Nietzsche 'Art and Life'

Nick Aldridge (Manchester Metropolitan University)

Nietzsche, drawing heavily on Schopenhauer's metaphysics, struggled to develop a practical philosophy of art, exploring the appropriate aesthetic and moral response to a world filled with inexplicable suffering.  He feared that the decline of Christianity - the "death of God" - would leave life devoid of meaning, and saw ancient Greek aesthetics, which transfigured horrific tragedy through drama, as a template for the cultural rebirth of humanity.  Nietzsche's sweeping philosophical claims, his contempt for the morals and culture of his time, and his powerful, dramatic prose, make him one of the more fascinating and influential philosophers of the 19th century.

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