The Tragedy of the Birth

Author: Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
Publisher: Zuoyan
Publication Date: 2005-12-01
Features: If one book can be chosen to statically represent the fundamental concerns of Nietzsche's thought and dynamically his intellectual development across different stages, we believe it can only be The Birth of Tragedy. The Birth of Tragedy is Nietzsche's first formally published philosophical work. In this book, he distinctly states his stance and formally expresses his criticism and dissatisfaction with traditional philosophy. Thereafter, he builds upon the two intellectual threads presented in The Birth of Tragedy—the art of tragedy and the philosophy of tragedy—to further explore various philosophical issues closely related to life attitudes. As Nietzsche himself said, he repeatedly returned to The Birth of Tragedy during different stages of his life to reflect and re-examine the viewpoints and questions he had proposed. In this sense, The Birth of Tragedy is not only an independent work but also one that accompanies the development, evolution, and adjustment of Nietzsche's thought, remaining an unfinished book that is always. Therefore, we hope to take The Birth of Tragedy as the main thread to connect the preceding gestation period with Nietzsche's later stages of thought, presenting the development of Nietzsche's thought centered around The Birth of Tragedy. Although this cannot represent the entirety of Nietzsche's philosophy, it is a meaningful and worthwhile approach to understanding Nietzsche.
The selection of texts in this book gathers most of Nietzsche's works related to the ideas of The Birth of Tragedy. Centered around The Birth of Tragedy, it traces back to The Gay Science and The Philosophy of the Greek Tragedy, and extends forward to his Basel inaugural address, Schopenhauer as Educator, Wagner at Bayreuth, and excerpts from his later works such as Beyond Good and Evil and The Will to Power. It ends with the portion of Look! This Man! that discusses The Birth of Tragedy.