The Joyous Science Read online

  3

  One might surmise that I do not wish to take my leave of that period of severe infirmity ungrateful for the profits it afforded me, which are far from spent: I am well aware of the advantages over sturdier intellects conferred by my capricious health. A philosopher who has repeatedly passed through many conditions of health has also passed through just as many philosophies: he really cannot do otherwise than invariably convert his condition into the most intellectual form and distance – this art of transfiguration just is philosophy. We philosophers are not at liberty to separate body and soul, as the people do; and we are still less at liberty to separate soul and intellect. We are not thinking frogs, we are not coolly objective recording instruments, frigid and barren – we are mothers whose thoughts are born from our pain, and we must lavish on them all that we have of blood, heart, fire, joy, passion, torment, conscience, destiny and doom. Life – for us that means the continual transformation of all that affects us and all that we are into light and flame; we simply cannot do otherwise. And as for the illness, are we not almost tempted to ask if it is not indispensable? In the end, it is great pain only which liberates the spirit;2 for it teaches a great suspicion which reveals the apparently genuine to be counterfeit, makes a known quantity into an unknown one, and, in solving that equation, prepares us for an ultimate decision3 …

  It is great pain only, the long, slow pain which takes its time, by which we are burnt, as it were, with green wood, that compels us philosophers to descend into our deepest depths and put aside all confidence, everything good-natured, dressed-up, mild, middling, which perhaps formerly constituted our humanity. I doubt whether such pain ‘improves’ us; but I know that it makes us profound. Whether we learn to oppose to it our pride, our scorn, our force of will, and do as the Indian does, who, howsoever horribly tortured, requites himself on his torturer with his malicious tongue; whether we withdraw from the pain into that Oriental nothingness – also known as Nirvana – into deaf, mute, numb resignation, oblivion, annihilation: one emerges from such long, dangerous exercises in self-mastery as another person, with a few more question marks, above all determined to keep questioning, more profoundly, strictly, sternly, wickedly and discreetly than ever before. Trust in life is gone: life itself has become a problem.

  One should not infer that this is inevitably a dismal condition! Even love of life is still possible – only one loves differently. It is the love for a woman who inspires doubts …

  But with such more intellectualized men, the attraction of the problematic, the delight in an unknown quantity, is too great not to spark a bright blaze of delight again and again over all the distress of the problematic, over all the risk of uncertainty, and even over the jealousy of the lover. We know a new happiness …

  4

  Finally, that the most essential may not be left unsaid: one comes back out of such abysses, out of such severe infirmity, and out of the infirmity of strong suspicion – reborn, with skin shed; more ticklish, more mischievous, with a finer taste for delight, with a more delicate palate for all good things, with a more blithesome disposition, with a second and more dangerous innocence in delight, at the same time more childish and a hundred times more sophisticated than before. Oh, how repugnant to us now is pleasure, coarse, dull, drab pleasure, as the pleasure-seekers, our ‘educated’ classes, our rich and ruling classes, usually understand it! How mischievously we now listen to the great festive tumult of ‘educated people’ and city folk today, as they allow themselves to be violated by art, books and music for the sake of ‘spiritual pleasures’, with the aid of distilled spirits! How the theatrical cry of passion now hurts our ears, how foreign to our taste all this romantic riot and confusion of the senses which the educated riff-raff love, along with their aspirations to the illustrious, the exalted and the eccentric! No, if we convalescents still need an art at all, it is another art – a mocking, light, fleeting, divinely serene, divinely artificial art which blazes up like a bright flame into cloudless skies! Above all, an art for artists, only for artists! Afterwards, we understand better that such an art first requires cheerfulness, any sort of cheerfulness, my friends! also as artists – I should like to prove it. There are some things we now know too well, we knowledge-seekers: oh how well we artists now learn to forget, learn not to know! And as to our future, you are not likely to find us again on the paths of those Egyptian youths4 who break into temples at night, embrace statues and want to unveil, uncover and bring into the light of day everything which is with good reason concealed. No, this bad taste, this desire for truth, this love of truth, for ‘truth at any cost’, this madness of youth has been spoiled for us: we are too experienced, too serious, too blithe, too burnt, too profound for that …

  We no longer believe that truth remains truth when her veil is withdrawn; we have lived too long to believe this. Nowadays we regard it as a matter of common decency not to be eager to see everything naked, or be present at everything, or understand and ‘know’ everything. ‘Is it true that the good Lord is present in all things?’ asked a little girl of her mother: ‘I think that is indecent’ – a hint to philosophers! One should cherish the modesty with which nature has concealed herself behind enigmas and iridescent uncertainties. Perhaps truth is a woman who has reasons for not showing her reasons? Perhaps her name (to speak in Greek) is Baubo?5

  Oh, those Greeks! They knew how to live: for that one must boldly stay on the surface, the fold and the skin, to worship appearance, to believe in forms, tones and words, in the whole Olympus of appearance! Those Greeks were superficial – from profundity! And are we not returning to just this, we daredevils of the spirit, who have scaled the most perilous heights of contemporary thought and have looked around up there, have looked down from up there? Are we not exactly in this respect – Greeks? Worshippers of forms, of tones, of words? And for that very reason – artists?

  Deruta, near Genoa,

  Autumn 1886

  ‘Jest, Trick and Revenge’1 Prelude in German Rhymes

  1

  Invitation

  Would you try this dish I offer?

  Later it will taste much better,

  And later still, taste good enough!

  Should you want more of this porridge,

  Buckle down, screw up your courage,

  And try some of my older stuff.

  2

  My Happiness

  Since the quest now wearies me,

  I much prefer the grail.

  Since the winds all fought with me,

  These days I trim the sails.

  3

  Undaunted

  Where you stand you must dig deep,

  Below you is the well!

  Let the superstitious shout,

  That down there’s only hell!

  4

  Dialogue

  A: I was sick and then got better?

  I don’t even know my doctor!

  How could I forget all that!

  B: Only now do you recover:

  Health returns when you forget.

  5

  To the Virtuous

  Our virtues ought to dash, and so,

  Like Homer’s verse, should come and go!

  6

  Worldly Wisdom

  Don’t stay on the solid ground,

  The peaks you should forswear,

  Gorgeous vistas are all found,

  Before you get up there.

  7

  Vademecum – Vadetecum2

  Attracted by my style and voice,

  You would follow after me?

  Walk your own path faithfully,

  And – bit by bit – become like me.

  8

  The Third Moulting

  My skin already bends and breaks,

  From all the earth which I’ve devoured,

  And yet the snake within me craves

  More earth with every passing hour.

  On crooked trails, hungering,

  I creep between the rocks and t
urf

  Seeking what I’m always seeking,

  Food for snakes,3 delicious earth!

  9

  My Roses

  My delight wants to delight you,

  Does my garden not invite you?

  Won’t you take some roses with you?

  You must crouch ’twixt rock and hedges,

  Grasping at the thorny branches,

  Often pricking fingertips!

  My delight – she loves her tricks!

  My delight would love to tease you!

  Won’t you take some roses with you?

  10

  The Scornful

  I spill much of what I pour,

  And so you say I’m filled with scorn.

  And yet whoever’s cup is full

  Will find that when he drinks, he spills –

  Without despising wine the more.

  11

  The Proverb Speaks

  Incisive, gentle, crude, refined,

  Familiar, foreign, pure and vile,

  A tryst of sage and imbecile:

  All this I seek and claim as mine,

  To be at once dove, snake and swine!

  12

  To a Friend of Light

  Lest your eyes be blinded,

  And your mind prostrate,

  You should follow sunlight,

  While you walk in shade!

  13

  For Dancers

  Smooth ice

  Is paradise

  For those whose dancing can suffice.

  14

  The Brave and True

  Sooner whole hostility

  Than pieced-together amity!

  15

  Rust

  There should be rust on a blade so keen,

  Lest they all say that you’re too green!

  16

  Upwards

  ‘What’s the best way to the summit?’

  Climb! Don’t think too much about it!

  17

  Maxim for the Violent

  Never ask! Leave off this pleading!

  Seize whatever’s there for seizing!

  18

  Narrow Souls

  Narrow souls are odious:

  Good or bad, they scarce possess.

  19

  The Involuntary Seducer

  He shot vain words into the air,

  And thereby felled a maiden fair.

  20

  Consider

  Shared pain is not as hard to bear,

  As lone pain: do you take my dare?

  21

  Against Arrogance

  Self-inflation’s ill-advised,

  You’ll pop when pinpricks are applied.

  22

  Man and Woman

  ‘Ravish the woman, if that’s what you feel!’ –

  Men think like robbers, but women just steal.

  23

  Interpretation

  My soul is in my work, I will admit,

  But I myself cannot interpret it.

  If you climb up your own path, then you might

  My image carry with you to the light.

  24

  Antidote to Pessimism

  You say that life’s unsavoury?

  My friend, renounce that ancient grievance!

  By ranting, raving endlessly,

  You break my heart and try my patience!

  Take a tip from me, my friend,

  And wisely follow this suggestion,

  Every morning eat a toad4 –

  I’ll bet that cures your indigestion!

  25

  Request

  My grasp on others’ minds is sure,

  But to myself I am obscure!

  My eye is far too close to me –

  I am not what I saw and see.

  For introspection, it might help

  To get more distance from myself.

  Though not as distant as my foe,

  Or closest friend, for neither know

  Me. Something halfway would be best!

  Can you guess what I request?

  26

  My Hardness

  I have to climb a hundred stairs.

  I hear a voice cry in despair:

  ‘Tread lightly! Am I made of stone?’ –

  I have to climb a hundred stairs,

  But no one would be tread upon.

  27

  The Wanderer

  ‘No path! Abysses! Isolation!’

  Wasn’t straying your decision?

  Eyes ahead, and do not frown:

  For all is lost if you look down.

  28

  Consolation for Beginners

  Among the pigs, a child is crawling

  Never rising to his feet.

  Listen to his endless bawling!

  When will he get up and stand?

  No, he won’t admit defeat!

  Soon the child will learn to dance!

  First he walks on his two feet,

  But in the end walks on his hands.

  29

  Planetary Egoism

  Were I not, in empty space,

  A barrel ever turning,

  How could I endure to chase

  The hot sun without burning?

  30

  The Neighbour

  My neighbour is too close to me:

  To height and distance banished, he

  May yet become a star to see! –

  31

  The Holy Mask

  Lest your happiness depress,

  Wrap yourself in wickedness,

  In wicked wit, in wicked dress.

  But in vain! Your eyes exhibit

  All your hidden holiness!

  32

  The Unfree

  A. Is he deceived in what he hears?

  What’s that ringing in his ears?

  What struck him down and laid him low?

  B. If chains were once all he did know,

  Then chains are all he’ll ever hear.

  33

  The Recluse

  How I detest to lead and to be led.

  I won’t command! And nor will I obey!

  Only the fearsome make others afraid;

  Only the frightened let themselves be led.

  I hate still more the task of self-command!

  I love to play like beasts of sea and land,

  I love to lose myself for just a day,

  To sit and muse, to lead my thoughts astray,

  And when at length my home I yearn to see,

  I coax myself and then return to me.

  34

  Seneca et Hoc Genus Omne5

  They scribble their insufferably

  Noble dreck and folly,

  As if to primum scribere,

  deinde philosophari.6

  35

  Ice

  Yes! At times I make some ice,

  It helps me to digest!

  If you had all this to digest,

  You too would love my ice!

  36

  Early Writings

  All my wisdom’s A and O7

  resounded from them. What I hear

  now doesn’t sound wise any more.

  Perennial youth’s Ah! and Oh!

  of suffering is all I hear.

  37

  Caution

  Sojourning in those parts is rather hard,