The end of a melody is not its goal: but nonetheless, had the melody not reached its end it would not have reached its goal either. — Nietzsche
The Sleepwalkers is one of the most remarkable books I’ve ever read, very close to the edge of what can be accomplished with the written word. I had never heard of either the book or the author — neither seems to have any following here in the States — but Amazon for some reason started recommending me post-WWI Austrian modernists. (I also read Robert Musil’s A Man Without Qualities, which was extremely tedious.) I don’t know who to compare Broch with, in terms of language, wit, psychological and historical insight — maybe Nietzsche, if Nietzsche had decided to write historical fiction. The book chronicles, via multiple overlapping narratives, the moral history of Germany in the late 19th and early 20th century, and the disintegration of values that led to fascism. And in his fear of the voice of judgment that threatens to issue from the darkness, there awakens within him… Read more →
O man, take care! What does the deep midnight declare? “I was asleep— From a deep dream I woke and swear:— The world is deep, Deeper than day had been aware. Deep is its woe— Joy—deeper yet than agony: Woe implores: Go! But all joy wants eternity— Wants deep, wants deep eternity. — Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra Read more →
o those human beings who are of any concern to me I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities — I wish that they should not remain unfamiliar with profound self-contempt, the torture of self-mistrust, the wretchedness of the vanquished: I have no pity for them, because I wish them the only thing that can prove today whether one is worth anything or not — that one endures. Read more →
his is now my way: where is yours?’ Thus I answered those who asked me ‘the way’. For the way – does not exist! — Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra Read more →
Paul McCartney has 5,700,000 Likes on Facebook. John Lennon has 15,000,000 Likes, despite being dead for more than 30 years. As Nietzsche used to say, “One must discontinue being feasted upon when one tasteth best; that is known by those who want to be long loved.” Read more →
Christine Lagarde, managing director of the IMF, was scheduled to speak this coming Sunday at Smith College, but she withdrew her name after nearly 500 people signed a petition objecting to the policies of the IMF. Similar outcries foiled speaking engagements by former National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice at Rutgers University and human-rights activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali at Brandeis University, among several others. — WSJ.com As Nietzsche used to say, “The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.” Read more →
The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. — Friedrich Nietzsche
It’s important to die at the right time. As Nietzsche used to say, “One must discontinue being feasted upon when one tasteth best; that is known by those who want to be long loved.” You were so beautiful in the 1950s . . . Read more →
It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book — what everyone else does not say in a book. — Friedrich Nietzsche Read more →
The human being who does not wish to belong to the mass must merely cease being comfortable with himself; let him follow his conscience which shouts at him: “Be yourself! What you are at present doing, opining, and desiring, that is not really you.” . . . — Friedrich Nietzsche Read more →
Americans are by all measures a deeply religious people, but they are also deeply ignorant about religion. — Atheists Outdo Some Believers in Survey on Religion – NYTimes.com The article describes a study in which researchers phoned up 3,400 Americans and asked them 32 questions about religion. On average, respondents got half the questions wrong. Breaking down the results by faith (or lack thereof), the highest scores were registered by atheists and agnostics, closely followed by Jews and Mormons. Some of the knowledge gaps are amazing: Fifty-three percent of Protestants could not identify Martin Luther as the man who started the Protestant Reformation. Forty-five percent of Catholics did not know that their church teaches that the consecrated bread and wine in holy communion are not merely symbols, but actually become the body and blood of Christ. As Nietzsche used to say: If you want happiness and peace of mind, believe.… Read more →
RT @Jesus_M_Christ: How do I know Adam and Eve were white? When’s the last time you seen a black man give up a rib? # RT @eddiepepitone: Tweets of Nietzche’s wife- God isn’t as dead as our sex life! # RT @pattonoswalt: In the future, everyone will be obscure for fifteen minutes. # Read more →
And the Gileadites took the passages of Jordan before the Ephraimites: and it was so, that when those Ephraimites which were escaped said, Let me go over; that the men of Gilead said unto him, Art thou an Ephraimite? If he said, Nay; Then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth: and he said Sibboleth: for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew him at the passages of Jordan: and there fell at that time of the Ephraimites forty and two thousand. — Judges 12:5-6 Thus the original meaning of the word “shibboleth”: a password that people from one side can pronounce but their enemies can’t. The word has since taken on a more general meaning as not necessarily a password, but a custom or practice that separates the good guys from the bad guys, the insiders from the outsiders. Read more →
[James] Dean died before he could fail, before he lost his hair or his boyish figure, before he grew up. — Donald Spoto, Rebel: The Life and Legend of James Dean One must discontinue being feasted upon when one tasteth best; that is known by those who want to be long loved. — Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra Many die too late, and some die too early. Yet strange soundeth the precept: ‘Die at the right time!’ — Ibid. Read more →
