Seminar Paper - Nietzsche: The Birth of Tragedy

Friedrich Nietzsche : October 15th 1844 - August 25th 1900 

Nietzsche was a German philosopher (who began as a classical philologist), poet, composer and classical philologist of the 19th Century. His works ranged from different subjects including religion, contemporary culture, morality, philosophy and science and based on different influences such as philosophy, existentialism, nihilism and post-modernism. Furthermore, he was particularly fond of the ideas of metaphor, irony and aphorism. Nietzsche's style was very radical and focussed on the questioning of the value and objectivity of the truth, his controversial work and ideas were not always easily understood and accepted.


Nietzsche had strong ideas about - death of god, perspectivism, the ubermensch, amor fati, the external recurrence and will to power.
And "life - affirmation" which was a central idea in which involves honest questioning of all doctrines that drain life's expensive energies, however socially prevalent the views are.


After Nietzsche served in the Prussian forces during the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71 he contracted numerous infections which may have contributed to his dementia later on in life, and maybe contributed to his ideas.

'The Birth of Tragedy'

In 1872 Nietzsche wrote and published his first book - 'The Birth of Tragedy' which was not well received by other academics and it affected Nietzsche's career for the worst. However, it had a great impact on the history of  western thought through the interpretation of the 'serenity' of Greek culture.


The preface contains Nietzsche stating that he contradicts himself throughout 'the birth of tragedy'...


Chapters 1-15 contain ideas and philosophy on the nature of Greek tragedy
Chapters 15-25 focus on modern culture in terms of the decline in traditional Greek tragedy and the significance and detailing on the possible rebirth.


Chapter 1 shows that Nietzsche has something serious to say about German culture in terms of the Greeks. He compares Dionysus and Apollo with Men and Women - there is an opposition amongst both but in order to procreate (art and life) the oppositions need to be resolved - Dionysus and Apollo must unite to create high art; they may have differences but the differences are necessary as well as destructive.


Nietzsche focusses on the dream analogy in chapter 4 in order to look at the question of the naive artist. Naive is "the complete absorption in the beauty of appearance". 
During everyday experience the real conscious life is preferable but at the metaphysical stage, the dream state is preferable to the awake stage. Because in the dream state a balance can be maintained - primal unity. 
"The Truly-Existent and Primal Unity, eternally suffering and divided against itself, has need of the rapturous vision, the joyful appearance, for its continuous salvation…"  ---> this quote shows that Nietzsche may well have Christian influences - with words such as - suffering, salvation and joyful.
The conscious world shows only one layer of experience whilst the dream word shows a double layer of experience or metaphor - "appearance of an appearance".
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This links to a similar state in naive art - which is also seen to be "appearance of an appearance".
'Dionysian' and 'Apollonian' state. This may seem contradictory, as previously he has spoken of the 'Apollonian Greek' and the 'Dionysian Greek', but in this chapter he shows that the Dionysian Greek is really an Apollonian Greek who has seen and understood the suffering that lies beneath the veil of Apollonian appearance.

In chapter 5 and 6 of 'The Birth of Tragedy' Nietzsche goes into subjectivity and objectivity in terms of poets and overall 'art'. Homer was an Apollonian naive artist and was objective whereas, Archilochus (who wrote in the 6th century) was passionate and furious as a lyric poet and was subjective; these two poets show the meeting of the 'objective' and the 'subjective' poet. Nietzsche believed that the 'subjective' was completely without merit BUT the Greeks thought that Archilochus was a great poet. 

"The subjectively willing and desiring man...can never at any time be a poet". 

Nietzsche believes it is essential that Dionysus and Apollo have to unite together to create 'art' and this is shown in his argument ---> 'art' must be created without the influence of subjectivity ---> Dionysus and Apollo allow this to succeed. 

Nietzsche questioned the Greeks for a long time and then in terms of the importance and significance of science.


- 'What is the point in science' - 'Where did it come from?' - 'Is there as pessimism of strength?' -


Nietzsche then went on to look at science from the perspective of art and of the artist which led into looking at the art from the perspective of life because science is dubious.


Furthermore, Nietzsche spent time looking at pessimism.


- 'Is there as pessimism of strength?' - 'Is pessimism necessarily the sign of collapse, destruction and disaster?' - 'Is there a way of suffering from the fullness of life?' - 


And in terms of Greek culture.
Was Epicurus an optimist because he was suffering? 


Nietzsche showcased a great deal of bias when deciding if something is considered 'art' or not and he formed an extremely accurate definition of what makes 'art' - the definition excludes the opera and subjective self-expression. 


Chapters 7 and 8 highlight the differences between ancient traditional tragedy (which had no chorus and no actors) and 5th century tragedy (which had chorus and actors). Nietzsche defines the relationship between the actors and the chorus within the tragedy - the chorus was seen to be the most important and significant part of the tragedy and it was seen to be the Dionysian way.


"Optimistic dialectic drives music out of tragedy with the scourge of its syllogisms: that is, it destroys the essence of tragedy, which can be interpreted only as a manifestation and illustration of Dionysian states, as the visible symbolizing of music, as the dream-world of Dionysian ecstasy."


This quote is from Chapter Fourteen of 'The Birth of Tragedy' and shows Nietzsche's continuous emphasis on the importance of music in tragedy. According to Nietzsche music is how the Dionysian essence reaches the audience, who is the "aesthetic listener." Music can reach everybody, it is like a lingua franca and it has the ability to give a deep significance to Apollonian appearances. Nietzsche regards music extremely highly. 


First, opera, as a recitative art, combines text with music in such a way that the music must always be slave to the text. Second, opera champions an idyllic conception of primitive man that sooths us with its quaintness but that cannot satisfy our metaphysical needs. Third, opera suggests that every man is an artist, and thus it must cater to the cheerful tastes of the laity.


Nietzsche presents Dionysus as an uplifting alternative to the salvation offered by Christianity - Christianity says that man renounces life on earth and should focus purely on heaven - HOWEVER Dionysus believed that you should immerse in life now - live life in the moment. Nietzsche liked this idea and he thought that Apollo is required along side Dionysus in terms of Greek culture and in real tragic art elements of Dionysus and Apollo were inevitably entwined and music was at the forefront of the art form as the spoken word alone does not go far enough. Music is superior in Nietzsche's eyes. 


The chorus within a Greek tragedy is needed to voice the essence of Dionysus as a form of representation. This will allow the viewer to get lost in Dionysian ecstasy. 

Nietzsche had great faith in the human soul, even though he had great criticisms of human culture and he thought we need to accept the culture of Dionysus.


Nietzsche believed that Euripides was the murderer of art. Euripides introduced different ways of representing art as a part of Greek culture and they were derived from and seemed similar to Socratic ideas based on knowledge. This led to Euripides disregarding the use of music as the main part of the tragedy. 


Furthermore, a rebirth of tragedy is what Nietzsche wanted after Euripides and to move away from the Socratic technique. 
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-NIETZSCHE SEES WAGNER AS THE ROUTE TO THE REBIRTH-

Between the years of 1873 and 1876 Nietzsche published four long essays - 

1. David Strauss: the confessor and the writer
2. On the use and abuse of history for life
3. Schopenhauer as Educator
4. Richard Wagner in Bayreuth

These essays contained a great deal of critique on culture and especially challenged the developing German culture - Nietzsche was influenced by Schopenhauer and Wagner here.

However, he was alienated by his friend Wagner because of Wagner's superiority of German Culture which Nietzsche thought was a huge contradiction which all led to Nietzsche distancing himself from Wagner. 

In 1878 Nietzsche wrote 'Human, All Too Human' which basically showed his reaction against the pessimistic philosophy of Wagner and Schopenhauer. 

In 1882 Nietzsche wrote 'The Gay Science' 

The Death of God

"God is Dead" occurs in several of Nietzsche's works. Most commentators regard Nietzsche as an Atheist and Nietzsche frequently called himself an 'immoralist'; he criticizes Christianity, Kantianism and  Utilitarianism which leads in to the idea that God is dead. 

BUT

Kaufmann suggests that the statement - "God is Dead" - reflects a subtle understanding of divinity AND in Nietzsche's view the combination of the recent developments in modern science and the increasing secularisation of European society had effectively 'killed' the Abrahamic God.

Furthermore, Nietzsche claimed that the death of God would lead to the loss of any universal perspective on anything and would lead to the no real sense of the truth, as well as this, the death of God would lead to unimaginable violence - Nietzsche stated this after Darwin's theories on evolution which suggested that he knew about how the world can evolve which supported his idea that violence could evolve. 

The death of God could either lead to Perspectivism - where multiple, diverse and fluid perspectives are retained OR it could lead to Nihilism - where the belief that nothing has any importance and life lacks any purpose at all so the death of God doesn't lead to anything extraordinary.

The Will To Power

This provides a basic understanding of human behaviour.

Nietzsche attacked Schopenhauer's notion of an aimless will - which is also known as Utilitarianism. Nietzsche believed that man should live the life of eternal recurrence and to just do what you want and not regret anything that you do. This differs from Socrates' who spent most of his time trying to work out WHY things happened the way they did and wanted to explain WHY anything happened, Nietzsche hated Socrates' philosophies. 

Ubermensch - in 1883 book - 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra'

German for "Overman, Overhuman, Above-Human, Superman"

The Ubermensch is a goal set for humanity and the Ubermensch have no fear.
Someone who overcomes a perspective and is capable of creating a new perspective without forcing the view upon others.

Schopenhauer

• German Idealism of the 19th century
• He was contemporary of Hegel - (he hated Hegel)
• Immaterialism - the world does not exist independently of perception
• He is similar to Kant 
• Looks at Kant's idea - dual nature of objects and their formless, potential or 'noumenal' nature.
• Kant - each object can be a 'thing in itself' (each object with its own noumenal and phenomenal nature)
• Schopenhauer - only one undifferentiated 'thing in itself' 
• Concept of 'will' for Schopenhauer is the same (according to Nietzsche) as 'eternal fire' is to Heraclitus 
• Nietzsche - 'Will to power' 
• "Will" in Schopenhauer was heavily criticised as being a poor choice of word due to possible confusion with the idea of free will in debates about ethics, personality, morals 
• Schopenhauer - only Western Philosopher to draw parallels between Western and Eastern philosophy.
• He was openly Atheist
• He wanted to understand the world in which he lived - through the 'will'
• He began with the premise of Kant - the way we see the world is from a human perspective and a pre-programmed perspective and a thing in itself is not necessarily what it appears, therefore we need a distinction from appearance.