Couple weeks back I pointed out Nietzsche was an internet theorist avant la net. He is a nice observer of the psychology of it.
Stand tall, you philosophers and friends of knowledge, and beware of martyrdom! Of suffering “for the sake of truth”! Even of defending yourselves! You will ruin the innocence and fine objectivity of your conscience, you will be stubborn towards objections and red rags, you will become stupid, brutish, bullish if, while fighting against danger, viciousness, suspicion, ostracism, and even nastier consequences of animosity, you also have to pose as the worldwide defenders of truth. As if “the Truth” were such a harmless and bungling little thing that she needed defenders! And you of all people, her Knights of the Most Sorrowful Countenance, my Lord Slacker and Lord Webweaver of the Spirit! In the end, you know very well that it does not matter whether you, of all people, are proved right, and furthermore, that no philosopher so far has ever been proved right. (Beyond Good and Evil, Part 2, 25, The Free Spirit, trans. Judith Norman)
Lord Slacker and Lord Webweaver are perfect, not to mention the Knight – ahem – Troll. (“Ihr Ritter von der traurigsten Gestalt, meine Herren Eckensteher und Spinneweber des Geistes!” Not sure about the German connotations of ‘Eckensteher‘ – corner stander. Does it mean: flaneur? Guy who hangs out on the stoop, just watching the passing show? Rubbernecker, wallflower, guy who has been sent to the corner by teacher? Probably not that last.) Some of you will want to continue reading the post. Others will already be running to stick bits of the above passage into a Meme Generator. O joy! (For a circa 2012 value of ‘joy’.)
Anyway, Nietzsche’s right. About the internet. Except, of course, truth – poor gel – does need defenders. But that’s not why she is defended. That’s still a valid point. So is the Nietzschean solution to turn off, tune out, cancel your broadband, the better to contemplate the interiority of your soul, without a comment box or hashtag to sully it? Does the tweet of reason breed monsters? (Someone should ‘shop that with lots of little Twitter logos above his poor head.) Yes and no.
Every choice human being strives instinctively for a citadel and secrecy where he is rescued from the crowds, the many, the vast majority; where, as the exception, he can forget the human norm. The only exception is when he is driven straight towards this norm by an even stronger instinct, in search of knowledge in the great and exceptional sense. Anybody who, in dealing with people, does not occasionally glisten in all the shades of distress, green and gray with disgust, weariness, pity, gloominess, and loneliness – he is certainly not a person of higher taste. But if he does not freely take on all this effort and pain, if he keeps avoiding it and remains, as I said, placid and proud and hidden in his citadel, well then one thing is certain: he is not made for knowledge, not predestined for it. Because if he were, he would eventually have to say to himself: “To hell with good taste! The norm is more interesting than the except – then me, the exception!” – and he would wend his way downwards, and above all, “inwards.” (26)
Nietzsche admits it. After a long day writing Ecce Homo, he would probably click over and read Gawker. “I’m predestined for knowledge,” he rationalized! Really I only visit Gawker to understand myself. (Would ‘gawker’ be a good translation of ‘Eckensteher‘?)
{ 26 comments }
FS 07.28.15 at 12:53 pm
The term Eckensteher at that time refered to day labourers standing at certain corners waiting for work. There was a famous Eckensteher in Berlin (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eckensteher_Nante) who wittingly commented on the day-to-day going-ons of the corner where he was standing.
In the context though, I think that Nietzsche here refers to a person standing in a – not necessarily physical – corner defending a position. In german schooling there has been a long tradition of putting schoolboys and -girls into a corner (Eselsecke) if they were naughty or didn’t fulfil the teachers expectations. Hence the still used term “Geh in die Ecke und schäm dich” (Go into the corner and be ashamed of yourself), also the practice is not used anymore now.
Also, to put someone into a left or right corner (Jemanden in die linke oder rechte Ecke stellen) is an method by which someone is denounced as being a right or left extremist, and thus morally unacceptable.
In my view Nietzsche refers here to persons who are slightly socially excluded because of their views, but nevertheless continue to defend them, pretty much like Speakers’ Corners in London.
Jesús Couto Fandiño 07.28.15 at 1:12 pm
I have the impression that “Ritter von der traurigsten Gestalt” is not an invention of Nietzsche, but just German for “El Caballero de la Triste Figura”, a.k.a Don Quijote.
Bloix 07.28.15 at 1:38 pm
Hail, Knight of the Woeful Countenance! Knight of the Woeful Countenance! Wherever you go, people will know,
of the glorious deeds,
of the Knight of the Woeful Countenance!
John Holbo 07.28.15 at 1:49 pm
Are you telling me you don’t think Don Quixote was trolling those windmills?
Jesús Couto Fandiño 07.28.15 at 1:53 pm
Considering the end result, no, trolling is not exactly what it was, or at least in my experience, trolls dont get badly beaten by their victims :P
TM 07.28.15 at 2:09 pm
2: Correct, except Nietzsche added a superlative to traurig.
Jesús Couto Fandiño 07.28.15 at 2:19 pm
#4 More seriously, I dont know the full context, but in my mind, when you call somebody a Quixote, it goes more to say they are foolish idealists that think they are fighting a good cause but are so mistaken about reality (their capabilities, the actual situation) that the only thing they get is to be ridiculous and harm themselves.
Anderson 07.28.15 at 2:51 pm
My blog’s sidebar includes what I think of as N’s comment on blogging (he is sneering at “literary females” IIRC):
“I shall see myself, I shall read myself, I shall go into ecstasies, and I shall ask—Is it possible that I have so much ésprit?”
— Twilight of the Idols
William Timberman 07.28.15 at 3:03 pm
It’s not the trolls I mind so much, it’s the orcses. Is there really no place left in the world for hobbits — or for Sancho Panza? And how far is it to the next inn, anyway? All this blathering on an empty stomach is giving me a headache.
Jim Harrison 07.28.15 at 3:39 pm
About that Knight of Sorrowful Countenance: the dream-the-impossible-dream version of Don Quixote makes him into an adorable pet, but Cervantes and Nietzsche understood that he was a dangerous madman.
Bloix 07.28.15 at 3:54 pm
“makes him into an adorable pet”
Well, in the musical he manages to provoke the muleteers into gang-raping Aldonza, so he’s not all that harmless.
The Temporary Name 07.28.15 at 5:23 pm
What I’m doing now is DRAMATIC!
Jason Smith 07.28.15 at 6:04 pm
“Would ‘gawker’ be a good translation of ‘Eckensteher‘?”
Genius.
John Holbo 07.28.15 at 9:35 pm
” trolls dont get badly beaten by their victims”
Trolls get badly beaten by their victims – in a sense – all the time. They roll into some discussion. They are refuted. But they don’t know they are refuted. They misunderstand even who they have been talking to. Obviously there are trolls and there are trolls. Quixote is a model of the sincere but misguided ones.
John Holbo 07.28.15 at 9:37 pm
Thanks very much for the linguistic commentary, FS. All that sounds pretty plausible.
Lawrence Stuart 07.28.15 at 11:19 pm
Oh–lovely stuff, worth repeating, even:
“And you of all people, her Knights of the Most Sorrowful Countenance, my Lord Slacker and Lord Webweaver of the Spirit! In the end, you know very well that it does not matter whether you, of all people, are proved right, and furthermore, that no philosopher so far has ever been proved right. ”
And don’t it just make philosophy all the more, I was going to say essential, but desirable is what I really mean. Not in a Don Quixote way, but in a Sapphic way:
“One Girl”
I
Like the sweet apple which reddens upon the topmost bough,
Atop on the topmost twig, — which the pluckers forgot, somehow, —
Forget it not, nay; but got it not, for none could get it till now.
II
Like the wild hyacinth flower which on the hills is found,
Which the passing feet of the shepherds for ever tear and wound,
Until the purple blossom is trodden in the ground.
We are prone to place too much emphasis on Sophia, not enough on Philos. What is desire? How does it work? What does it demand of us? Who does it make of us? Who are we?
That’s the question raised? It’s certainly what captivates me.
bianca steele 07.29.15 at 2:22 am
I’ve seen and heard Man of La Mancha and Shenandoah only in snippets and I’m curious which has aged more poorly.
js. 07.29.15 at 3:56 am
“Ritter von der traurigsten Gestalt” is surely the concern troll, no? Always so well-meaning!
John Holbo 07.29.15 at 5:06 am
Exactly! The concern troll.
ZM 07.29.15 at 6:32 am
There is a famous essay by Turgenev on how the characters of all men confirm either to the Don Quixote type or to the Hamlet type. Counter to commenters in this thread, Turgenev thinks Don Quixote is the better type of character.
Turgenev also makes much of the two characters being contemporaries — the first edition of Hamlet and the first part of Don Quixote were both published in the same year, and as it happened Shakespeare and Cervantes would both die on the same day in the same year.
“All men, to my mind, conform to one type or the other; one to that of Hamlet, another to that of Don Quixote — though it is true, no doubt, that in our era the Hamlets are far more common; still, the Don Quixotes are no means hard to find.
…
Let us therefore seek the core of the matter. To repeat: What does Don Quixote typify? Faith, first of all, a belief in something eternal, indestructible — in a truth that is beyond
the comprehension of the individual human being, which is to be achieved only the medium of self-abnegation and undeviating worship.
….
What, then, does Hamlet represent? Above all, analysis, scrutiny, egotism — and consequently disbelief. He lives wholly for himself, and even an egotist cannot muster faith in himself alone; one believes only in that which is outside or above oneself. But Hamlet’s I — in which he has no faith — is still precious to him.
….
We laugh at Don Quixote. But, my dear sirs, who of us can positively affirm with certainty, that he will always and under all circumstances know the difference between a brass wash basin and an enchanted golden helmet? Let everyone conscientiously examine his convictions, past and present, and let him then determine how far he may be certain of knowing one from the other.
…
To repeat: the Don Quixote’s invent; the Hamlet’s exploit what has been invented. Someone may ask, how can the Hamlet’s exploit anything when they doubt everything and believe no one? My reply is that nature administers our earth so adroitly that as to permit neither thoroughgoing Hamlets nor full-fledged Don Quixotes. These are simply extreme expressions of the two opposite tendencies. Life steers toward one or the other of these extremes, but never reaches either of them. It iswell to remember that, just as the principle of analysis, of scrutinizing and probing into everything, is extended in Hamlet to the limit of tragedy, so in Don Quixote enthusiasm is stampeded to the opposite order of comedy. In reality one seldom meets with either unalloyed comedy or utter tragedy.”
http://www.donquixote.com/uploads/4/3/9/6/43962907/turgenev_-_hamlet_and_don_quixote-libre.pdf
F. Foundling 08.01.15 at 6:11 pm
@ZM 07.29.15 at 6:32 am
>’Faith, first of all, a belief in something eternal, indestructible – in a truth that is beyond the comprehension of the individual human being, which is to be achieved only the medium of self-abnegation and undeviating worship.’
The translation seems a bit too free. IMO, ‘beyond the comprehension of the individual human being’ has too strong irrationalistic and theological implications. The original says, almost literally: ‘belief in something eternal, unshakeable – in a truth located outside of the individual human being, yet easily accessible to it; a truth that requires service and sacrifices, yet one that is approachable through the constancy of service and the power of sacrifice.’ (в иÑтину, находÑщуюÑÑ Ð²Ð½Ðµ отдельного человека, но легко ему дающуюÑÑ, требующую ÑÐ»ÑƒÐ¶ÐµÐ½Ð¸Ñ Ð¸ жертв, но доÑтупную поÑтоÑнÑтву ÑÐ»ÑƒÐ¶ÐµÐ½Ð¸Ñ Ð¸ Ñиле жертвы). ‘Outside of’ / ‘external’ is not at all the same thing as ‘beyond the comprehension of’.
ZM 08.01.15 at 7:49 pm
I am happy to defer to your translation if you know the language F Foundling, when I was a teenager and read bilingual Russian books with a Russian-English dictionary I found whenever I looked up passages they were not translated exactly, so it is quite likely to be the case here.
I would quibble somewhat with your interpretation that something “outside of ” the individual human is less irrational and theological than something “beyond the comprehension of” the individual human being – the difference seems rather to be that the latter translation suggests the thing can’t be understood by individual humans, rather than that the former is more rational and empirical.
F. Foundling 08.02.15 at 3:50 am
@ZM 08.01.15 at 7:49 pm
I meant that all sorts of ideals and ‘truths’ are or can be viewed as being outside of the individual human being, whereas it is religious claims that are most commonly described as *incomprehensible* objects of faith.
F. Foundling 08.02.15 at 3:55 am
That said, kudos for linking to a very nice essay.
ZM 08.02.15 at 5:42 am
Oh I see what you mean now F Foundling, but I don’t know that I agree in the context of Turgenev’s essay — as I am not sure what your grounds are to this argument you seem to be making via a more accurate translation that Don Quixote’s devotion to Dulcinea is more comprehensible to the individual human being than, for instance, The First Epistle to the Corinthians is comprehensible to the individual human being?
Lee A. Arnold 08.02.15 at 10:34 am
I always think of Don Quixote as the first person to fall prey to Hollywoodish special effects (FX), and it suddenly dawns on me that special effects are a way of trolling our whole culture. Maybe the windmills are trolling us.
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