To Forget and Surrender in Order to Live : A Reinterpretation of Nietzsche's Views on History and Life

• Main Author: Ragnhage, Linus
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Högskolan i Skövde, Institutionen för kommunikation och information 2010
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:his:diva-4243

In this essay the dangers of an overconsumption of history are investigated, and concerns are raised over the nature of philosophy and its role as a central part of man. Using material from Friedrich Nietzsche an argument is built, showing how we today suffer from a disease caused by a lack of attention to the present moment, and an overemphasis on truth rather than health. Through Ralph Waldo Emerson, Hindu myth, and Chinese thinkers a defense of surrendering to fate and being content with what happens is put forth, and with the help of Joseph Campbell, and his studies of mythology and anthropology, the value of religious unity and grand narratives receives a new interpretation. The overall style of argumentation is more artistic than analytical, and the intention of the essay is not to prove that the ideas within are true, but merely to show that they are available to anyone who are in need of them. Thus it is not to be approached as a polemic essay of continental philosophy, or as an objective presentation of analytical standards, but as a hybrid of both these traditions and the evocative tradition of Chinese philosophy.