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From: ccw94@xxxxxxxxxx (Colin Wight)
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Date: Mon, 24 Mar 1997 11:14:35 +0000
John ranson wrote:
>If Nietzsche's line about aesthetics is as important as the "Preface to
>transgression" essay seems to imply it is, we might want to look at it
>more closely.
>
>In the English translation by Kaufmann, N writes that "art represents
>highest task and truly metaphysical activity of this life" (_Birth_,
>"Preface to Wagner," p. 32).
>
>Later on, he claims that "it is only as an aesthetic phenomenon that
>existence and the world are justified" (_Birth_, Section 5, p. 52).
>
>Perhaps this thought of N's not as easy to follow as first appears. Take
>the second quote. Is N saying that existence and the world are only really
>good when they are aesthetic phenomena?
>
>Or, if we put the stress on "justified," does he mean that we only get to
>the point of accepting the world, of considering it justified, when it is
>tarted up as an aesthetic phenomenon? Those are two very different
>readings.
Well these are certainly two readings. But what both quotes betray to me is
N's anthropocentrism.
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Colin Wight
Department of International Politics
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
SY23 3DA
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