My 14-year-old grandson, Samuel, has a birthday coming up. He has become intensely interested in politics, thanks to the presidential campaign, and his mother, Diana, says he would enjoy books about American electoral politics. I need some suggestions. I am looking for books with lots of charts, tables, pictures, stories, and the like, informative and somewhat beyond his chronological age but not the sorts of deep dives that you or I might enjoy.
Does anybody have any suggestions? Perhaps I could find several books like that and add to it Howard Zinn's classic work, A People's History of the United States.
I have already given him in previous years my textbook, About Philosophy, and also In Defense of Anarchism and he has read both!
57 comments:
Ted White’s “Making Of The President” series might serve, but they go back a bit, covering the 1960 through 1972 and 1980 elections, and I do not believe they have any charts or pictures, but they give comprehensive accounts of those elections in an easily readable format. I believe they are still available on Amazon and at used book outlets on the internet.
I thought about that but those books are too old for someone who is 14. They are just the sort of thing I am looking for, though.
The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded American is Tearing Us Apart
The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail--but Some Don't (Useful review at the NYT also)
Sounds dry but very accessible (I read age 17) and chock a block full of stats
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Patterns-Democracy-Government-Performance-Thirty-six/dp/0300078935
Anon from 10:12am- I should add that it is firmly entrenched in the whole Fukuyama liberal discourse of that era and has some questionable conclusions, but it is definitely a good introduction to seeing whether you like political science and the stats side of things. And he can learn the theory from his grandfather!
Doh! I linked the first ed., here is the 2012 edition:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Patterns-Democracy-Government-Performance-Thirty-Six-dp-0300172028/dp/0300172028/ref=dp_ob_title_bk
I promise that's my last comment!
Heather Cox Richardson's "How the South won the Civil War" is a remarkable book.
He might enjoy Hacker and Pierson's Let them Eat Tweets: How the Right Rules in an Age of Extreme Inequality.
I find paging through my copy of an "Atlas of World History" to be enjoyable and always Informative: I imagine that a young person deeply interested in history might really take to it.
I think Alistair Cook's "America" is intellectually a lighter choice, but entertaining and informative.
I think "Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee" is one worth considering.
I find I have really enjoyed having a copy of "Our Times: The Illustrated History of The United States" on my shelf, but I think it's out of print so you would need to buy it used.
Paraphrasing René Magritte: This is Not a Commentary
Suggested reading for a precocious 14 year old; I am assuming
that I do not need to list the author for most of the titles:
Animal Farm
The Autobiography of Malcom X
poetry by Bertolt Brecht and/or Dennis Brutus
I Know Why the Cage Bird Sings
Notes of a Native Sun
Slaughterhouse n. 5
Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life
Earthsea or Annals of the Western Shore (Ursula Le Guin)
Talking to My Daughter About the Economy, Yanis Varofaukis
I guess he is too young for Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail.
What the post is seeking is going to be difficult to find, I think. However, if you get into several book sites, incl ones for used and out-of-print like ABE Books, you may be able to find something like A Guide to the 1980 (or 1992 or 2000 or whatever) Election, w maps, charts, illustrations etc. Try also searching on American Heritage, as in the American Heritage Illustrated Story of the Election of xxxx (hypothetical title but may exist). Univ of Kansas Press has a series of books on particular presidential elections, but best to wait on those until he's a little older, I think.
And very nitpicky note to MS, meant in a friendly way: Theodore White, afaik, was never "Ted"; he was always "Teddy".
LFC,
Nitpicky indeed. You may have known him as Teddy, from your confabs at the hoity-toity cocktail parties you both attended. But I only knew him as Ted, never having had the honor of meeting the man. But I enjoyed each of his great electoral narratives, and avidly read every one of them. And here’s a bit of academic trivia that you may not know: His second marriage was to Beatrice Kevitt Hofstadter, the widow of historian Richard Hofstadter.
I have no advice for books on electoral politics, but you could buy the following paperback as a supplement to the books you do decide on getting for your grandson:
Great Inaugural Addresses (Dover Thrift Editions) Paperback – October 18, 2010
--I believe I bought my copy over a year ago from Amazon.com. The inaugural speeches range from Washington's to Obama's 1st inaugural address.
If he's interested in philosophy, you might try Time of the Magicians, a recent book by
Wolfram Eilenberger, which talks about four philosophers in the 1920's, Wittgenstein, Benjamin, Heidegger and Cassirer, contrasting their thought and narrating their lives, with lots of anecdotes and photos, a good book for a bright 14 year old and for anyone interested in a non-academic account of continental philosophy almost a hundred years, between World War 1 and the rise of Hitler. Here's the Guardian book review:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/aug/13/time-of-the-magicians-by-wolfram-eilenberger-review-philosophys-great-decade
Have any of Chomsky's books been mentioned yet?
But should he be really interested in both politics and graphics, you might consider Edward Tufte's books--he was both a political scientist and a statistician and graphic designer. They might be a bit too sophisticated, but the graphics are very interesting.
If your grandson is interested in reading books he's already way ahead of the game. Shout out to S. Wallerstein for mentioning Ernst Cassirer.
My first, immediate thought was "Animal Farm."
Clearly not about US electoral politics, but highly relevant to any politics.
Perfect for someone that age (or my age), assuming he has not already read it.
Thomas Frank - "Listen, Liberal"
Ryan Grim - "We've Got People: From Jesse Jackson to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the End of Big Money and the Rise of a Movement"
OK not directly on-topic wrt politics but very illuminating , a fun read and well within the compass of an intelligent 14-year-old
Frank and Cook 'The Winner Take-All Society'
Of (if he hasn't read it which he probably has) Ursula Le Guin's 'The Dispossessed'
(One of the best SF and political novels ever).
There's a whole raft of relevant titles in the Oxford University Press Series called Very Short Introductions. The individual volumes run to 120-150 pages usually, in smallish format.You can find them on Amazon. (There's even one on Anarchism.)Anyway, they're worth a look. --Fritz Poebel
I do not have any suggestions for your 14-year-old grandson but I have some for when he turns 25 or 30. If you want him to understand how the US political/social/economic system REALLY works (especially Trump, the Republican Party, Wall Street, and Corporate America), then give him copies of the following:
Nietzsche, 'The Will to Power' (an unofficial work)
Nietzsche, 'The Genealogy of Morals'
Nietzsche, 'Beyond Good and Evil'
Overall, Nietzsche is a proud immoralist, atheist, Anti-Christian (he calls himself "The Antichrist"), elitist, fascist, and Social Darwinist. And 2020 has BRUTALLY demonstrated the empirical, descriptive truth and relevance of Social Darwinism.
If you're rich, you can hide out in your mansion, enjoy the ample space, work from home, have your groceries delivered, and have access to the best medical treatment possible. Or if you were really forward-looking and proactive in February or March 2020, you just moved to New Zealand before they closed their borders and bought a mansion there. (Yes, numerous rich people did this.) In any case, since the US stock market has set new highs this year, you have gotten richer this year, despite the economic crisis, sickness, misery, and 250,000 US deaths.
But if you're poor, you must live in a small house or apartment, show up for work (if you still have a job) for starvation wages, and risk contracting the coronavirus. You either have Medicaid, mediocre/shitty private health insurance, or no health insurance at all. If you get the coronavirus and end up in the hospital for several days or more and if you have private health insurance or no insurance, you may very well receive a hospital bill of $30,000 or more. Good luck paying that hospital bill. If you have lost your job due to the pandemic, then hopefully you have been collecting the enhanced unemployment insurance, which will expire at the end of the year. Good luck paying for rent, food, etc. And good luck waiting in line at your local food bank. Link. In the worst case scenario, you have been evicted and you are living on the streets and scavenging for food.
Meanwhile, Mitch McConnell and the Senate Republicans are laughing at you behind closed doors and are refusing to help by passing another major stimulus package. “Just pull yourself up by your bootstraps! Take personal responsibility! We need to re-open the economy! We shouldn’t be paying people more not to work than to work! We don’t want to further increase the budget deficit, regardless of the $1 trillion Trump tax cuts and the $7 trillion the Federal Reserve is spending to prop up the stock market (to preserve the wealth of the wealthy). The Makers (i.e. Job Creators) and the Takers!” And Ivanka Trump tells you, “Just find something new!” And Jared Kushner tells you, “We can just blame the pandemic fallout and deaths on the Democratic governors and mayors.”
In short, the rich get richer; the poor get poorer, sicker, and more miserable; and the middle class collapses.
Yes, we live in a Nietzschean, Social Darwinian world. As Nietzsche says, the truth is terrible. Indeed, the truth is terrible, horrendous, and appalling. Many of us cannot psychologically handle it. Thus many of us seek comfort and solace in religion, Marxism, (democratic) socialism, or FDR liberalism, all of which Nietzsche considers delusions.
But the real forces at work in the US political/social/economic system are based on Nietzsche and Social Darwinism. Donald Trump, Roy Cohn, Fred Trump, Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, Charles Kushner, Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, many CEOs, many hedge fund managers, many private equity managers, many investment bankers, and many corporate lawyers follow the playbook of Nietzsche and Social Darwinism. It’s all about being a “killer” and demonstrating your superior will to power. Hence the Cult of Death in America and the extreme income and wealth inequality.
Calling Prof Brian Leiter, calling Prof Brian Leiter...
Nietzsche isn't a social-darwinist and still less a fascist.
He's obviously not a democrat nor does he care much about the fate of the poor. Yes, he considers socialism and FDR liberalism to be delusions.
Fascist, no way. He is not a nationalist nor a chauvinist and still less an anti-semite. He refers to himself as a "anti-anti-semite" and "a good European". I can't imagine any human being more uncomfortable in a mass Nazi or Trump rally than Nietzsche. Trump supporters for Nietzsche are the herd, although CNN-watching liberals are just another herd for him.
As someone who spent most of his creative life living on a pension from a Swiss university,
Nietzsche is hardly the prototype of a hedge fund manager, a type of human being for whom Nietzsche would have felt infinite contempt. Among the people whom he admires there are no captains of industry, investment bankers or corporate lawyers: his examples of higher human beings generally include Beethoven, Goethe, Napoleon (a good European who unites Europe) and Nietzsche himself.
There's no death-cult in Nietzsche. Rather he worships life and the life-cult of Dionysius. Dionysius is to be sought not in the market-place nor in the palaces of government, but on high mountains, climbed only by a few. His will to power is generally a transcendence of one's own weaknesses and of herd values, a becoming who you are.
I woke up in the middle of the night and this isn't my best summary of Nietzsche, but Nietzsche has nothing to do with Trump nor with Biden nor even with Bernie Sanders. He's a weird and unique voice and at least let's give credit for that.
MS
I was never at a cocktail party w Teddy White. First, I've been to rather few cocktail parties in my life. Second, White and I are of different generations. Third, I didn't belong to his social circles. There are a couple of considerably more attenuated connections but I'm too tired to go into them now, and no one really cares.
Second the recommendation re Tufte, Visual Display of Information (or the follow-on volumes). Not directly politics but extremely interesting for those interested in charts and graphs and the like,
Yes, let's not denigrate poor Nietzsche once again (he always gets lumped in with Nazis, and now the Trumps?) while much else of what you said regarding our current situation seems quite accurate. Maybe more based on teachings by people like Ayn Rand, Milton Friedman, and Leo Strauss, if there is any coherent justification behind any of it. Even those works are an intellectual stretch probably for the Trump family.
Nietzsche was a realist when it came to aspects of biology, nature, the social hierarchy, but his philosophy hardly promotes the status quo, fascism, greed, social darwinism, or stupidity.
As for the book recommendation, this one might be a bit more entertaining for a teenager:
https://www.amazon.com/Daily-Stewart-Presents-America-Teachers/dp/0446691860
S. Wallerstein:
I’m not a Nietzsche scholar or expert but I have read the following:
Nietzsche, ‘The Will to Power’ (550 pages of Nietzsche’s unpublished writings, i.e. aphorisms that he actually thought and wrote)
Nietzsche, ‘The Genealogy of Morals’
Nietzsche, ‘Beyond Good and Evil’
Nietzsche, ‘The Antichrist’
Nietzsche, ‘Twilight of the Idols’
Brian Leiter, ‘Nietzsche on Morality’ (first edition)
Brian Leiter, ‘Nietzsche's Moral and Political Philosophy’ (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Jacob Golomb, ‘Nietzsche, Godfather of Fascism? On the Uses and Abuses of a Philosophy’
Ronald Beiner, ‘Dangerous Minds: Nietzsche, Heidegger, and the Return of the Far Right’
Yes, you can plausibly argue that Nietzsche is a Social Darwinist or at least largely agrees with Social Darwinism: the strongest, smartest, fittest, richest people (i.e. the aristocrats or masters) should be allowed to dominate and procreate (in accordance with master ethics), and the weakest, dumbest, sickest, poorest people should submit to the masters and should not be allowed to procreate. Consider these passages from ‘The Will to Power’:
“Society, as the great trustee of life, is responsible to life itself for every miscarried life—it also has to pay for such lives: consequently it ought to prevent them. In numerous cases, society ought to prevent procreation: to this end, it may hold in readiness, without regard to descent, rank, or spirit, the most rigorous means of constraint, deprivation of freedom, in certain circumstances castration” (Aphorism 734, my emphasis)
“The Biblical prohibition "thou shalt not kill!" is a piece of naiveté compared with the seriousness of the prohibition of life to decadents: "thou shalt not procreate!"—Life itself recognizes no solidarity, no "equal rights," between the healthy and the degenerate parts of an organism: one must excise the latter—or the whole will perish.—Sympathy for decadents, equal rights for the ill-constituted—that would be the profoundest immorality, that would be antinature itself as morality” (Aphorism 734)
“Through Christianity, the individual was made so important, so absolute, that he could no longer be sacrificed: but the species endures only through human sacrifice. All "souls" became equal before God: but this is precisely the most dangerous of all possible evaluations! If one regards individuals as equal, one calls the species into question, one encourages a way of life that leads to the ruin of the species: Christianity is the counterprinciple to the principle of selection. If the degenerate and sick ("the Christian") is to be accorded the same value as the healthy ("the pagan"), or even more value, as in Pascal's judgment concerning sickness and health, then unnaturalness becomes law” (Aphorism 246)
“This universal love of men is in practice the preference for the suffering, underprivileged, degenerate: it has in fact lowered and weakened the strength, the responsibility, the lofty duty to sacrifice men […] The species requires that the ill-constituted, weak, degenerate, perish: but it was precisely to them that Christianity turned as a conserving force; it further enhanced that instinct in the weak, already so powerful, to take care of and preserve themselves and to sustain one another” (Aphorism 246)
“Genuine charity demands sacrifice for the good of the species—it is hard, it is full of self-overcoming, because it needs human sacrifice” (Aphorism 246)
“The great majority of men have no right to existence, but are a misfortune to higher men.” (Aphorism 872)
Continued:
“In the background [for the poor and lowly] is insurrection, the explosion of a stored-up antipathy towards the "masters," the instinct for how much happiness could lie, after such long oppression, simply in feeling oneself free—(Usually a sign that the lower orders have been too well treated, their tongues have already tasted a happiness forbidden them—It is not hunger that provokes revolutions, but that the people have acquired an appetite en mangeant [through eating])” (Aphorism 209) [Note: so it is better if the peasants never acquire an appetite in the first place and just starve to death]
“But where may I look with any kind of hope for my kind of philosopher himself, at the least for my need of new philosophers? In that direction alone where a noble mode of thought is dominant, such as believes in slavery and in many degrees of bondage as the precondition of every higher culture” (Aphorism 464)
In addition, see John Richardson’s ‘Nietzsche’s New Darwinism’ (pp. 137-146).
To the extent that Nietzsche is a Social Darwinist who supports the sacrifice of the poor, sick, weak, and lowly, he supports the Cult of Death (in relation to the lowly), although he does affirm maximum will to power and will to life for the masters and creative geniuses (e.g. Caesar, Napoleon, Beethoven, Goethe, Nietzsche).
Now, is Nietzsche a fascist? The answer is complex. Jacob Golomb’s ‘Nietzsche, Godfather of Fascism?’ has a whole series of essays debating to what extent Nietzsche was a fascist, proto-fascist, or precursor to fascism. But it is indisputable that he inspired the fascists, including Mussolini (who wrote numerous articles about Nietzsche and embraced Nietzsche’s anti-egalitarianism and the idea of the übermensch), Hitler, and the Nazis. In particular, Hitler often visited the Nietzsche museum in Weimer and posed for photographs standing in front of Nietzsche’s bust. Now, Mussolini and the Nazis may have been extremely selective in their appropriation of Nietzsche (e.g. ignoring his diatribes against German nationalism and his positive remarks about Jews) but he still inspired them and thus arguably served as the precursor to fascism.
Now, how does Nietzsche relate to Trump, hedge fund managers, private equity managers, etc.?
According to Ivana Trump, Donald Trump owned and read ‘My New Order,’ a collection of Hitler’s political speeches. Obviously, Hitler and the Nazis have influenced Trump, and Nietzsche has influenced Hitler and the Nazis. So Nietzsche (or certain elements of his thought) has indirectly influenced Trump, even if he has never directly read any Nietzsche. Furthermore, Fred Trump and Roy Cohn instilled in him many Nietzschean ideas about the strong and the weak (along the lines of “birds of prey” and “the herd”), amorality (“might makes right” and being “beyond good and evil”), will to power, and domination (i.e. being a “killer”).
Moreover, Nietzsche heavily influenced Ayn Rand, whose novels (e.g. ‘The Fountainhead’ and ‘Atlas Shrugged’) have influenced many (wealthy) libertarians and conservatives, including many CEOs, hedge fund managers, private equity managers, and investment bankers. The Ayn Rand Institute even uses the phrase “the Makers and the Takers.” Like Nietzsche, Ayn Rand glorifies the individual (especially creative geniuses like Howard Roark in ‘The Fountainhead’) and condemned collectivism (Marxism, socialism, FDR liberalism).
So, yes, one can plausibly argue that Nietzsche was a Social Darwinist and proto-fascist or precursor to fascism, and that there are strong connections between Nietzsche (or certain elements of his thought), Trump, and the plutocracy. And even if I’m wrong and Nietzsche was neither a Social Darwinist nor a proto-fascist, all my other comments about Social Darwinism, 2020, the pandemic, the rich versus the poor, and the Republican Party are accurate. One cannot reasonably deny that there are numerous Social Darwinian forces at work.
To clarify: I do not think that Nietzsche (or certain elements of his thought) and Social Darwinism are the only forces at work. The playbook that the plutocrats, Republicans, and some Democrats are following is not simply the playbook of Nietzsche and Social Darwinism. The playbook also includes major elements from Ayn Rand, Milton Friedman, Robert Nozick, libertarianism, neo-liberalism, etc. But Nietzschean elements and Social Darwinism are important parts of the playbook.
Nietzsche has had a massive cultural influence on the 20th and 21st centuries, and the plutocratic playbook reflects this influence.
The Will to Power, which you quote, was taken from Nietzsche's notebooks by his sister, who was a proto-Nazi. Leiter, among many others, claims that the fact that Nietzsche never published such remarks indicate that he ultimately rejected them.
Nietzsche states that he is not a Darwinist because in the struggle for the "fittest", many of the most sensitive and creative individuals are destroyed and the Trumps and the Roy Cohens triumph. Nietzsche wants to promote more Beethovens, not more Roy Cohens. Social Darwinian fittest is not a value for him. Nietzsche can be no more blamed for being misread by the Nazis than Marx can be blamed for being misread by Stalin.
How about _Democracy for Realists_? Never read it myself, but it comes with a good reputation and seems like it might be right.
It could also be good for someone around 14. In my experience, politically engaged kids around that age have a tendency to become very partisan, very fast. This could be a useful antidote to such premature alignment!
Okay, so are we to understand that Enam el Brux is the identity which Prof. Wolff assumes when he wishes to comment without appearing too intrusive? I was wondering why he removes so many of his own comments.
Kudos to Michigan’s Republicans legislators who, at Trump’s request, met with him at the White House, and then issued a statement indicating, in their words, that they would not succumb to threats or intimidation, and will choose electors who will fulfill the will of Michigan’s voters by selecting Biden as the winner in Michigan. This grab for power by Trump exceeds anything that has ever occurred in this country. Hopefully, the Republican legislators in Arizona and Georgia will show as much backbone as those in Michigan.
One more book recommendation which has not been mentioned, perhaps because of its author’s identity, “Profiles in Courage,” which at one time was hailed as a very informative work about American history, but has perhaps fallen into disfavor. In any case, the consensus appears to be that the book was actually ghost written by Theodore (Teddy?) Sorensen, not John Kennedy.
And scratch my last comment about the identity of Enam el Brux. Upon rereading the tripartite elements of his/her philosophy, they do not coincide with Prof. Wolff’s. Enam el Brux, who are you?
I don't know the literature on U.S. electoral politics, but I would think that books suggested by Jerry Fresia above would be good gifts. With regard to his suggestion of the biography of Che Guevara, I would add that Guevara's own book The Motorcycle Diaries is a terrifically interesting read. On the Nietzsche question: Nietzsche had a life-long hatred of both democracy and egalitarianism; everything else was worthy of nuanced consideration. He did say some guardedly positive things about Solon, but that was probably because Solon was an innovative value-giver and a poet. I first read Nietzsche right after my 15th birthday, in a long out-of-print selection of his writings, with pre-Walter Kaufmann translations. It induced a life-long interest in him, and, although I'm not a Nietzsche scholar, I have for example taught a graduate seminar on him. I'm not sure where a teenager would best start: if he's also interested in the arts, it might be The Birth of Tragedy. For adults I've suggested Twilight of the Idols. When I was a teenager I got a big kick and a lot of laughs from Ecce Homo. Any of them might do the trick, except probably not Untimely Meditations or Human-All-Too-Human.
John Rapko,
Since you are a professor of the philosophy of art, you may be interested in a documentary I saw recently titled “Who The &% Is Jackson Pollock?” about a woman who purchased a painting at a thrift shop as a gift for a friend. When she was told that the painting looked like it could be a Pollock- whom she had never heard of - and might be very valuable, she had it appraised, which caused a storm of debate as to whether it was, or was not, a genuine Pollock. If it were, it would be worth some $10 million. Various art critics and are appraisers differed – Thomas Hoving maintained that it was not; Peter Brio, a forensic art expert, maintained that it was. Even though the owner was offered several million to sell it, but not the amount it would be worth if it were authentic, she has refused to sell it.
C.,
Upon reflection, I believe that you are partially right above.
Nietzsche can be seen in at least three ways.
1. As a philosopher: Nietzsche the philosopher should be judged, I believe, by the books he wrote, not by his notebooks.
2. As a person: Nietzsche the person wrote the remarks which appear in his notebooks. There's a Bob Dylan line (from It's all right ma): "if my thought dreams could be seen/they'd probably put my head in a guillotine". I believe that's true about most of us, but maybe Nietzsche was less repressed than the rest of us about noting down his politically incorrect thoughts in a notebook or maybe he had more politically incorrect thoughts than the rest of us.
3. As a cultural phenomenon: The Will to Power, the selection from his notebooks compiled by his protofascist sister after he went mad, are part of Nietsche the cultural phenomenon. Nietzsche interpreters such as Heidegger and Deleuze work mainly from The Will to Power, not to mention the Nazis who acted in bad faith when they interpreted Nietzsche. Nietzsche the cultural phenomenon counts, although he's not responsible for that at all.
Nietzsche 2 and 3 are social darwinists, although not protofascists except in the very distorted Nazi interpetation. As I said above, Nietzsche is not an anti-semite (he explicitly calls himself an "anti-antisemite"), he's not a German nationalist, and above all, he would have seen 50 thousand people chanting "Heil Hitler" in unison as herd mentality, the thing he most despised.
Now Nietzsche 2 and 3 are not orthodox social darwinists because Nietzsche does not see the struggle as one between the fittest, but between those who have the strongest will to power. He does see life as struggle, at least in Nietzsche 2 and 3.
One further note: I don't think that either in his published work or his notebooks can one find a single remark favorable to capitalists or the rich or the bourgeoisie, not because he has a Marxist take on exploitation but because he has the typical 19th century
counter-cultural scorn for those who dedicate their lives to earning money. In that sense, he has nothing to do with Ayn Rand.
Walter Kauffman's book on Nietzsche I believe is entitled, "Philosopher, Psychologist, Anti-Christ". I used to use that as a letter-head way back in the uproarious 80's. My mother always sent the letters back---return to sender. Dad, however, always responded; "Hey, just get a god-damn job".
I have a book recommendation for those who enjoy reading Nietzsche and about Nietzsche. It is titled, “When Nietzsche Wept,” by Irvin Yalom. It is based on Nietzsche’s infatuation with Loue Andreas-Salome, a Russian femme fatale, who had many lovers, including Nietzsche’s close friend, Paul Ree. The events described in the novel take place before Nietzsche has achieved prominence as a writer and philosopher. Via Salome’s intervention, he seeks treatment from Dr. Josef Breuer, a protégé of Freud and the originator of the therapy which Freud perfected as psycho-therapy.
Dr. Yalom is himself a highly regarded psychiatrist, a developer of the methodology of group therapy, professor emeritus of psychiatry at Stanford, and a superb writer. He has written several novels which combine psychiatry and philosophy, including “The Schopenhauer Cure” and “Love’s Executioner,” and I recommend them all.
Thanks.
Robert Dahl's classic, A Preface to Democratic Theory, has a few graphs and isn't too deep a dive.
I have a cinema question. Why hasn’t a bio-movie been produced about the life of Nietzsche. They’ve done Freud (several times), Jung, Oliver Sacks, so why not Nietzsche? It would be fascinating. Michael Fassbender (who played Jung in A Dangerous Method), Russell Crowe (A Beautiful Mind), or Anthony Hopkins (his depiction of Hannibal Lecter notwithstanding) could portray Nietzsche, and I nominate s. wallerstein (in all seriousness) to write the script. All proceeds could be donated to a charity or the Philosophy Dept. of the script writer's choice.
S. Wallerstein:
I specifically claimed that Nietzsche was a fascist, proto-fascist, or precursor to fascism. I never said that Nietzsche was a Nazi, German nationalist, or anti-Semite. You can be a fascist without being a Nazi (e.g. Mussolini and Franco, although they were sympathetic to Hitler and Nazism). You can be a fascist without being a German nationalist (e.g. Mussolini and Franco, who were Italian and Spanish nationalists respectively; or Stephen Miller, Jared Kushner, and Steve Bannon who are American nationalists and fascists). And you can be a fascist without being anti-Semitic or while being Jewish (e.g. Stephen Miller, Jared Kushner, or Ivanka Trump).
And, yes, I’m aware that Nietzsche said many favorable things about Jews and scathing things about Germany, Germans, and German nationalism. And, yes, if he had seen the Nazi Nuremberg rallies, he likely would have been appalled by such herd behavior. But I think he would have grudgingly recognized that Hitler was aspiring to be the next Caesar or Napoleon and was imposing his superior will to power on Germany and the rest of Europe.
In any case, I still maintain that Nietzsche has many fascistic elements in his thought: the will to power, master ethics, dominance, aggression, strength, hardness, beasts of prey, exploitation, slavery, the sacrifice of the herd, the order of rank, and aristocratic radicalism.
If Nietzsche has no fascistic elements in his thought, then why does the Alt Right consider him (as well as Heidegger) an intellectual godfather? Why does Richard B. Spencer cite Nietzsche as a key figure in his intellectual development (note: he took a graduate course in Nietzsche at the University of Chicago when he was getting his MA there)? Why do so many Neo-Nazis draw inspiration from him? If Nietzsche were explicitly, categorically, and consistently opposed to fascism, then there would not be so many fascists appealing to him.
Regarding The Will to Power: Yes, I know that Nietzsche’s Nazi sister (Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche) and his friend (Peter Gast or Heinrich Köselitz, who had many conversations with Nietzsche and was well-versed in his thought), assembled and edited this text. It consists of 1067 aphorisms, all of which Nietzsche himself thought and wrote. Yes, Elisabeth and Peter selected and organized the aphorisms and could have imposed their bias to some degree, but Nietzsche still thought and wrote all these aphorisms. Now, if these aphorisms largely contradicted what Nietzsche writes in his official, published writings, then you could argue that we should entirely dismiss The Will to Power since it consists of unpublished writings. However, overall, The Will to Power overwhelmingly coheres with Nietzsche’s official, published writings. Reading it is like reading a rough, choppy overview of all his major ideas but he emphasizes certain concepts (namely, the will to power) more. So, yes, we should take The Will to Power seriously, as long as we consider it alongside his other, published works. That is, we should assign it some weight (but not total weight) alongside his other, published works. And John Richardson is a leading Nietzsche scholar who basically agrees with this.
Continued:
Furthermore, in his official, published writings (outside The Will to Power ), Nietzsche makes many comments that basically parallel Social Darwinism:
The Gay Science 73: “Holy cruelty.—A man who held a newborn child in his hands approached a holy man. "What shall I do with this child?" he asked; "it is wretched, misshapen, and does not have life enough to die." "Kill it!" shouted the holy man with a terrible voice; "and then hold it in your arms for three days and three nights to create a memory for yourself; never again will you beget a child this way when it is not time for you to beget."—When the man had heard this, he walked away disappointed, and many people reproached the holy man because he had counseled cruelty; for he had counseled the man to kill the child. "But is it not crueler to let it live?" asked the holy man.”
Beyond Good and Evil 257: “Every elevation of the type ‘human being’ has so far been the work of an aristocratic society—and it will be so again and again: a society, which believes in a long ladder of the rank-order and difference in value between human and human, . . . needs slavery in some sense or other. ”
The Gay Science 377: “[W]e count ourselves among conquerors; we think about the necessity for new orders, also for a new slavery—for every strengthening and elevation of the type ‘human being’ also involves a new kind of enslavement.”
The Antichrist 3: “The problem I thus pose is not what shall redeem humanity in the succession of beings […]: but what type of human one should breed, should will, as of higher value, worthier of life, surer of a future.”
Beyond Good and Evil 62: “[S]overeign religions are among the chief causes that have kept the type ‘human’ on a lower rung—they have preserved too much of what should perish.”
The Antichrist 7: “[P]ity crosses the law of evolution, which is the law of selection. It preserves what is ripe for destruction; it defends those who have been disinherited and condemned by life”; it “crosses those instincts which aim at the preservation of life and at the enhancement of its value.”
Ecce Homo iv.8: “In the concept of the good human one sides with all that is weak, sick, failed, suffering of itself, with all that ought to perish—that crosses the law of selection.”
Beyond Good and Evil 265: “[E]goism belongs to the essence of a noble soul, I mean that unshakable faith that to a being such as ‘we are’ other beings must be subordinate by nature and have to sacrifice themselves.”
Continued:
Beyond Good and Evil 259: “Here we must think things through thoroughly, and ward off any sentimental weakness: life itself is essentially a process of appropriating, injuring, overpowering the alien and the weaker, oppressing, being harsh, imposing your own form, incorporating, and at least, the very least, exploiting… [Even a body of individuals who treat each other as equals] will have to be the embodiment of will to power, it will want to grow, spread, grab, win dominance,—not out of any morality or immorality, but because it is alive, and because life is precisely will to power… “Exploitation” does not belong to a corrupted or imperfect, primitive society: it belongs to the essence of being alive as a fundamental organic function; it is a result of genuine will to power, which is just the will to life. [...] at the level of reality, it is the primal fact of all history. Let us be honest with ourselves to this extent at least!”
So, yes, in his official, published writings, Nietzsche the philosopher (as opposed to Nietzsche the person or Nietzsche the cultural phenomenon) expresses support for many Social Darwinian ideas. He may not completely agree with the Social Darwinists (as John Richardson argues in Nietzsche's New Darwinism) but his thought overlaps with theirs to a large degree.
Therefore, in conclusion, Nietzsche has many fascistic elements in his thought and many Social Darwinian elements in his thought. And we should take The Will to Power seriously, as long as we consider it alongside his other, published works.
First of all, I admire you energy. I certainly don't have the energy to search through the works of Nietzsche to find so many quotes and copy them out.
I concede on the social Darwinism, but not on the fascist question.
I have a narrower conception of what fascism is than you do: it involves aggressive nationalism (which Nietzsche rejected) and a formal or informal mass movement such as the Black Shirts, SA or SS. Nietzsche would have rejected any kind of right or leftwing mass movement as a manifestation of the herd.
That U.S. fascists read Nietzsche does not make him one anyone more the Nazi reading of him made him a Nazi or Pol Pot's reading of Marx make him complicit in genocide.
For example, you mention Nietzsche's aristocratic radicalism and I concede that, but his aristocratic radicalism is elitist and non-fascist since it rejects the fascist herd.
Do people expect that in the future, philosophy readers with a social conscience will feel uneasy owning books by Nietzsche, or Heidegger, for example?
I feel somewhat guilty, or at least "dirty," to be associated as a consumer with writers who support or espouse what stinks of bigotry and fascism. But in defense of Nietzsche and Heidegger, obviously there are enough decent people and serious scholars who insist that their writings are indisputably worthwhile in spite of the moral-political stains their reputations have justly or unjustly acquired.
So, sure, I do have a handful of sketchy authors in my book collection, but I figure that it's clear enough (or would be to someone who allowed me to explain) that my interest in them has little to do with what makes them sketchy. But still, I'll admit to being troubled by pieces like the following, which describe the alt-right's growing admiration for these figures:
https://jacobinmag.com/2019/01/neitzsche-heidegger-ronald-beiner-far-right?fbclid=IwAR3Pm6D79oQ27U9KNmP8sNiwD5h_xNB0-B7mPxByAB3jKmwk87pRgq1jY6M
I wonder if it wouldn't be too far off to envision a future where committed feminists, anti-racists, and progressives in general will be inclined to look askance at someone for owning books by Nietzsche and Heidegger, or for perusing them in a bookstore, etc., just as people do now with Ayn Rand or Jordan Peterson or what-have-you.
There is, as far as I can see, a Nietzsche boom right now.
When I look at the most solicited books section in the Santiago public library, there are more Nietzsche books there than of any other philosophers. Next is probably Foucault, then Plato, then Marx. By the way, given where it is situated, the Santiago public library does not cater to rightwingers.
When I look at the philosophy books displayed on the table to attract customers at Metales Pesados bookstore, I also see more Nietzsche than any other. Metales Pesados bookstore is geared towards the leftie, the feminist and the counter-cultural reader.
So just as there is a Nietzsche boom among the alt-right there is a Nietzsche boom among
the postmodern left, among the Foucault queer theory people, among a certain type of environmentalist (there is plenty of environmental material in Zarathustra, for example.).
Nietzsche is entertaining to read, probably the most entertaining philosopher and my guess is that given that people enjoy reading him, they are more likely to try to find support for whatever focus they already have in their head in Nietzsche than in Kant, who is boring in my opinion at least.
What's more, given Nietzsche's aphoristic style, you can find here or there an aphorism which will support many different positions, although not liberal democracy or socialism.
And given the aphoristic style, you can skip the aphorisms which turn you off without losing the thread of the text.
Michael:
“I wonder if it wouldn't be too far off to envision a future where committed feminists, anti-racists, and progressives in general will be inclined to look askance at someone for owning books by Nietzsche and Heidegger, or for perusing them in a bookstore, etc., just as people do now with Ayn Rand or Jordan Peterson or what-have-you.”
I own, and have read, many primary and secondary texts on Nietzsche and Heidegger, as well as Ayn Rand’s ‘The Fountainhead.’ I also own numerous Leo Strauss books, and in college I took several courses with a “Straussian.” He was actually a great teacher; we rarely talked about contemporary politics.
If other progressives negatively judge me for owning and reading these books, then I don’t give a shit. I’ve fully read Piketty’s ‘Capital in the 21st Century’ and ‘Capital and Ideology,’ I voted for Bernie in the 2016 and 2020 primaries, I’ve signed many of his petitions, and I’ve donated money consistently to him and Elizabeth Warren (although I disagree with them on certain issues).
You can read texts by conservatives or far right-wingers, take their perspective seriously, perhaps agree with them on certain points, but still be a liberal or progressive overall. I can read the most hardcore right-wing stuff (e.g. Nietzsche’s ‘The Will to Power’), and I will always be an FDR liberal at the end of the day, although I may be aware of the potential limits and drawbacks of such liberalism.
If you read only leftist books (e.g. Marx and Piketty), you will be intellectually limited, narrow-minded, and prone to confirmation bias. You need to critically examine and stress-test your liberal views. Thus I favor rigorous, critical, multi-dimensional, intellectual inquiry, intellectual debate, and intellectual diversity.
Overall, liberals need to avoid censorship, cancel culture, extreme political correctness (as opposed to reasonable political correctness), hardcore identity politics (e.g. white and black people, or men and women, cannot possibly understand each other’s perspective and thus cannot communicate rationally or find rational common ground), and the descent into left-wing totalitarianism. Liberals should not be emulating the Thought Police.
If some (extreme) right-winger is giving a university lecture, do not try to cancel his lecture, shout him down, provoke a fight with his supporters, or physically assault him (which happened to Charles Murray at Middlebury College). Instead, ask him sharp, incisive questions and try to rebut or refute his views. Or hold a separate lecture rebutting or refuting his views. Or protest peacefully outside.
I’ve enjoyed reading this thread since I no nothing about Nietzsche. Two observations:
First, you can’ t separate or compartmentalize Nietzsche for purposes of analysis. He, like any subject of historical analysis needs to be understood as a totality. The person can’t be separated from published works, notes not published, etc. Every intellectual’s work needs to be understood in it’s totality. Think of all the energy spent in defense of partial understandings of Marx that were based on limited availability not just of published material but also his notes, which comprised The Grundrisse, the second and third volumes of Capital, and The Theory of Surplus Value. If one is going to assume the role of an intellectual historian, it all must taken into account.
Second, I must take issue with S.Wallerstein’s definition of Fascism. As I recall, we have disagreed about when there Trump is a fascist in the past. I agree that fascism involves aggressive nationalism, and a mass movement. I think fascists are what fascists do: they identify a group that is the cause of society’s problems and exploit fear and hatred of that group to acquire and maintain power. This has historically involved white supremacy, at least as fascism has manifested in Western Civilization. The superior group needs an inferior group to provide a contrast, and when necessary, as a foil fo maintain power. At it’s extreme it is genocidal. I see the dynamic of using fear and hatred of a group and exploiting that to gain and keep power as essential to the the definition of fascism. I am curious as to why you do not include that element in your definition.
With respect to Nietzsche, the will to power involves domination and subordination, a criteria every civilization thus far has met. All that is needed is for the dominate group to identify a subordinate group to blame for societies problems for fascism to arise. Perhaps there is an elective affinity between Nietzsche’s theory and Fascism. That affinity is likely the link between his work and the white supremacist, far-right fascists groups.
Christopher Mulvaney,
The superior group scapegoating an inferior group for the problems of society is always there in contemporary capitalist society.
For fascism to occur there need be a further step or several further steps. That is, fascism is an intensification for that normal scapegoating.
Bigotry and scapegoating have been used since the beginning of U.S. society to channel frustrations of the general population against Native-Americans, blacks, at times Jews, immigrants, leftists during the 50's, Muslims, formerly homosexuals, etc., yet I just don't think that it has ever reached the threshold of fascism. It's a question of determining the threshold.
No suggestions for who might play Nietzsche in a bio-pic or in a dramatization of “When Nietzsche Wept”? Paul Muni would have been a natural, with his grand moustache and superb acting credentials (four nominations for Best Actor, one win for “The Life Of Louis Pasteur”), but he, sadly, has passed on. Perhaps Vigo Mortesnsen, who played Freud in “A Dangerous Method”?
Wallerstein,
Funny how I didn’t use the term ‘scapegoating’ once, but you hang your response on it. So, your explanation for not including the persecution of a group(s) of people as a central element of fascism is that you don’t know where scapegoating stops and persecution begins? Where is the threshold? How many steps up the ladder of violence? Can you give us a hint? But you do know that there is no fascism in the U.S. Not knowing the criteria you can nonetheless apply it. That’s a good one, I mean that is rich.
But thanks, anyway, for your puerile response. Gee, like, I didn’t know all that about scapegoating in American history. So you really think that a certain level of violence must be reached for a party or government to be called fascist. On the contrary, I think that ship sailed when Trump gave the speech announcing his candidacy when he identified the group of rapists, murderer and drug dealers responsible for the woes of the country, and sailed again when he took children from their parents, imprisoned the children and effectively orphaned them, and again when he identified areas represented by African Americans as rat infested slums, and again when he told us all the suburbs would become slums if a democrat were elected president, and once more when announced that there were good people on the fascist, anti-semitic, white supremacist right. I have more than enough evidence to label Trump as a fascist. A body count isn’t necessary.
Historical evidence suggests that it doesn’t take along for fascist violence to ramp up, and when it does, it may be too late to do anything about it. How long do you wait, how many bodies have to pile up before you identify this s**t as fascist?
Let us know when you have the answer
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