Product Description

This long overdue English translation of Karl Lwith's magisterial study is a major event in Nietzsche scholarship in the Anglo-American intellectual world. Its initial publication was extraordinary in itself a dissident interpretation, written by a Jew, appearing in National Socialist Germany in 1935. Since then, Lwith's book has continued to gain recognition as one of the key texts in the German Nietzsche reception, as well as a remarkable effort to reclaim the philosopher's work from political misappropriation. For Lwith, the centerpiece of Nietzsche's thought is the doctrine of eternal recurrence, a notion which Lwith, unlike Heidegger, deems incompatible with the will to power. His careful examination of Nietzsche's cosmological theory of the infinite repetition of a finite number of states of the world suggests the paradoxical consequences this theory implies for human freedom. How is it possible to will the eternal recurrence of each moment of one's life, if both this decision and the states of affairs governed by it appear to be predestined? Lwith's book, one of the most important, if seldom acknowledged, sources for recent Anglophone Nietzsche studies, remains a central text for all concerned with understanding the philosopher's work.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1570575 in Books
• Published on: 1997-08-20
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304282251 pages

Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: German

From the Inside Flap
"This superb translation fills a crying need. I think all competent Nietzsche scholars would rank Löwith's book among the top three or four books written on Nietzsche."--Werner Dannhauser, Michigan State University

From the Back Cover
"This superb translation fills a crying need. I think all competent Nietzsche scholars would rank Lwith's book among the top three or four books written on Nietzsche." (Werner Dannhauser, Michigan State University)

Customer Reviews

Lowith discusses the centrality of the concept of Superman.
Lowith was a brilliant German-Jewish scholar whose work was published in Berlin at the onset of National Socialism. However, he could not teach due to the racial Laws of the regime. Lowith's book is clearly and beautifully written, and is a superb analysis of the centrality of the Eternal Recurrence and the Superman idea to Nietzsche studies. Highly recommended to advanced students of Nietzsche.

Exceptional
I've read many books about Nietzsche. This is by far the best. Unlike Heidegger, Lowith neither looks for nor finds himself in Nietzsche. Rather, he engages with Nietzsche's thought and really tries to understand what the latter understood by his "eternal recurrence of the same."

It's not an easy read, but it is well worth the effort. A marvelous work.