Beyond Good and Evil

I won't drone on about the wealth of knowledge in this book. I will say i've listened to it twice since i got it two weeks ago, and i will keep listening to it. I find it very practical.
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The narration and production of this book is exceptional. Like any book, it's difficult to read to others, and communicate the nuance. Jennings & McMillan bring this production through with excellence. Even Jennings tone, a slight snear, really plays well, because Nietzsche himself writes with a slight snear.
Contrast this production with one i downloaded from "Librovox". Librovox allows non-professionals to record a book, and upload it. I downloaed Nietzsche's "The Gay Science", and i couldn't get through the first chapters. The narrator couldn't communicate the spirit and intent of the book. This production achieves that.

Great read, great narrator, interesting, thought provoking, and surprisingly funny at times. If you have never read any Nietzsche this is a good one to start with.

"Beyond Good and Evil" is a well-known classic, so I will not review the work itself.

The narration by Alex Jennings was excellent. He kept my attention throughout with his lively speech.

And, Ian Johnston was more than a translator. He also wrote commentary which is included in this audio. The commentary is excellent: accurate and helpful for understanding Nietzsche's background and ideas.

John Christmas, author of "Democracy Society"

This book needs to be studied and discussed. It is no easy listen to whilst commuting to work. I would not recommend it as entertainment.

Something totally different, perhaps light entertainment like a Flashman book or the new narrated book by Dustin Hoffman, 'Being There'.

I don't think so, but they are excellent in their performance from this book.

I am not smart enough to appreciate it. Would need to spend more time discussing and studying it to get the benefit from it. I understand the Nazi used Nietzeche to back up their weird ideas, so if you like to study that part of history, it might be a good resource. For me, it was unfortunately a waste of time.

Interesting, nothing like the communist manifesto, or the great thinkers from the age of enlightenment but important as it did have an influence on the 20th Century. Not my 'cup-of-tea'.

Nietzsche's analysis and critique of false authority, master-slave relationships, herd morality, rationalistic/scientific barriers to living fearlessly are amazing critiques for the time he wrote, and flew in the face of the rationalistic zeitgeist of Kant, Hegel and science.

His critique is very psychological, in that he does not himself present a rationalistic argument for or against his views (although he reveals brilliant thinking), but rather a series of observations/aphorisms which we automatically string together as his "philosophy" (and then wonder what he said). He makes scathing observations of the Jews being the cause of the despised master-slave relationships, and compounded by Christians. For sure, he despises weakness.

Because of his own questioning of human motivation leading to the destructive master-slave devaluation of human, I find myself analyzing his own motivation for his concerns. While his interpretation of women parallels hatred of weakness everywhere, his misogyny, mistrust and devaluation seems embedded in every pore of his being, and explains most of his philosophy as a rant against how his mother (including father) treated him. He describes women as like a cat, they do their own thing, they have claws waiting to strike and are fundamentally manipulative and shallow.

If my impression of Nietzsche's devaluation of human relationships (esp. with women) is accurate (his self/other esteem is relationally absent), then he is blind and in contempt (indignant) of any relational resolution to his existential predicament. His primary target therefore is anyone who presents a threat to him, his thinking, his power/right to live fully.

More interestingly, this theory helps explain the either/or, master/slave position which he takes as the truth of the human condition. Since psyche (which is conditioned by society he states)/people/society/ bad philosophers/scientists/politics/countries are not to be trusted, the first goal is to avoid being a slave of your own weak conscience or that of anyone else's, have the courage to be master of your own soul, and do not be afraid of your passions/instincts/impulses, but let them give you instinctive taste/guidance, power, freedom of will, nobility--not made weak by conscience.

His use of the term "Truth" is almost always stated in some disdainful way against others, especially philosopher metaphysicians who go around telling others what "Truth" is. His effort is to invert this terrible misconception, and restore the meaning of truth as ones own Will to Truth (which becomes Will to Power), the power to be who you are based on your own value. The ultimate truth in life is thus to embrace the value of your own power. He often speaks positively of artists who engage in their expressive, empowered freedom in life (i.e., Wagner).


He states that "all organic functions [including sexuality] could be traced back to this Will to Power" (36)--this is his claim about reality/truth. There are thus two reading of Nietzsche--the amoral, harsh, cynical, heartlessness, and the one that some of us would like to believe: that his thoughts just haven't been developed clearly and that he is more artistic in his nature (and that Santa Claus and Heaven are not in jeopardy). It is not hard to see why his ideas became usable for Hitler's regime. We can thank subsequent philosophers who salvaged his genius out of his darkness.

Definitely worth listening to, if only to see what the fuss is all about. I really wanted to find out exactly what he had against god - but I remain confused.

He could have outlined a proposition, presented arguments to support it, argued against contrary arguments, and then made a killer conclusion. Sadly, he did none of these.

n/a

Oh dear dog, no. Maybe Monty Python could do a satire of it - but it already satirises itself, so they'd have precious little to do.

This book is written entirely as a series of numbered aphorisms, none appearing to have any relationship to any of the others. In each case I understood every word, understood the grammar and syntax, yet when it finished I had no idea at all what it was about. He remained completely and utterly inaccessible (to me).
Boy! Those Prussians sure didn't like the Jews, did they! I see where Adolf got it from.
This audiobook was well-presented and read in a pleasant voice - yet Nietzche's prose remains thick and turgic beyond the point of incomprehensibility.

I'm not sure what I expected from Nietzsche, but it most certainly wasn't a constantly contradictory, self-pitying diatribe about how all of the problems in the world are everyone elses fault and how Nietzsche, himself, is some sort of advance guard for a super-awesome totally kick-ass mega race of philosopher kings who need to be put in charge of everything because they are our superiors and we are just herd animals waiting to be led by them!

Nietzsche take perfectly logical presumptions- like "there is no singular morality"- and twists them into value judgments- like "there is no singular morality, therefore some morality must be superior morality and some inferior morality, and the inferior people who have inferior morality must subjugate themselves to the superior". WTF?!

In the end, Nietzsche falls prey to the brier patch of the small minded- the absolute. If a man is not one way, he must then be the absolute opposite, if a man does not completely believe one thing, he must completely believe the absolute opposite, if a man is not a master, then he must be a slave. And all the while condemning this very act in others.

Over and over again, Nietzsche takes reasonable, and sometimes very wise, ideas and twists them to fuel his own self-gratification and sense of superiority.

It is important to read Nietzsche to understand the kind of childlike thinking that we must avoid in ourselves. Of course, if Nietzsche wrote this as a satire and is laughing at us from the grave (like Machiavelli), then I take all of this back. If that is the case the man has done us the great favor of giving us a glimpse into our own, darkest nature.

I am not much of a critic but i found this book extremely inspiring and very educational. The narrator is a little boring and tends to put me to sleep but apart from that it was great in my opinion.

it was more so the information that i found compelling, rather than the narration.

both we ok but very still put me to sleep. i will have to listen to it again to properly answer this question. i could say this about most narrators as they tend to almost sound like they are speaking in the same tone without much expression.

i think the subtitle was well suited.

i must have another listen and try to stay awake to give a better opinion. sorry about that.