Nietzsche: history and morals
Nietzsche, Friedrich. Vom Nutzen und Nachteil der Historie für das Leben (Unzeitgemäße Betrachtungen, Zweites Stück). In Werke: Band 1, hrsg. Karl Schlechta. Frankfurt a/M: Ullstein, 1980 (1874).
Nietsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morals (Zur Genealogie der Moral). Trans. Walter Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale. Ed. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage, 1967 (1887).
I guess the thing to say about the first piece is that the title is hard to translate. The reigning English versions "Use and Abuse of History" and "Advantages and Disadvantages of History" both get one term right while sacrificing the other for euphony: "advantage" would be Vorteil, "abuse" would be Mißbrauch or Mißhandlung. It isn't really a pros-and-cons argument about historical study and life, since we always use history in the service of life, and it's only the perverse nature of scientific study (which is really what Historie is; the succession of historical events itself is Geschichte) that allows us to forget this. The point is less to revamp historical study than to integrate it into a fuller life overall.
The thing to say about the second piece is that when I got to the section on punishment, I realized I could get rid of all my Foucault.
Nietsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morals (Zur Genealogie der Moral). Trans. Walter Kaufmann and R.J. Hollingdale. Ed. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage, 1967 (1887).
I guess the thing to say about the first piece is that the title is hard to translate. The reigning English versions "Use and Abuse of History" and "Advantages and Disadvantages of History" both get one term right while sacrificing the other for euphony: "advantage" would be Vorteil, "abuse" would be Mißbrauch or Mißhandlung. It isn't really a pros-and-cons argument about historical study and life, since we always use history in the service of life, and it's only the perverse nature of scientific study (which is really what Historie is; the succession of historical events itself is Geschichte) that allows us to forget this. The point is less to revamp historical study than to integrate it into a fuller life overall.
The thing to say about the second piece is that when I got to the section on punishment, I realized I could get rid of all my Foucault.
