Ebook: Nietzsche's Gay Science

A guide to Nietzsche’s most personal book – but one more often quoted than understood

Includes a clear outline of the place of The Gay Science within Nietzsche’s life

Describes what the text has in common with the earlier writings and how it goes beyond them

Traces important links to the later works and particularly to Beyond Good and Evil, written in the same year

Offers an account of Nietzsche’s critique of religion and of Christianity in particular

Includes helpful resources for students: a chronology of Nietzsche’s life and work, a glossary of key terms, and index of names and subjects and a guide to further reading

From philosophy undergraduates showing off in murky bars to Chidi's unforgettable monologue in TV sensation The Good Place, The Gay Science is one Nietzsche's most-quotable texts. But what do those soundbites actually mean? Robert Miner attends closely to the rhymes and aphorisms that make up Nietzsche’s The Gay Science– and make it so appealing yet so frequently misunderstood. Tracking Nietzsche’s mixture of subtle argumentation, memorable images and provocative rhetoric, Miner opens up multiple ways of interpreting the text and applying it to our own circumstances.

Presupposing no prior knowledge of Nietzsche, Miner begins with the 1882 edition – the first to announce the ‘death of God’, amor fati and eternal recurrence. He also illuminates the significance of Nietzsche’s decision to publish a second edition of The Gay Science in 1887 with a fifth book, 40 aphorisms composed after Zarathustra, a new preface and an appendix of songs.

As well as learning to interpret The Gay Science for yourself, you’ll also become familiar with scholarly debates about Nietzsche’s intentions in The Gay Science.