Nietzsche: A Selected Annotated Bibliography

Nietzsche & Political Thought

Nietzsche's politics are probably the most controversial aspect of his thought. After World War II, Walter Kaufmann helped rehabilitate Nietzsche in the English-speaking world from his reputation as a Nazi, fostered by Nietzsche’s sister and the Nietzsche archive that she founded.  For Kaufmann, Nietzsche was uninterested and contemptuous of politics; his concern was, rather, with “the anti-political individual who seeks self-perfection far from the modern world." ²⁰  This view of Nietzsche, and long the accepted opinion, has been challenged in recent years. Those who argue that Nietzsche was a political thinker take two main approaches.  One is to argue that an aristocratic order is the political solution to Nietzsche’s despair over the leveling effects of democracy and his hope for higher men. The other is to claim that in spite of Nietzsche’s contempt for democracy, a progressive and democratic politics can built upon his ideas, usually by arguing that his politics doesn’t follow from his philosophy.

With the revival of interest in Nietzsche’s politics, there has also arisen fresh interest in his relationship to Nazism.  Nietzsche’s elitism and fierce rejection of equality and democracy places him on the right, politically.  But as Harold Bloom argues, “Elitism is not protofascism.  Elitism is the condition of the spirit…” ²¹  Also, attempts to make him a proto-Nazi stumble against Nietzsche’s hatred of anti-Semitism, his rejection of nationalism, his condemnation of the German Reich, and “his break with Wagner and all that it signifies [since] Wagnerian ideology foreshadowed…a good deal of the völkisch tenets of National Socialism.” ²²

Ansell-Pearson, Keith.  An Introduction to Nietzsche as Political Thinker: the Perfect Nihilist.  (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994).  JFD 94-18211

A good introduction that surveys the wide range of interpretations of Nietzsche’s political thought, from conservative and authoritarian to liberal and left wing.

Bergmann, Peter.  Nietzsche, “The Last Antipolitical German”. (Bloomington, IN: Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1987).  JFE 87-1719

Nietzsche referred to himself, in Ecce Homo, as “the last anti-political German.”  Bergmann’s biography tries to explain Nietzsche’s statement in light of the historical and political controversies of his time.

Conway, Daniel W.  Nietzsche and the Political.  (New York: Routledge, 1996).  JFE 97-3024

“Political perfectionism” is how Conway describes Nietzsche’s politics.   Nietzsche’s primary goal is self-perfection through self-overcoming.  The aim of politics is to promote that goal and to create the conditions for the development of genius.

Detweiler, Bruce.  Nietzsche and the Politics of Aristocratic Radicalism. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990).  JFD 90-4770

Detweiler argues against scholars such as Walter Kaufmann and Peter Bergmann that Nietzsche was apolitical.  Contempt for liberal democracy and the belief in an aristocracy of “higher men” is central to Nietzsche, according to Detweiler.

Hatab, Lawrence.  A Nietzschean Defense of Democracy: An Experiment in Postmodern Politics.  (Chicago, Ill: Open Court, 1995)  JFE 96-2855

Hatab believes that a democratic politics can be created out of Nietzsche’s thought. Nietzsche’s belief in the need for a multitude of perspectives, and the necessity of competition or contest to promote excellence is, Hatab argues, best promoted by democracy, not aristocracy.

Strong, Tracy.  Friedrich Nietzsche and the Politics of Transfiguration.  (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2000).  JFE 00-8370

Strong argues that Nietzsche was not advocating a politics of domination, but of transfiguration.  In arguing this, he focuses on how Nietzsche understood the Greeks, especially Greek tragedy, whose essence, for Nietzsche, is transfiguration.

Thiele, Leslie Paul.  Friedrich Nietzsche and the Politics of the Soul: A Study of Heroic Individualism.  (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).

For Thiele, Nietzsche doesn’t reject politics, rather he internalizes it.  Nietzsche understood the soul to be a multiplicity of conflicting forces best described in political terms.   This “politics of the soul” is where Nietzsche’s politics is to be found.

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20. Walter Kaufmann,  Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist.  (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980)   418.

21. Harold Bloom, “Interview” in Criticism in Society: Interviews with Jacques Derrida, Northrop Fyre, Harold Bloom, et. al./ Imre Salusinszky. (New York: Methuen, 1987) 69

22. Roderick Stackelberg, “Critique as Apologetics: Nolte’s Interpretation of Nietzsche,” Nietzsche, Godfather of Fascism? (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002) 310.