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The best thing I've ever read... on Nietzsche (yes, excuse the misleading title but hey, you gotta market, right?), is in the chapter 'Paris. Nietzsche the Great Martyr' from Nikos Kazantsakis's autobiographical book Report to Greco. What can I say, but, wow. This guy gets it. He doesn't waffle around on the superficial words and logic of Nietzsche as many academics and commentators do, but rather takes the philosophy as is and deals with its implications in the world, judging it accordingly (which, I might add, is what all philosophical process should entail). And the implications are damning, at least for Kazantzakis and his hero, Friedrich. Nietzsche stood toe to toe with the "abyss", resulting ultimately in his madness, and Kazantzakis prepares himself for the same fate, spending three years in one of the most beautiful and cultured cities in the world, Paris, but hardly leaving his room, choosing to explore the eternal questions of meaning rather than exploring the more transient, but far more candescent, streets of Paris.
I'm not going to go into the conclusions and deductions that Kazantzakis reaches, because I'm not sure that that is the point of the writing. And besides, reading the chapter is a process in itself, and for me to attempt a quick summary of it here would be to strip it of its flesh and leave only its bones.
The saying "sour grapes" started with an Aesop's Fable. We all know what it means - but, how wide are its implications? Is there a connection between sour grapes and Nietzsche's ressentiment?
I have to write a blog today or my account will apparently become inactive, so, I'll just write a short one on a favourite quote of mine that I'll continue in a later blog.
"If you have to ask, you'll never know".
I love this because it is in favour of intuition. Particularly in my field of study, philosophy, people are asked to explain why they believe what they do. The problem is, though, that the reasons given are always only an approximation if what they already believe through their intuitive, or pre-rational, thought.
It also applies to aesthetics and more subjective fields. In the field of wine tasting, for example, if you are given a glass of Penfolds Grange, only to ask what is so good about it, it indicates a non-discerning sense of smell and taste, which no amount of explaining can account for.
It also applies to my blogs: if you have to ask what the he'll I'm on about, no amount of explaining on my part will fully enable you to grasp my point of view.
September 12th 2009 07:30
In the bible, Matthew 7:16 to be precise, it states that "by their fruits you shall know them". What this means, by analogy of how well a fruit can bear fruit, is that you can know somebody by their outward manifestations. I will analyse and expand upon the implications of this in more detail:
Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, in Beyond Good and Evil
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I have been doing a lot of thinking recently, and a lot of observing (yeah I know, what's new). Something that has become clear to me is the truth of the saying, "it takes one to know one". Yes I know this comment is often used in jest, for example:
Kid 1: You're an idiot
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I have never been one for titles. I have little to no ambition for achieving a high position in anything, in getting letters next to my name, or in receiving any awards. I think that they are a very poor gauge of the quality of a person. The quality of a person should instead be measured by the person. And by "person" I don't mean the sum someone's abstract qualities, I mean what they put into life every day. For example, Jack Kerouac should be judged on his works, not by how many awards he has won. Pearl Jam should be judged by their music, not by how many records they've sold. The big difference in doing this, though, is that it's not really a "judgement" at all. If I listen to Pearl Jam and am moved, that has nothing to do with judging. If I am caught up in the words of Kerouac, that has nothing to do with judging. All that is is an affectation. Titles, though, are always about judging, about awarding someone according to their honour or achievements or some other abstract invention. All they do is reward the ambitious, and I dislike ambition. It is not honest. I read an article that ambitious students are much more likely to cheat on their exams. You see, ambition is all about getting titles or marks or sales targets or whatever. It is never about service or contribution, otherwise it would not be called ambition.
Back to my main topic, then: the little guy. I like the little guy because he is without titles or status. Diablo Cody two years ago was just a regular internet blogger, a "little guy", and now she is an Academy Award winner. What has changed in that time? One screenplay. But was she any different before that screenplay? If someone had a good eye, they would have spotted her quality regardless of her "little guy" status (and they eventually did). No doubt people will judge her more highly now that she has "achieved" something worthy. People will want to know her for her status. These are the ambitious people, the people who see only titles. I prefer people who see only quality, and do not concern themselves with frivolous titles and positions.
1. Jeff Buckley, “Grace”. Sheer aural bliss. There is nothing more beautiful and graceful in music than Jeff Buckley at his best, there really isn’t. I’d recorded Eternal Life on tape off the radio before I bought the album, and that song was just intense. Jeff Buckley’s music just has something that no other music does, and I can’t pinpoint what it is. Some sort of mix between sadness, passion, anger, vulnerability, soulfulness, beauty… maybe it’s just Jeff-ness. Anyway I heard that in Eternal Life, especially part where it quietens down and builds back up to where he screams “when will I find the strength to bring me release?”. I think one of the main things that is so amazing about Jeff Buckley is that every little part of the song is infused with this Jeff-ness beauty: the guitar intro blew me away, the chords of the verse; just every little part is a microcosm of wonder. And I could say the same about every single song on Grace. I like to say that if music just sounds like a bunch of notes or chords, that’s a sign of bad music. With Jeff Buckley, a C chord never sounded like a C chord, and a guitar never sounded like a guitar, it all just completely transcended that. It really is beyond music.
2. Pearl Jam, “Ten”. No other band changed my life the way Pearl Jam did. Before I got into Pearl Jam, I was listening to whatever was playing on Ugly Phil’s Hot 30, including non other than the Spice Girls, whose album I even bought. But I changed over to Triple M for some random reason, and it wasn’t long before I came across Pearl Jam, whose songs they used to play on fairly heavy rotation. Songs like Alive, Daughter and especially Even Flow just blew me away. I already had Vitalogy sitting at home which my dad had bought years before, but never bothered to listen to it, so I got it out and gave it a few listens. It wasn’t until I bought Ten, though, that I was completely won over. There used to be a sort of magic about buying CD’s for me that unfortunately kids of the new generation will not be able to experience. I saved up the $30 required and headed over to Sanity Eastgardens with the sole purpose of buying Ten. Unfortunately I have to resort to a cliché here: words simply can’t describe how much magic that CD contained for me (after all, where words fail, music speaks). I was completely riveted, moved and inspired, and begun playing guitar in order to learn all the songs, in particular the main riff and solo to Alive. I listen to Ten today and it doesn’t have quite the same effect on me – I have listened to it far too much over the years and the shiny gloss has kind of worn off, but I still remember the feelings when I first used to listen to songs like Black, Release, Alive, Once
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"You can never step in the same river twice"
I've been thinking a lot recently about careers - what path to follow, what job to go after etc. This got me thinking about identity - if I am to know what job or career is best suited to me, then I first have to know who I am. Of course, this is a massively problematic question. Who indeed am I?? It's a question at the centre of a lot of philosophical and spiritual inquiry
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I was thinking about this blog, and it occurred to me that it's a bit purposeless. I initially started it because I found quotes to be interesting, and contain a lot of truth (or at least the potential for truth). Reading back over my blogs though, the various quotes used have just been excuses for me to splurge my opinion on things, and while I enjoy having that outlet, it doesn't seem to be very purposeful. In addition, it is very unlikely that people who type "quotes" or "quips" into Google are looking for a hyper-analysis of what a quote means or its implications. As such, I'm going to change this blog at some point into a format where the readers that find the site will be people who are actually looking for strongly opinionated analysis on generally held wisdom.
My blog is NOT intended to be light reading and I don't want anymore to attract readers who are just looking for some smart quips or their origins.
My top 10 songs ever (not necessarily my favourites now, but the ones that were the most significant etc):
1. Walk Away, Ben Harper. I have sung this by myself in my room with a guitar so many times I couldn't even count. And I feel more each time - such a simple song, but so much power between the notes
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Comment by Banana Mango
on The best thing I've ever read...
Quotable Quips
Banana and Mango
I did address your point in my last paragraph, which I don't know if you saw as it's hidden underneath a not-so-conveniently placed Google Ad:
"I'm not going to go into the conclusions and deductions that Kazantzakis reaches, because I'm not sure that that is the point of the writing. And besides, reading the chapter is a process in itself, and for me to attempt a quick summary of it here would be to strip it of its flesh and leave only its bones."
Kazantzakis is not an analyst or even a philosopher; he's an author. And some might disagree that he understands Nietzsche. But I love his writing and I think it's worthwhile to read it just to get a glimpse into the effect that Nietzsche had on him, not to mention for the writing itself.
I guess this blog is a recommendation more than anything.