The value of this book depends entirely on the ability of the reader to think about it. I happened to enjoy it as confirmation of many efforts I have previously made to understand Nietzsche and the world at large, and this review pays far too much attention to the world, which is as at large as ever.

Long ago, I had the opportunity to consider what Nietzsche thought about a normal appreciation for the truth, compared to the opposite which he discovered in what was most forceful. "When the Christian crusaders in the Orient encountered the invincible order of Assassins, . . . whose lowest ranks followed a rule of obedience the like of which no order of monks ever attained, they obtained in some way or other a hint concerning that symbol and watchword reserved for the highest ranks alone as their secretum: `Nothing is true, everything is permitted.' " (ON THE GENEALOGY OF MORALS, translated by Walter Kaufmann, p. 150). This collection of notebooks of private thoughts, which Nietzsche did not publish, reflect the process in which he prepared his work. Trying to find some secret doctrine, which the public could never understand, seems to be like trying to understand everything, as dangerous as any other aspect of his thought.

In 1872 or early 1873, he had written, "Conversely, we are returning to culture in a sectarian manner, we are trying once again to suppress the philosopher's immeasurable knowledge and convince him of the anthropomorphic character of all knowledge." (p. 57). This is so true, I need only mention GENIUS by Harold Bloom, in which "A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary Creative Minds" are explained by classifications which seek to glorify how individuals think. Otherwise, in our culture, "Groupthink is the blight of our Age of Information, and is most pernicious in our obsolete academic institutions, whose long suicide since 1967 continues. The study of mediocrity, whatever its origins, breeds mediocrity." (Bloom, p. ix).

When Nietzsche was becoming an expert in Greek civilization, learning about the Pre-Platonic philosophers, a battle was fought at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, early in July, 1863. The Confederacy lost that battle, but in 1870-1871, the newly united states of Germany, under Prussia, having organized its troops for rapid deployment, had triumphed in a war with France. Long years of division and deprivation had prepared Germany to become the economic powerhouse which it is today, third in the world, following the United States and Japan. In the monetary system of the world, the dollar, the yen, and now the euro are the leading currencies. The state of financial collapse which is now a threat to the dominance of globalization is best imagined by considering Iraq like Gettysburg, a battle dragged out for years instead of days, in which the United States, the chief invader (England was the foreign power which offered the most support for the Confederacy during the American Civil War), has managed to remain in the area, which it considers a battlefield on which it may yet triumph. In his notebook, Nietzsche sought the "Value of truthfulness. --It does indeed improve things! Its aim is decline. It sacrifices. Our art is the likeness of desperate knowledge." (p. 57)

Though Nietzsche has been dead for over a hundred years, the range of his thought is accessible to people who are willing to search within themselves for whatever is the matter with their situations. Trouble? I could show you trouble. Compared to the twentieth century, thinking about America in Iraq seems to be the most hopeful way to go for anyone who has hoped for money, or oil, or power, or the opportunity to be right in a way that the world can't deny. But Nietzsche went looking into the big question, and found:

"When among the tumult at the outbreak of the last great war an embittered French scholar called the Germans barbarians and accused them of lacking culture, people in Germany still listened closely enough to take deep offense at this; and it gave many journalists the opportunity to polish brightly the armor of their culture, . . . and venerable Carlyle publicly praised precisely those qualities in the Germans and, for the sake of these qualities, gave their victory his blessing, then everyone was clear about German culture; and after the experience of success, it was certainly quite innocuous to speak of the victory of German culture. Today, when the Germans have enough time to examine in retrospect many of the words flung at us then, there are probably a few who recognize that the Frenchman was right: the Germans are barbarians, despite all those human qualities." (p. 93). The distinction Nietzsche would like to draw is regarding the future: "the hope for an emerging culture vindicates the Germans: whereas one gives no deference to a degenerate and exhausted culture." (p. 93). It is necessary to look in another book to find the phrase of Goethe which Nietzsche was to include in his published work. "But another couple of centuries may have to pass before our countrymen will have absorbed sufficient spirit and higher culture for one to be able to say of them: it has been a long time since they were barbarians." (UNFASHIONABLE OBSERVATIONS, p. 10). Since the United States bombed bridges and buildings in Europe in 1999 to react to a civil war in which a ruling party there seemed uncivilized to us, perhaps the stance of the German and French people today tries to seem more cultured than the Americans as their last, best hope to avoid the terrorists that can do far more to hasten the decline of civilization than America would acting alone.

I don't like the idea that people have to study books like this. I think they should just be left lying around in the living room, next to the most comfortable chair, and anybody who is curious can just pick it up and open it to see what it says. This book has a great page 6. It helps if you can be listening to music that says the same thing, like Jewel's "Spirit," which has a song called "What's Simple is True." At the top of page 6, Nietzsche is trying to write about a philosopher who "does not stand so completely apart from the people." Nietzsche wants a philosophy that is like "art--its own transfiguration and redemption. The will strives for purity and ennoblement." People who read this without listening to Jewel might not know what Nietzsche is trying to say, but Jewel actually sings it.

There is a section on "the thirst to know it all," which doesn't seem all that great to anybody anymore, but then the last sentence on page 6 says, "The philosopher is a means for coming to rest in the rushing current, for becoming conscious of the enduring types by disdaining infinite multiplicity." If anything, Jewel ends up being too right for this book, she's so much better than the number of ways that Nietzsche might still get it wrong by his own standards. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Nietzsche has gained much fame and notoriety over the 100 years since his death. This has, unfortunately, led many people to believe that they have some idea what he wrote, why and when. The other "reviews" here are a case in point.

The writings here are from the period just after The Birth of Tragedy. Specifically, these are notes and fragments from the period of the Untimely Meditations, here called Unfashionable Observations, basically 1872-74.

I was struck by the richness of these jottings, and by the breadth of topic and subject. You can find insights concerning semiology and linguistics, politics and sociology, etc., written with refreshing originality and boldness. What surprised me most of all is how readable this volume is. In some ways, it is more engaging than the published texts of the same period.

One more thing, Nietzsche's cerebral breakdown occurred many years after this period, and even so, it is quite dubious to call his writings into question even from that later period. His problem was organic, not psychological. And secondly, anyone who thinks that the value of reading Nietzsche is for "a couple of clever quotes to throw around at dinner-parties", has really missed something.

Anyone who has studied Nietzsche's philosophy will be thrilled by this collection of notes. Not only do they throw light on the Unfashionable Observations; they show how wide reaching Nietzsche's interests were at such an early period.