Nietzsche and Dostoevsky...
Surely, by noting the title of this blog one is aware of the relation of it to Dostoevsky. His novel entitled Notes from the Underground was the first stop on my journey to find the source of original thought. I was haunted by his words and have since read a dozen of his novels. I later read several works of Nietzsche and found many similarities between the concepts of the two authors.
It was quite peculiar how similar Nietzsche's Pale Criminal from Thus Spake Zarathustra was to Raskolnikov from Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. Indeed, the concept that most relate as Nietzsche's was first described by Dostoevsky in Notes from the Underground.
In that novel Dostoevsky's character describes a potential future where all human behavior could be predicted based upon conditions and a measurement of advantage. He explained that no matter how rigorous and all encompassing the calculation for the human behavior, the results would inevitably be inaccurate. This is because the nature of humanity centers on spite.
Spite, he explained, is what makes us human. We can rebel from conformity in order to be individual. We can rebel from our originality to conform. And if every advantage was laid before us we can rebel from ourselves and choose injury in spite of what is expected. Spite is the key to individuality; without it, we are automatons responding predictably to stimuli.
By committing to spite, as this character had, he was forced to reassess his morals and principles, deciding on his own what constituted value. Good wasn't determined by what everyone else thought was good (Aristotelian model) and bad wasn't dependent upon injury. His character repeatedly displayed this mentality throughout the book. He had developed his own rules.
The ending of the novel better reveals the theme and demands to be restated here:
And this idea that Dostoevsky speaks of, this spiteful man from which a truer individual is spawned, was defined twenty years later and almost 2000 miles away by the German philosopher, Nietzsche.
Nietzsche, took this spiteful man concept further to develop the Ubermensch (super-human). He described it as the goal of mankind. The steps required to reach this goal included:
It was quite peculiar how similar Nietzsche's Pale Criminal from Thus Spake Zarathustra was to Raskolnikov from Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. Indeed, the concept that most relate as Nietzsche's was first described by Dostoevsky in Notes from the Underground.
In that novel Dostoevsky's character describes a potential future where all human behavior could be predicted based upon conditions and a measurement of advantage. He explained that no matter how rigorous and all encompassing the calculation for the human behavior, the results would inevitably be inaccurate. This is because the nature of humanity centers on spite.
Spite, he explained, is what makes us human. We can rebel from conformity in order to be individual. We can rebel from our originality to conform. And if every advantage was laid before us we can rebel from ourselves and choose injury in spite of what is expected. Spite is the key to individuality; without it, we are automatons responding predictably to stimuli.
By committing to spite, as this character had, he was forced to reassess his morals and principles, deciding on his own what constituted value. Good wasn't determined by what everyone else thought was good (Aristotelian model) and bad wasn't dependent upon injury. His character repeatedly displayed this mentality throughout the book. He had developed his own rules.
The ending of the novel better reveals the theme and demands to be restated here:
We don't even know what living means now, what it is, and what it is called? Leave us alone without books and we shall be lost and in confusion at once. We shall not know what to join on to, what to cling to, what to love and what to hate, what to respect and what to despise. We are oppressed at being men -- men with a real individual body and blood, we are ashamed of it, we think it a disgrace and try to contrive to be some sort of impossible generalized man. We are stillborn, and for generations past have been begotten, not by living fathers, and that suits us better and better. We are developing a taste for it. Soon we shall contrive to be born somehow from an idea.
And this idea that Dostoevsky speaks of, this spiteful man from which a truer individual is spawned, was defined twenty years later and almost 2000 miles away by the German philosopher, Nietzsche.
Nietzsche, took this spiteful man concept further to develop the Ubermensch (super-human). He described it as the goal of mankind. The steps required to reach this goal included:
- Rebelling against the old ideas (Spite)
- Creating your own code of living
- Continually overcoming yourself
Each step is reminiscent of Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground to such a degree that one could assume that Nietzsche was Dostoevsky's protege. Unfortunately the two never met.
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