Nietzsche arrived back in Basel from Bayreuth on August 27, 1876, and continued working on the notes that would eventually become Human, All-Too-Human. Since Elizabeth, after a year as his housekeeper, had gone back to Naumburg, he returned to his old, bachelor digs in Baumann's Cave. Overbeck was in Dresden with his new wife, Ida, and so Nietzsche's favourite student, Adolf Baumgartner, took over the rooms he had vacated. And Rée took his place in lunchtime conversations.

In Bayreuth, Malwida von Meysenbug had renewed her suggestion that, for his health, Nietzsche should join her in Italy. Nietzsche had applied for sabbatical leave the previous May, stressing (as one does) the ‘academic’ character of his proposed visit to the South – to the homeland of classical civilisation. The leave approved, he accepted Malwida's invitation and arranged to be accompanied by a favourite former pupil, the delicate Albert Brenner (who had, in fact, barely eighteen months to live). On September 26 he asked Malwida if he could bring Rée, as well, since he ‘took great delight in his utterly clear head as well as his considerate, truly friendly soul’.

Shortly before leaving for Sorrento he received a telegram from Wagner, who, suffering from the stresses of the Festival, had also decided on Italy as a place of recuperation. It must have been difficult for Nietzsche not to find it insulting: