The Weaver Reads reviewed Nietzsche by Michael Tanner
Goodreads Review of Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction
5 stars
First, this isn't a great introduction to Nietzsche: Tanner just throws you in there and battles with other scholars who write about Nietzsche.
Secondly, Tanner is fucking hilarious. Nietzsche has a line in Beyond Good and Evil that goes something like this, "We asked rather about the value of this will. Suppose we want truth: Why not rather untruth? And uncertainty? Even ignorance?"
Tanner's response is:
"It is a quite different matter from being [...] complacent about the lack of rigor with which one looks for truth as almost everyone is on all important issues. And it is also different from wanting to believe what is in fact false, though we do not know that. There is nothing odd in saying 'Many of my beliefs are false,' which any sane person will agree to: But there is a terminal oddness in saying 'Many of my beliefs are false, including the …
First, this isn't a great introduction to Nietzsche: Tanner just throws you in there and battles with other scholars who write about Nietzsche.
Secondly, Tanner is fucking hilarious. Nietzsche has a line in Beyond Good and Evil that goes something like this, "We asked rather about the value of this will. Suppose we want truth: Why not rather untruth? And uncertainty? Even ignorance?"
Tanner's response is:
"It is a quite different matter from being [...] complacent about the lack of rigor with which one looks for truth as almost everyone is on all important issues. And it is also different from wanting to believe what is in fact false, though we do not know that. There is nothing odd in saying 'Many of my beliefs are false,' which any sane person will agree to: But there is a terminal oddness in saying 'Many of my beliefs are false, including the following...'"
Five stars.
