Nietzsche and Music

In his youth, Friedrich Nietzsche yearned to become a great composer and wrote many pieces of music. He later claimed to be "the most musical of all philosophers." Yet most books on Nietzsche fail to explore the importance of music for his thought.

Nietzsche and Music provides the first in-depth examination of the fundamental significance of music for Nietzsche's life and work. Nietzsche's views on music are essential for understanding his philosophy as a whole. Part biography and part critical examination, Georges Liébert brilliantly demonstrates that despite failed attempts at a professional career as composer, Nietzsche never fully removed himself from the world of music, but instead, became a composer of philosophy, utilizing the musical form as a template for his own writings and creative thought. Liébert's study surveys Nietzsche's opinions about particular composers and compositions, as well as his more theoretical writings on music and its relation to the other arts. He also explores Nietzsche's listening habits, his playing and style of composition, and his many contacts in the musical world, including his controversial and contentious relationship with Richard Wagner. For Nietzsche, music gave access to a realm of wisdom that transcended thought. Music was Nietzsche's great solace; in his last years, it was his refuge from madness.

A virtuoso exploration of this little-known but crucial aspect of Nietzsche's life and work, this volume will be of enormous value to scholars of philosophy, music, aesthetics, and literature.

"Without music, life would be an error"—Friedrich Nietzsche

In his youth, Friedrich Nietzsche yearned to become a great composer and wrote many pieces of music. He later claimed to be "the most musical of all philosophers." Yet most books on Nietzsche fail to explore the importance of music for his thought.

Nietzsche and Music provides the first in-depth examination of the fundamental significance of music for Nietzsche's life and work. Nietzsche's views on music are essential for understanding his philosophy as a whole. Part biography and part critical examination, Georges Liébert brilliantly demonstrates that despite failed attempts at a professional career as composer, Nietzsche never fully removed himself from the world of music, but instead, became a composer of philosophy, utilizing the musical form as a template for his own writings and creative thought. Liébert's study surveys Nietzsche's opinions about particular composers and compositions, as well as his more theoretical writings on music and its relation to the other arts. He also explores Nietzsche's listening habits, his playing and style of composition, and his many contacts in the musical world, including his controversial and contentious relationship with Richard Wagner. For Nietzsche, music gave access to a realm of wisdom that transcended thought. Music was Nietzsche's great solace; in his last years, it was his refuge from madness.

A virtuoso exploration of this little-known but crucial aspect of Nietzsche's life and work, this volume will be of enormous value to scholars of philosophy, music, aesthetics, and literature.

Library Journal

According to Nietzsche, life without music was unimaginable, and his passion for it permeated his life and his writings. The importance of this influence, however, is often overlooked. In this thoroughly unique study, Li bert (producer, France-Musique; maetre de conference, Institut d'Etudes Politiques) presents Nietzsche in the context of his lifelong relationship with music and its milieu. Nietzsche, an accomplished pianist who was fluent in the musical circles of the Naumburg of his youth, studied the masters, composed a number of his own works, formulated theories about the art of music, and analyzed composers from Beethoven to Schumann. Liebert stresses that it was Wagner, however, who was a major factor in Nietzsche's life both musically and personally. Therefore, he suggests that in order to obtain a deeper insight into Nietzsche it is essential to study not only his writings on music in general but also those on Wagner in particular-thoughts that run from positive to contrary and provide valuable perspectives on this esteemed philosopher. Solid biographical, historical, and scholarly research is well integrated into this original and imaginative study of an oft-neglected aspect of Nietzsche, with a thoughtful translation that enhances the material. For academic and scholarly music collections.-Carol J. Binkowski, Bloomfield, NJ Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Georges Liébert is maitre de conference at the Institut d'Études Politiques in Paris and a producer at France-Musique. He is the author of four other books. David Pellauer is a professor of philosophy at DePaul University. Graham Parkes is a professor of philosophy at the University of Hawaii.