Is it that the stronger you are, the weaker you feel (much like the smarter you are, the more stupid you feel; the more you know, the more you notice how much you do not know)?

I just can't help seeing a 'wish to overpower and become master' as a desperate desire stemming from some kind of insecurity, and not from anything I could call "strength."

I wonder, too, if the German word Nietzsche uses for "strength" may have some connotations that the English word doesn't have.

Do we (people on here, who I guess are prodding satirists), really not get what N is trying to get at? Do we really miss his message?

Maybe I'm wrong...what exactly is he trying to say...maybe I'm missing the Schtick, or nichean, part of his message, but just in a vacuum...what exactly is his philosophy all about?

What is the vision of the great noon where man stand between the beast and ubermensch?

When all gods are dead does Nietzsche mean the morality of the gods have been internalized by Zarathustra’s followers sort of like’ creation of their own morality for sake of itself like mother loves its child and no more relying on gods?’. Is that paradise on earth or am I misinterpreting, is the war of gods internal (philosophically on a personal level) but also externally (conflict between moralities)? Will this war forever enhance the morality of the ubermensch?

On one hand, going after young people seems like a strategy of weak men. On the other hand, pursuing this interest in a society that condemns even talking to a 17 year old requires independence and free spirit, willingness to go beyond social norms in the pursuit of your true feelings. What do you think?

Who here truly rejects the last man?