Friedrich Nietzsche - Discussion

The Story of Philosophy

The lives and opinions of greater philosophers

by Will Durant

Chapter Nine - Friedrich Nietzsche

You can read the text in pdf format using the link below.  

Chapter Nine - Friedrich Nietzsche: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-FVf0mqmYMjib-7cmDh_HfRTfYBDCfdp/view?usp=share_link

The following pdf file has markings and some comments inserted: 

Chapter Nine - Friedrich Nietzsche: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Tq_FQ7AK_kw7kawFzX48ryVpEiD7pKB-/view?usp=share_link

This text references many concepts, philosophers, writers etc. that may be unfamiliar.  I have included some of these in the Notes section below.

YouTube video (audio only)

You can listen to the chapter from the YouTube video above.  The section starting times are shown below:

00:00    The Lineage of Nietzsche

03:55    Youth
12:00    Nietzsche and Wagner
26:00    The Song of Zarathustra

38:20    Hero - Morality

51:50    The Superman

1:00:00    Decadence

1:08:00    Aristocracy

1:22:20    Criticism

1:39:10    Finale

Initials representing books by Nietzsche in the footnotes

The following initials were used by Will Durant in the footnotes of Chapter Nine of his book as short forms for some of Nietzsche's books:

1. Antichrist (1889)
2. B.G.E. - Beyond Good and Evil (1886)
3. B.T. - The Birth of Tragedy (1872)
4. C.W. - The Case for Wagner (1888)
5. D.D. - The Dawn of Day
6. E.H. - Ecce Homo (1889)
7. G. M. - The Genealogy of Morals (1887)
8. J.W. - The Joyful Wisdom (1882)
9. H.A.H. - Human All Too Human (1876-80)
10. T.O.S. - Thoughts Out of Season (1873-76)
11. T.I. - The Twilight of Idols (1888)
12. W.P. - The Will to Power (1889)
13. Z - Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883)

Notes

Chapter Nine in Will Durant's book references many concepts, philosophers, writers etc. that may be unfamiliar to many of us. The following are explanations of some of these:

1. Aeschylus — Aeschylus (c. 525/524 – c. 456/455 BC) was an ancient Greek tragedian, and is often described as the father of tragedy. Academic knowledge of the genre begins with his work, and understanding of earlier Greek tragedy is largely based on inferences made from reading his surviving plays. 
2. aequanimitas — Aequanimitas, a Latin word derived from aequo animo, “with even mind”, meaning equanimity or calmness of mind.
3. amor fati — Amor fati is a Latin phrase that may be translated as "love of fate" or "love of one's fate". It is used to describe an attitude in which one sees everything that happens in one's life, including suffering and loss, as good or, at the very least, necessary.
4. apotheosis  — the highest point in the development of something; a culmination or climax.
5. Apollo — The national divinity of the Greeks, Apollo has been recognized as a god of archery, music and dance, truth and prophecy, healing and diseases, the Sun and light, poetry, and more.
6. bacchanalian —  characterized by or given to drunken revelry.
7. bier gemütlichkeit — Bier is German for beer.  Gemütlichkeit is a German-language word used to convey the idea of a state or feeling of warmth, friendliness,[1] and good cheer.
8. Bismarck — Otto von Bismarck, (1815–98, ), prime minister of Prussia (1862–73, 1873–90) and founder and first chancellor (1871–90) of the German Empire. Once the empire was established, he actively and skillfully pursued pacific policies in foreign affairs, succeeding in preserving the peace in Europe for about two decades. However he has been criticized for his domestic policies such as Catholic persecution, and the centralization of executive power.
9. Bourgeois — belonging to or characteristic of the middle class, typically with reference to its perceived materialistic values or conventional attitudes; a person with social behavior and political views held to be influenced by private-property interest : capitalist.
10. Carlyle — Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) was a British essayist, historian, and philosopher from the Scottish Lowlands. A leading writer of the Victorian era, he exerted a profound influence on 19th-century art, literature, and philosophy.
11. Comte — Auguste Comte (1798 – 1857) was a French philosopher, mathematician and writer who formulated the doctrine of positivism. He is often regarded as the first philosopher of science in the modern sense of the term. Comte's ideas were also fundamental to the development of sociology.
12. corollary—noun: a proposition that follows from (and is often appended to) one already proved.
13. Darwin — Charles Robert Darwin  (1809–82).
14. Dionysus — In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus is the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre.
15. Fichte  — Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762 – 1814) was a German philosopher who became a founding figure of the philosophical movement known as German idealism, which developed from the theoretical and ethical writings of Immanuel Kant. 
16. Goethe — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe[a] (1749–1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as treatises on botany, anatomy, and colour. He is widely regarded as the greatest and most influential writer in the German language, his work having a profound and wide-ranging influence on Western literary, political, and philosophical thought from the late 18th century to the present day.
17. Goethe's Gotz — Götz von Berlichingen is a successful 1773 drama by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, based on the memoirs of the historical adventurer-poet Gottfried or Götz von Berlichingen (c. 1480–1562). Goethe's plot treats events freely: while the historical Götz died in his eighties, Goethe's hero is a free spirit, a maverick, intended to be a pillar of national integrity against a deceitful and over-refined society, and the way in which he tragically succumbs to the abstract concepts of law and justice shows the submission of the individual in that society.
18. Heine — Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (1797 – 1856) was a German poet, writer and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of Lieder (art songs) by composers such as Robert Schumann and Franz Schubert. Heine's later verse and prose are distinguished by their satirical wit and irony. He is considered a member of the Young Germany movement. His radical political views led to many of his works being banned by German authorities—which, however, only added to his fame.  He spent the last 25 years of his life as an expatriate in Paris.
19. philology — Philology (from Ancient Greek φιλολογία (philología) 'love of word') is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology.
20. positivism — In philosophy, a philosophical system recognizing only that which can be scientifically verified or which is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and therefore rejecting metaphysics and theism.
21. positivist — An adherent of the philosophical or legal theories of positivism.
22. "L'amour est de tous les sentiments le plus egoiste, et par consequent lorsquil est blesse, le moins genereux." — (French) Love is the most selfish of all feelings, and therefore when hurt, the least generous.
23. Mutius Scaevola — probably means Gaius Mucius Scaevola, who was a legendary Roman hero of the 6th century bc. According to the legend, Mucius volunteered to assassinate the Etruscan king Lars Porsena, who was besieging Rome. However, Mucius killed Porsena’s attendant by mistake. The Etruscans captured Mucius and brought him before the royal tribunal. Mucius declared that he was one of 300 noble youths who had sworn to take the king’s life. He demonstrated his courage to his captors by thrusting his right hand into a blazing fire and holding it there until it burned away. Deeply impressed and fearing another attempt on his life, Porsena ordered Mucius to be freed and made peace with the Romans before withdrawing his forces. According to the story, Mucius was rewarded with a grant of land and given the name Scaevola, meaning “left-handed.” 
24. Nibelungs — (or Nibelungen), in Germanic and Scandinavian mythology, a race of dwarfs or elves dwelling in Niflheim (or Nibelheim), a realm of mist or darkness. According to some accounts, the Nibelungs were the descendants of Nibelung, a legendary Scandinavian king, and heirs to a vast treasure hoard of gold and jewels that had been amassed in some ancient time.
25. Sadowa and Sedan — refer to the battle of the Battle of Königgrätz (or Sadowa) and The Battle of Sedan.
26. Schiller's Karl Moor  — The Robbers is the first drama by German playwright Friedrich Schiller. The plot revolves around the conflict between two aristocratic brothers, Karl and Franz Moor. Karl (Charles) Moor, the older son, is a self-confident idealist. He is good-looking and well liked by all. He holds feelings of deep love for Amalia. After his father, misled by brother Franz, curses Karl and banishes him from his home, Karl becomes a disgraceful criminal and murderous arsonist.
27. Shelley (p378) — probably Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) was one of the major English Romantic poets.  A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame during his lifetime, but recognition of his achievements in poetry grew steadily following his death and he became an important influence on subsequent generations of poets.
28. Spencer — Herbert Spencer (1820–1903) was an English polymath active as a philosopher, psychologist, biologist, sociologist, and anthropologist. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest", which he coined in Principles of Biology (1864) after reading Charles Darwin's 1859 book On the Origin of Species. The term strongly suggests natural selection, yet Spencer saw evolution as extending into realms of sociology and ethics.
29. Stendhal  — Marie-Henri Beyle (1783 – 1842), better known by his pen name Stendhal, was a 19th-century French writer. Best known for the novels Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black, 1830) and La Chartreuse de Parme (The Charterhouse of Parma, 1839), he is highly regarded for the acute analysis of his characters' psychology and considered one of the early and foremost practitioners of realism. A self-proclaimed egotist, he coined the same characteristic in his characters' "Beylism".
30. Stirner — Johann Kaspar Schmidt (1806 – 56), known professionally as Max Stirner, was a German post-Hegelian philosopher, dealing mainly with the Hegelian notion of social alienation and self-consciousness. Stirner is often seen as one of the forerunners of nihilism, existentialism, psychoanalytic theory, postmodernism and individualist anarchism.
31. supererogation — the performance of more work than duty requires.
32. Vaterlanderei — (German) fatherlandism
33. Voltaire — François-Marie Arouet ( 1694–1778) was a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his nom de plume M. de Voltaire, he was famous for his wit, and his criticism of Christianity—especially of the Roman Catholic Church—and of slavery. Voltaire was an advocate of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and separation of church and state.
34. Umana commedia — Italian - human comedy.
35. Wagner's Siegfried  — Siegfried, is the third of the four epic music dramas that constitute Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung), by Richard Wagner. It premiered at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus on 16 August 1876, as part of the first complete performance of The Ring cycle.