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  3. Nietzsche's Struggle against Pessimism
  • Cited by 8
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    • Publisher:
      Cambridge University Press
      Publication date:
      02 November 2023
      16 November 2023
      ISBN:
      9781009380287
      9781009380270
      9781009380294
      DOI:
      https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009380287
      Dimensions:
      (229 x 152 mm)
      Weight & Pages:
      0.57kg, 292 Pages
      Dimensions:
      (229 x 152 mm)
      Weight & Pages:
      0.426kg, 292 Pages
      • Subjects:
      Nineteenth-Century Philosophy, History, Philosophy, History of Ideas and Intellectual History
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    Subjects:
    Nineteenth-Century Philosophy, History, Philosophy, History of Ideas and Intellectual History
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    Book description

    On what grounds could life be made worth living, given its abundant suffering? Friedrich Nietzsche was among many who attempted to answer this question. While always seeking to resist pessimism, Nietzsche's strategy for doing so, and the extent to which he was willing to concede conceptual grounds to pessimists, shifted dramatically over time. His reading of pessimists such as Eduard von Hartmann, Olga Plümacher, and Julius Bahnsen—as well as their critics, such as Eugen Dühring and James Sully—has been under-explored in the secondary literature, isolating him from his intellectual context. Patrick Hassan's book seeks to correct this. After closely mapping Nietzsche's philosophical development on to the relevant axiological and epistemological issues, it disentangles his various critiques of pessimism, elucidating how familiar Nietzschean themes (e.g. eternal recurrence, aesthetic justification, will to power, and his critique of Christianity) can and should be assessed against this philosophical backdrop.

    Reviews

    ‘In place of a superficial acceptance or rejection, Patrick Hassan nuances in a fruitful and quite original way Nietzsche's critical engagement with the varieties and historical iterations of pessimism. A rare combination of historical erudition and analytic precision, this is an essential book on a core topic in Nietzsche studies.'

    Anthony Jensen - Providence College

    ‘Nietzsche's critique of pessimism has often been framed as a response to Schopenhauer. Hassan usefully expounds the wider intellectual context and shows philosophical sensitivity in reconstructing the thought of the now-lesser-known figures that Nietzsche was in dialogue with, beyond just Schopenhauer.'

    Andrew Huddleston - University of Warwick

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