Beyond Good and Evil: Amazon.ca: Friedrich Nietzsche, Steven Crossley: Books

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Book Description

Friedrich Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil, first published in 1886, presents a scathing critique of traditional morality and attacks previous philosophers for their blind acceptance of Christian ideals of virtue. As an alternative to what he viewed as the illogical and irrelevant philosophy of the nineteenth century, Nietzsche argues for the importance of imagination, self-assertion, danger, and originality for genuine philosophy. He furthermore denies the existence of a universal system of morality and instead offers a framework in which social roles and power dynamics dictate what is appropriate. A culmination of Nietzsche's mature philosophy, Beyond Good and Evil is a classic of moral thought and one of the foundations of existentialism. This edition is the translation by Helen Zimmern.

Book Description

This is a major work by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, whose writings have been deeply influential on subsequent generations of philosophers. It is offered here in a new translation by Judith Norman, with an introduction by Rolf Peter Horstmann that places the work in its historical and philosophical context. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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First Sentence
The will to truth, which is still going to tempt us to many a hazardous enterprise; that celebrated veracity of which all philosophers have hitherto spoken with reverence: what questions this will to truth has already set before us! Read the first page

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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover

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59 Reviews

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4.4 out of 5 stars (59 customer reviews)

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18 of 19 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Autobiography of a mind, April 28 2004

By

Henry Platte (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beyond Good & Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future (Paperback)

Forget Nietzsche the philosopher. As he himself said, 'Before you ask what a philosopher thinks, find out what he wants' (or something to that effect), and, as Freud said, "He had a sharper understanding of himself than any man in recent history." You could blow holes in the logical validity of his arguments, but he has never been about logic; all of his texts are deeply personal, and show an outstandingly intelligent and sensitive man grappling with the same issues that plague most people. Although he often has a reputation as arrogant and self-centered, he was often more tenuous about his ideas than other philosophers, advancing an idea by a series of partly related statements, sometime changing his mind or pausing to restate his position in different terms. You can see his ideas evolving over the course of this book alone. There are also some solid and entertaining insights here, and the aphorisms are highly quotable, but I think its greatest value is as a glimpse into a human soul.

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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars What to say about Nietzsche?, Sep 4 2003

By

A. Lowry (Madison, MS United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

This review is from: Beyond Good & Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future (Paperback)

N. doesn't need my sales pitch, but anyway ...

First, if you're going to buy BG&E, go ahead & get the Modern Library "Basic Writings" in paperback---not a volume of snippets, but the complete text of N.'s two best books, BG&E and On the Genealogy of Morals, & some other works, for scarcely more than BG&E alone. If you don't like one book, try the other. N. says the same thing from different angles in his last 4 or 5 books. Anything after Zarathustra, except for Ecce Homo, is a good place to start.

Second, despite reading a translation, don't forget that N. is a clever, funny, & devilishly smart writer. Freud said no one before N. ever had as much self-knowledge. Read him with a sense of ironic humor. Too often N. is treated as some heavy thundering German, when if there's one thing that drove him up the wall, it was heavy thundering Germans.

Third, forgive his attitude problems about women. N.'s dad died when he was a kid; his mom & aunts raised him, got on his last nerve, & gave him a bad attitude towards women. Which, regrettably, was not exactly uncommon in the 19th c. BG&E includes his acknowledgement that his misogyny is a bedrock level of stupidity that he can't escape.

Fourth, if you're a Christian, there's a lot of N. that won't be acceptable to you. But learn what you can. A lot of so-called "Christianity" strongly resembles the "slave morality" that he describes.

This is an amazing book that I haven't even tried to describe, the book that made philosophy come alive for me with N.'s comment that, when wondering where the hell some metaphysician's notions came from, one should ask what morality the notions are aiming at. The book is full of great insights from a brilliant man. Read this, then the Genealogy, then Twilight of the Idols.

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4.0 out of 5 stars A very frustrating read, May 27 2003

By

M. A. ZAIDI "Ali Zaidi" (Karachi; Pakistan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beyond Good Evil (Paperback)

Beyond Good and Evil from the start is a book concerning moral philosophy. The title leads the prospective reader to believe that Nietzsche is dealing essentially with ethical issues, but the scope of the text is much broader, encompassing reflections on religion, and current affairs.

Beyond Good and Evil opens with a section on the 'Prejudices of Philosophers', in this he under takes a critique of the philosophical traditions. Unlike previous philosophers, Nietzsche does not select an issue or notion and analyze it, in the process distinguishing his views from those of the previous writers and erecting a body of concepts that form a system of thought. Instead he calls into question the very basis of philosophizing. His targets are philosophers themselves. He claims that philosophers merely pose as persons seeking the truth.

Nietzsche considers religion as 'neurosis', it involves an unnatural self-denial and sacrifice. He is not unaware of the advantages that religion brought to human society, even as it has debases human nature. He believes it has helped create a variable social order. By demanding we love each other. However his attitude towards religion is that it represents a stage in human development that must be over come.

Beyond Good and Evil is not an easy task to read. I admit that there are parts of this I I had trouble understanding and often it was a frustrating read.

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2.0 out of 5 stars A Mix Of Interesting Perspectives And A Rather Dark Disposition
There were some insights that I found very interesting. I am sure most readers, will also find many of the conclusions quite interesting as well. Read more

Published 11 months ago by Patrick Sullivan

5.0 out of 5 stars Light from the furthest stars
Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future was first published in 1886.

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