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Spastic Cat Press Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche Translated by Thomas Common
Zarathustra is my brothers most personal work; it is the history of his most individual experiences of his friendships ideals raptures bitterest disappointments and sorrows. Above it all however there soars transfiguring it the image of his greatest hopes and remotest aims. My brother had the figure of Zarathustra in his mind from his very earliest youth: he once told me that even as a child he had dreamt of him. At different periods in his life he would call this haunter of his dreams by different names; but in the end he declares in a note on the subject I had to do a Persian the honor of identifying him with this creature of my fancy. Persians were the first to take a broad and comprehensive view of history. Every series of evolutions according to them was presided over by a prophet; and every prophet had his Hazar his dynasty of a thousand years. All Zarathustras views as also his personality were early conceptions of my brothers mind. Whoever reads his posthumously published writings for the years 186982 with care will constantly meet with passages suggestive of Zarathustras thoughts and doctrines. For instance the ideal of the Superman is put forth quite clearly in all his writings during the years 187375; and in We Philologists the following remarkable observations occur: How can one praise and glorify a nation as a whole?Even among the Greeks it was the individuals that counted. Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a 19thcentury German philosopher poet composer and classical philologist. He wrote critical texts on religion morality contemporary culture philosophy and science displaying a fondness for metaphor irony and aphorisshow more