# I Am Dynamite! by Sue Prideaux - Blinkist

What’s in it for me? Learn about the fascinating life of influential philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.

These days, Friedrich Nietzsche is a key name in the history of philosophy – a late nineteenth-century figure whose complex writings proved hugely influential to many future movements, including existentialism. But his professional career was hardly a success; he only gained renown after his descent into madness.

Nietzsche’s career began impressively. He was appointed Chair of Classical Philology at just 24 and soon made the acquaintance of the great Richard Wagner. But the books he published fell flat, his health deteriorated, and he eventually succumbed to mental illness.

Why was Nietzsche’s life so difficult? What were his books really about? And what sort of influence did he end up having on the world? You’ll find out in these blinks!

In these blinks, you’ll learn



how Nietzsche and Wagner bonded in beautiful Lucerne;

why Nietzsche declared the death of God; and

how his sister Elisabeth controlled his legacy into the twentieth century.

Friedrich Nietzsche’s early years set him on a great intellectual path.

One day in November 1868, a sickly but brilliant student at Leipzig University – Friedrich Nietzsche – received a life-changing invitation. But he almost didn’t make it; a last-minute disagreement with his tailor’s assistant left him without formal evening wear.

Running late, Nietzsche had to dash through the pouring rain without a dinner jacket to meet the man who would become his mentor and friend: the great composer and polemicist Richard Wagner.

The two bonded over Wagner’s music and their mutual appreciation for the work of the then obscure philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. Nietzsche left with a cherished invitation to visit Wagner at home.

It was a dream come true for young Nietzsche, whose intense intellect and passion for music were evident from early childhood.

The key message here is: Friedrich Nietzsche’s early years set him on a great intellectual path.

Nietzsche was born in the Saxon town of Röcken in 1844 to his mother, Franziska, and Lutheran minister father, Karl Ludwig. His sister Elisabeth was born two years later; Friedrich affectionately called her “Llama.”

Tragedy struck the family in 1849, when Karl Ludwig died after months of horrible illness and near-blindness, at just 35. His doctors ascribed cause of death to a brain condition. Young Friedrich was also prone to severe headaches and eye pain, which sometimes left him bedridden for up to a week.

The family then moved to the larger city of Naumburg, but from the age of 14 Friedrich boarded at the Schulpforta – the local elite school. Despite his delicate health Nietzsche excelled, showing a particular aptitude for philology, the study of ancient languages and texts.

He initially continued his studies at the theological faculty in Bonn to fulfill his mother’s wish that he enter the clergy. But his intellect was drawn to philology, and he soon left Bonn to study it in Leipzig with professor Albrecht Ritschl. Shortly after his meeting with Wagner the precocious student was offered the Chair of Classical Philology at the University of Basel in Switzerland. At just 24, he was the youngest person ever to be appointed to this post.

Enthralled by the Wagners, Nietzsche wrote his first book in idyllic Lucerne.

Nietzsche was thrilled by this appointment – particularly as Basel was near Lucerne, where Wagner lived. Once settled, he took the train down to the lake, made his way to the Wagner residence, and knocked on the door.

Wagner’s home in Lucerne, called Tribschen, was a paradise for Nietzsche. The ornate villa became a second home – complete with his own room – as his friendship with both Richard and his wife, Cosima Wagner, flourished.

The key message here is: Enthralled by the Wagners, Nietzsche wrote his first book in idyllic Lucerne.

The composer was some 30 years Nietzsche’s senior, but they bonded over talk of philosophy and music. Nietzsche’s classical education impressed Wagner, who was fond of Greek tragedy but couldn’t read the language. The young Nietzsche was spellbound by the genius of his new friend and entranced by the forceful personality of Cosima.

The three became inseparable friends – so close that Nietzsche was once tasked with buying new silk underpants for the composer. There were also spectacular walks in the surrounding mountains including Mount Pilatus, the fabled site of Pontius Pilate’s suicide after the crucifixion of Christ.

But Wagner was not the only influential thinker Nietzsche befriended during this time. The eccentric professor Jacob Burckhardt became an intellectual sparring partner. Burckhardt was a revolutionary, but he detested nationalism. Unlike the bellicose Wagner, Burckhardt dreaded the looming specter of the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.

Nietzsche served as an ambulance attendant during the war and was appalled by the devastation he witnessed. But it was only a matter of weeks before his delicate health required he leave this post. He returned to Basel firmly opposed to the conflict. 

Though Nietzsche and the Wagners did not agree on this issue, the friendship endured for the time being. Nietzsche’s first book, The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music, stands as testament: Nietzsche penned it as a kind of pro-Wagner manifesto. In it, he claims the ancient Greek tragedians as noble precedent to Wagner’s new form of “music drama,” epitomized by Tristan and Isolde and the Ring cycle.

The book introduces the conflict between the ordered, elegant Apollonian and the wild, ecstatic Dionysian – a duality crucial to much of Nietzsche’s thought. Music and tragedy were both Dionysian art forms, capable of transporting the spirit to a state of bliss.

The Wagners loved Nietzsche’s book, but their time in Lucerne had come to an end. Filled with fond memories, they moved to Bayreuth in 1872 to supervise production of the opera house where the Ring would be performed. Meanwhile Nietzsche once again fell into illness.

Nietzsche struggled with his career, his health, and his relationships after The Birth of Tragedy.

After The Birth of Tragedy, Nietzsche’s stellar academic career swiftly plummeted. Bizarrely out of step with the times, the book garnered almost no attention from Nietzsche’s friends and fellow scholars. His former teacher, Professor Ritschl, wrote a polite letter to the author but scribbled damning judgments in his personal copy. Burckhardt was likewise polite, but unimpressed.

Nietzsche also sought critique on a musical work he had composed, but even the Wagners remained tight-lipped. The conductor Hans von Bülow eventually gave him feedback – but it was cruel. “Is this all some awful joke?” he asked. 

In short, the rising star suddenly found himself firmly back on earth.

The key message here is: Nietzsche struggled with his career, his health, and his relationships after The Birth of Tragedy.

The work was a blow to Nietzsche’s academic reputation, and only two students signed up for his philology course in Basel after publication. Not that Nietzsche really was a philologist anymore – he was far more interested in philosophy. He continued writing and embarked on a series of what he called Untimely Meditations, but this book, too, met with a chilly reception.

The stress proved too much for his health, which catastrophically declined. He became unable to tolerate natural light. For any trip outside, he wore thick, tinted glasses and a sun visor. His sister Elisabeth, still unmarried, became his caregiver and eventually moved in with him to provide constant support.

Meanwhile, his relationship with the Wagners was fraying. His first trip to visit them in Bayreuth felt awkward. Wagner later offered Nietzsche some paternalistic advice, suggesting he marry – counsel quite poorly received by the frail young philosopher.

Once a wunderkind, Nietzsche now found himself nearing 30 with a bad – and further declining – academic reputation. He was ever-conscious of his father’s early death, expecting the same for himself.

From this low point, some positives emerged. One of his Meditations, “Schopenhauer as Educator,” was relatively well received, and he found an eager disciple in the young composer Johann Heinrich Köselitz, who became his secretary. The controlling Nietzsche would later take the strange step of renaming him: he called him “Peter Gast.”

He also befriended the aging anarchist Malwida von Meysenbug, who became a godmother-like figure, and the philosopher Paul Rée, who introduced Nietzsche to the rationalism of Voltaire and greatly influenced his thinking.

Rée also introduced Nietzsche to a young woman, with far greater consequences.

After Human, All Too Human, Nietzsche spent years wandering around Europe.

Despite recent humiliations, Nietzsche charted a bold, new intellectual course in 1876. Human, All Too Human was his first book written in aphoristic style, terse and epigrammatic. He dedicated it to Voltaire – despite the disapproval of Wagner.

Nietzsche was carving his own path, and it became clear that his future did not lie in philology. In 1879, he resigned from Basel, blaming poor health. While not untrue, it was far from the full picture.

The university granted him a pension for the next six years, affording him some financial stability. But very little else remained stable in the lifestyle he chose to adopt.

The key message here is: After Human, All Too Human, Nietzsche spent years wandering around Europe.

Human, All Too Human argues that there is no eternal truth – everything is contingent upon circumstances. Importantly, that includes religion, which Nietzsche confidently assails. He equally cautions against blind faith in science; we must question science as ruthlessly as religion.

This intellectual evolution pleased Burckhardt and Rée but offended many others – including Nietzsche’s Christian sister. Richard Wagner declined to read it, but Cosima did. She attributed its failings to the pernicious influence of Paul Rée – who was Jewish. 

Nietzsche called this period his Wanderjahre – his years of wandering – in which he explored Alpine Europe from a series of resorts. He wandered without a permanent home, or nationality, having given up his citizenship when he moved to Switzerland.

He wrote Daybreak, describing himself as an “aeronaut of the spirit,” soaring above others in the Alps. He grew particularly fond of the cool summers in Sils-Maria, a village near St. Moritz. Yet his health – particularly his eyes – remained poor.

Rée wrote in 1882, imploring him to come to Rome and meet the young Lou Salomé, a highly intelligent and charming young woman and future pioneer in psychoanalysis; Nietzsche accepted. But this was no ordinary matchmaking. Lou’s desire was to live with both Rée and Nietzsche, in a passionate but platonic ménage à trois.

Captivated, the two men agreed. But this so-called “holy trinity” was far from harmonious, as the two men constantly vied for Lou’s attention.

On one occasion in May, Nietzsche and Lou escaped from Rée to climb the fearsome Monte Sacro. High above the Italian lakes, they discussed philosophy with rare intensity, and he disclosed to her his deepest thoughts. He ranked this among the greatest experiences of his life.

Nietzsche’s ever more confident philosophy was out of step with his chaotic private life.

The same year that Nietzsche entangled himself between Rée and Salomé, 1882, he penned the infamous words: “God is dead.”

They first appear in his book The Gay Science. Nietzsche tells the story of a madman running through a marketplace, yelling: “God is dead! God remains dead! And we have killed him.” 

But the central question of the book is, What should we do now? Nietzsche was intrigued by the moral vacuum that might emerge as the old dominance of Christian dogma seemed poised at the brink of extinction. What lay ahead for mankind, without a guiding moral force? The future could spell tragedy, he observed.

Nietzsche’s own future, meanwhile, was precariously bound to his curious relationship with Lou Salomé and Paul Rée.

The key message here is: Nietzsche’s ever more confident philosophy was out of step with his chaotic private life.

Despite Nietzsche’s rift with Wagner, the 1882 premiere of Parsifal in Bayreuth was such a major cultural event that it forced recognition. It was Wagner’s first new work since the Ring cycle.

However, Parsifal’s deep Christian influence confirmed the striking dissonance that had developed between Nietzsche and Wagner’s philosophies. More personally, Nietzsche was not invited by the composer and so refused to attend. But he used the opportunity for what he considered an ingenious ploy.

He decided to send Lou to the premiere along with his sister, Elisabeth, to strengthen his familial bond with Lou – and exclude the jealous Rée.

The trip was disastrous. Lou revelled in the aristocratic atmosphere, and her flirtatious demeanor shocked Elisabeth. Meanwhile, Elisabeth had to contend with malicious gossip about her brother. This included the news that five years earlier, Wagner had written to Nietzsche’s doctor about his suspicions that the philosopher was masturbating – believed at the time to cause blindness. Along with a scandalous picture of Lou brandishing a whip at Nietzsche and Rée, this became the talk of the festival.

Elisabeth left early, but the two had arranged to join Nietzsche after the festival at a nearby resort. This, too, turned out to be a particularly awkward holiday.

With the sulking Elisabeth remaining home, Nietzsche and Lou took long forest walks, during which the philosopher discussed his ideas with vehement intensity. It proved too much for Lou. She and Rée ran away together not long afterward.

Nietzsche was devastated. But, having declared the death of God, he was overflowing with ideas for his writing.

Nietzsche wrote the ecstatic Thus Spoke Zarathustra at a time of great torment.

Reeling from Lou’s departure, Nietzsche’s health suffered gravely during the winter of 1882–83. His choice of medication didn’t help – he began taking opium, which he confirmed in a series of alarming letters sent from his temporary home in Rapallo, a coastal town near Genoa.

On Christmas Day, however, he began writing what would become one of his most remarkable and influential works: the philosophical novel, Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

But for all its rhapsodic talk of a “superman,” Nietzsche himself was more sickly and frail than ever.

The key message here is: Nietzsche wrote the ecstatic Thus Spoke Zarathustra at a time of great torment.

Nietzsche published Thus Spoke Zarathustra in four books, but the first was the most influential. In it, Zarathustra, an ancient Persian prophet, descends from a mountain after ten years of solitude. He preaches: “Human being is something that must be overcome.” The superman must emerge in its place. 

Nietzsche stops short of defining exactly what he means by “superman,” but he depicts a strong leader who can resolve the moral crisis plaguing mankind since the death of God. For the superman, the death of God is liberating – not an excuse for nihilism.

Nietzsche was in Genoa to post the manuscript to his publisher when he learned that Wagner had died the day before. He considered this an omen.

The second book of Zarathustra reveals Nietzsche’s deep wound at the betrayal of Lou and Rée – the “tarantulas” depicted in his thinly veiled text. Nietzsche realized how autobiographical it was with surprise. The third book ends with a parody of The Revelation, the final book of the Bible, in which he declares he loves no woman except “Eternity.” In the fourth book, Zarathustra welcomes a variety of influential figures into his cave – including the Pope, Schopenhauer, Wagner, and Nietzsche himself.

Nietzsche’s mother considered his books blasphemous, but there was a more pressing issue causing family chaos. To the alarm of both Nietzsche and his mother, sister Elisabeth had become engaged to the German nationalist Bernhard Förster, a vocal supporter for the foundation of a new German settlement in Paraguay – one free from “Jewish influence.” Nietzsche did not support this movement.

Meanwhile, his health continued its steep decline. One acquaintance came to visit him in 1884, to find him delirious and in a distressed state; she suspected he was using opium or hashish. He asked her if she thought he was going mad like his father. She was terrified.

Despite his finances, health, and reputation, Nietzsche kept writing his incendiary books.

While the third part of Zarathustra was Nietzsche’s eleventh published book, none of his works had sold well – not even a hundred copies in most cases. Unsurprisingly, his publisher Schmeitzner withdrew support. Although he was glad to sever ties with Schmeitzner, an anti-Semite, this was still a blow for Nietzsche.

Another concern was his pension from Basel. Due to expire in 1885, the university kindly decided to renew it for an additional year. Even so, Nietzsche was running out of money.

Nevertheless, he continued to pour his limited resources into his books – now paying to self-publish.

The key message here is: Despite his finances, health, and reputation, Nietzsche kept writing his incendiary books.

The unstable, near-blind philosopher continued his European tour, spending the summer months in the Alps and the winters on the coast. He was a meek and courteous guest in the cheap hotels he frequented. He maintained peculiar diets in the vain hope he might cure his endless bouts of crippling illness.

Yet he managed to produce two strident, new works: Beyond Good and Evil and On the Genealogy of Morality.

As the first book’s provocative title suggests, Nietzsche encouraged readers to stop thinking of good and evil as absolutes. Rather, they are mere conventions, a product of both the defunct Christian faith and a philosophical tradition stretching back to Plato. Instead, we must adopt the morality of the superman, a free spirit driven by what Nietzsche called the “will to power” – that is, someone willing to live boldly, questioning every belief with an open-ended, “What if?”

On the Genealogy of Morality extends this argument and briefly mentions a new concept: the “blond beast.” This phrase is often considered a link between Nietzsche and the Aryan politics of Hitler. But Nietzsche claims this prowling, power-hungry force is, in fact, common to all races – not just the Germans.

The boldness of Nietzsche’s texts was finally garnering interest, and unlike most of his books, Beyond Good and Evil attracted a review. The critic, however, described it as “dangerous.”

Meanwhile, his sister and her new husband were making progress of their own, in more notorious fashion. They established Nueva Germania in Paraguay – intended as a glorious new home for the Fatherland. They had only convinced 14 families to come with them, and the misguided project quickly fell apart. But Elisabeth reveled in her queen-like status and maintained a robust stream of propaganda in the German press.

Nietzsche finally started to receive critical attention – but something was wrong.

Nietzsche’s career received a rare boost In 1887. He sent copies of his books to Georg Brandes in Denmark, one of the most renowned literary critics of the day. Brandes was impressed by what he read and wrote to Nietzsche in praise of his “aristocratic radicalism” – a phrase Nietzsche adored.

Despite receiving an excoriating letter from his sister Elisabeth in Paraguay – Brandes was Jewish – Nietzsche knew he was on the path to true recognition. Thus encouraged, he continued writing.

But all was far from well. His old friend Erwin Rohde was among the first to suspect there was something perniciously wrong with Nietzsche, beyond his standard health complaints. His behavior would suddenly become strange or even uncanny, Rohde observed, and his rhetoric was disturbing. Nietzsche declaimed his great destiny as the herald of a new philosophical age. He appeared delusional, and Rohde severed ties.

The key message here is: Nietzsche finally started to receive critical attention – but something was wrong.

In 1888 Nietzsche discovered Turin. It was a city that suited him well as an “aristocratic radical,” and he added it to his yearly schedule, alongside Nice and Sils-Maria.

In Turin, he once again took up his obsession with Richard Wagner, now a hate figure. He wrote the damning The Case of Wagner followed by Twilight of the Idols – a reference to Twilight of the Gods, the fourth part of Wagner’s Ring cycle. Subtitled “How to philosophize with a hammer,” this book renewed the author’s attack on both philosophy and religion.

His next work, The Anti-Christ, covered familiar ground, although its final section struck a new and disturbing note. It advocated war against Christianity and called for the arrest of priests. He signed the book “The Anti-Christ.” It’s difficult to determine if Nietzsche was being serious or satirical – or, perhaps, just manifesting psychosis.

Ever more convinced of his own importance – seemingly confirmed in the praise of Brandes – he began work on his autobiography. He entitled it Ecce Homo, the words spoken by Pontius Pilate when he presented Christ for crucifixion. Nietzsche compared himself to Christ frequently in its pages, whose first two chapters were titled “Why I Am So Wise” and “Why I Am So Clever.”

“I know my fate,” he wrote. He predicted that “something frightful” would one day be associated with him, for “I am not a man, I am dynamite.”

The delusional Nietzsche slipped into madness.

By Christmas of 1888, Nietzsche had written yet another brief book, Nietzsche contra Wagner, and read through his published work to date. It was all superb, he realized. What a powerful, visionary writer he was – Ecce Homo in particular. “There is no parallel to it even in nature herself,” he wrote.

In this ecstatic state, he penned a series of bizarre Christmas letters, vastly exaggerating his status. He signed a baffling letter to the playwright August Strindberg as “Nietzsche Caesar” and others as “The Crucified.” A letter to Cosima Wagner read simply, “Ariadne, I love you. Dionysus.”

A letter to Burckhardt greatly worried the kindly professor. He took it to Nietzsche’s friend Overbeck, and they both agreed something had to be done.

The key message here is: The delusional Nietzsche slipped into madness.

Nietzsche’s delusions had emerged gradually, but there was a critical moment for his mental health in January 1889. He broke down weeping in a Turin street at the sight of a horse being beaten. His landlord arrived at the scene and escorted him back home. Nietzsche spent several days in his room, singing wildly and crashing around naked, before Overbeck arrived.

Humoring his delusions, Overbeck persuaded Nietzsche to come with him to a clinic in Basel. His behavior there was erratic – sometimes aggressive, sometimes calm. He appeared to believe he could control the weather. Syphilis was often given as the cause of his mental deterioration, but tests at the time were inconclusive.

In March 1890, he left the asylum in the custody of his mother. They soon moved back to the family home in Naumburg. He remained there for several years, experiencing delusional rages and being fully dependent on his mother.

In 1893, his sister Elisabeth returned. Her husband had committed suicide in 1889 amid the failure of their Paraguay venture, and three years later the experiment ended. She sensed greater opportunities back in Germany, where her brother's insanity and the public's interest in his philosophical work were increasing hand in hand.

She worked quickly to establish what she called the “Nietzsche archive” and began to cultivate her brother’s growing legend. When their mother died in 1897, Elisabeth sold the family home in Naumburg and moved to Weimar – the famed cultural city of Goethe and Schiller. She purchased a large estate with the help of Meta von Salis-Marschlins, a concerned friend of Nietzsche’s, with room for her now demented brother to be kept out of sight upstairs.

Nietzsche's work became hugely influential, but he never knew.

Nietzsche never knew true success as a philosopher, though his reputation soared long before his death. Widespread recognition flourished during his decade of madness.

A well-connected young count, Harry Kessler, discovered Nietzsche’s work in 1891. Inspired, he worked tirelessly to promote Nietzsche in his influential circle. Nietzsche, to Kessler and others, was a free spirit and a champion of individualism. The idea of the superman in place of God was particularly resonant. Thus Spoke Zarathustra, in particular, became a fashionable text.

Unbeknownst to the demented Nietzsche isolated in his childhood home, his work inspired the Strindberg play Miss Julie, Munch’s famed painting The Scream, and a whole generation of dangerous, radical thinkers, including Mussolini.

The key message here is: Nietzsche's work became hugely influential, but he never knew.

Elisabeth had spent years cultivating the legend of Nueva Germania to a faraway German audience, and she embarked on a similar task of myth-building for her brother’s legacy. She maintained strict control over his correspondence and catalog of books. Responsibility for the estate had originally fallen to her mother, but Elisabeth bought her out.

Later, the villa in Weimar became a sort of museum for particularly committed Nietzscheans, and Elisabeth hosted salons and parties. Knowing that the philosopher himself was roving around upstairs gave these events a ghoulish thrill. Guests were sometimes even allowed a glimpse of him.

Nietzsche died in 1900. Ignoring his final wishes, Elisabeth arranged a Christian funeral service. 

Elisabeth lived on until 1935, ruthlessly controlling the archive of her brother’s work. She attained considerable success: her writings on her brother won her an honorary doctorate and four Nobel Prize nominations. Ever the committed German nationalist, she took great care to promote her preferred interpretation of Nietzsche’s work. Though Nietzsche himself had not been a nationalist his concepts of the “will to power” and the “blond beast” were co-opted by nationalists as the First World War approached.

Later, the Nazis went further still in using Nietzsche’s texts – from Elisabeth’s selectively edited editions – for their own ends. Hitler visited Elisabeth at the archive after becoming Chancellor in 1933 and again in 1934, when he commissioned a Nietzsche memorial from his preferred architect, Albert Speer. He attended Elisabeth’s funeral the following year.

Back in 1884, Nietzsche had written to his sister confiding his fear of what dangerous people might one day do in his name. But, he wrote, that was inevitable for any great teacher – one might end up a blessing for mankind, or a disaster.

Final summary

The key message in these blinks:

Despite his renown today, Friedrich Nietzsche was an obscure figure for most of his life. He suffered from terrible health and was out of step with the intellectual climate of his day. By the time acclaim eventually arrived, he had descended into madness, and his legacy was manipulated by his sister Elisabeth.

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What to read next: A Brief History of Thought, by Luc Ferry

Reason: Want to discover more about Nietzsche, as well as the ideas of other philosophical thinkers? The following blinks give an overview of western philosophical thought.

Nietzsche’s life was complex and fascinating, but it’s ultimately just one story of many that form the history of philosophy. To learn more about other philosophers and their work, we recommend the blinks to Luc Ferry’s A Brief History of Thought, which traces philosophy from the ancient Greeks to Nietzsche himself and outlines the influence his philosophy had on the twentieth century.