Individuality and beyond : Nietzsche reads Emerson / Benedetta Zavatta ; translated by Alexander Reynolds.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Zavatta, Benedetta, author.

Contributor:

Reynolds, Alexander, translator.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm, 1844-1900.

Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882--Influence.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882.

Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.).

Physical Description:

xxv, 265 pages ; 25 cm

Other Title:

Nietzsche reads Emerson

Place of Publication:

New York, NY, United States of America : Oxford University Press, [2019]

Summary:

Though few might think to connect the two figures, Ralph Waldo Emerson was an important influence on Friedrich Nietzsche. Specifically, Emerson played a fundamental role in shaping Nietzsche's philosophical ideas on individualism, perfectionism, and the pursuit of virtue, as well as his critiques of social conditioning, religious dogmatism, and anti-natural morality. With Individuality and Beyond, Benedetta Zavatta offers the first philosophical interpretation of Emerson's influence on Nietzsche based on a sound philological analysis of previously unpublished materials from Nietzsche's private library. Nietzsche's collection reveals numerous copies of Emerson's essays covered with annotations and marginalia as Nietzsche revisited these works throughout his life.0 Through close-reading, Zavatta casts a new light on the ways in which Emerson's work informed Nietzsche's defining ideas of self-creation, the relation between fate and free will, overcoming morality of customs and achieving moral autonomy, and the "transvaluation" of such values as compassion and altruism. Zavatta organizes these concepts into two main lines of thought: the first concerns the development of the individual personality, or the achievement of intellectual and moral autonomy and0original self-expression. The second, on the contrary, concerns the overcoming of individuality and the need to transcend a limited view of the world by continually questioning one's own values and engaging with opposing perspectives. 0 Ultimately, Zavatta clarifies the surprising contributions that Emerson made to 20th century European philosophy. She provides a fresh portrait of Emerson as an American thinker long stereotyped as a naive idealist disinterested in the social issues of his day. Seen through the eyes of Nietzsche, his acute interpreter, Emerson becomes an incisive cultural critic, whose contributions underpin contemporary philosophy.

Contents:

1 The Reception of the Emerson-Nietzsche Relation p. 1

1.1 A "Collective Amnesia" p. 1

1.2 The "American Goethe": The Reception of Emerson in Germany p. 2

1.3 Emerson and American Transcendentalism p. 6

1.4 The Hostility between the United States and Germany p. 10

2 The Struggle against Fate p. 17

2.1 The Young Titan p. 18

2.1.1 What Is Fate? p. 20

2.1.2 What Is Freedom? p. 24

2.1.3 Quisque faber for tunae suae p. 25

2.1.4 "Consciousness" and "Will" Critically Examined p. 27

2.2 The Freedom of the Human Mind and Scientific Determinism p. 30

2.2.1 The Abolition of Moral Responsibility p. 31

2.2.2 Do People Change? p. 34

2.2.3 Are People Free to Change Themselves? p. 38

2.2.4 Freedom as Agency p. 39

2.2.5 Tyranny and Mastery p. 41

2.3 Feeling Oneself to be Free p. 44

2.3.1 Does the Belief in Determinism Limit Our Freedom? p. 45

23.2 Redeeming the Past p. 49

2.3.3 Redeeming Suffering p. 52

2.3.4 The Principle of Compensation and the "Gay Science" p. 55

2.3.5 Amor fati p. 62

3 Self-Reliance as Moral Autonomy and Original Self-Expression p. 68

3.1 Overcoming Morality p. 68

3.1.1 Why Nietzsche Is an Immoralist p. 68

3.1.2 Nietzsche's (Im)moral Proposals p. 70

3.1.3 The Nietzschean Typology p. 75

3.2 Self-Reverence as Recognition and Defense of One's Own Individuality p. 76

3.2.1 On Envy p. 76

3.2.2 Social Conformism as Loss of Self p. 82

3.2.3 The Conflict between the Free Thinker and the Institutions p. 85

3.2.4 On Vanity p. 88

3.3 Putting Oneself in Question p. 90

3.3.1 Who Is Nietzsche's "Free Spirit"? p. 91

3.3.2 Coming Face to Face with Others p. 94

3.3.3 The Skepticism of Strength p. 97

3.3.4 Self-Reliance as Receptivity or Responsiveness to Others' Opinions p. 103

3.4 Creating New Values p. 103

3.4.1 Negative Liberty and Positive Liberty p. 104

3.4.2 Virtue as Spontaneity p. 107

4 Society or Solitude? p. 114

4.1 More Egoism, Less Compassion p. 115

4.1.1 Nietzsche's Critique of Compassion p. 117

4.1.2 The Transvaluation of Egoism p. 121

4.1.3 Virtuous Forms of Altruism p. 125

4.2 Ethics of Friendship p. 128

4.2.1 Friendship (Mitfreude) versus Compassion (Mitleid) p. 129

4.2.2 Higher Friendship (Mitfreude) versus Lower Forms of Friendship p. 131

4.2.3 The Goal of True Friendship p. 137

4.2.4 Friendship and Society p. 139

4.2.5 The Dream of a Community of "Free Spirits" p. 141

4.2.6 The Utopian Communities of New England p. 144

4.2.7 Overcoming Friendship p. 148

4.2.8 The Living Fool versus the Dying Sage p. 150

5 Making History and Writing History p. 155

5.1 Nietzsche's Position(s) on History and Historiography p. 155

5.1.1 The Malady of History: Diagnoses and Remedies p. 156

5.1.2 Making a Clean Break with the Past p. 158

5.1.3 Universal History as Biography p. 163

5.1.4 Thirst for Power p. 166

5.1.5 Historical Sense versus the "Humanity" of the Future p. 168

5.2 The Example of "Great Men" p. 172

5.2.1 Genius in the Third of the Untimely Meditations p. 173

5.2.2 The Genius in Human, All Too Human p. 179

5.2.3 How Does the Fortifying Effect of Past Examples Come About? p. 182

5.2.4 From Metaphysics to Biology p. 188.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Zavatta, Benedetta, author. Individuality and beyond

ISBN:

9780190929213

0190929219

OCLC:

1088905199