Biography
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) was a German philosopher, classical philologist, cultural critic and writer whose work became one of the most influential forces in modern philosophy.
Nietzsche was born on October 15, 1844, in Röcken, a small village in the Prussian Province of Saxony. His father, Carl Ludwig Nietzsche, was a Lutheran pastor, but he died when Friedrich was still a child. Soon afterwards, the family moved to Naumburg, where Nietzsche grew up in a household dominated by his mother, grandmother, two aunts and his younger sister Elisabeth.
From an early age he showed exceptional ability in languages, literature and music. He studied at the prestigious school of Schulpforta and later attended the universities of Bonn and Leipzig, concentrating on classical philology. During his years in Leipzig he discovered the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer, whose work had a profound influence on his early intellectual development.
In 1869, at only twenty-four and before completing a doctorate, Nietzsche was appointed professor of classical philology at the University of Basel in Switzerland. There he became close to the composer Richard Wagner, whom he initially admired as a figure capable of renewing German culture. Their friendship eventually collapsed as Nietzsche rejected Wagner’s nationalism, anti-Semitism and increasingly religious outlook.
Nietzsche served briefly as a medical orderly during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871. His already fragile health deteriorated during the following years, with severe headaches, digestive problems and impaired eyesight. In 1879 he resigned from his university post and began a wandering life, spending long periods in Switzerland, Italy and southern France in search of a climate that might improve his condition.
Freed from academic duties, Nietzsche produced the works for which he became famous. Among them were Human, All Too Human, Dawn, The Gay Science, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Beyond Good and Evil, On the Genealogy of Morality, Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist.
His philosophy challenged many of the moral, religious and intellectual assumptions of nineteenth-century Europe. He examined the origins of morality, criticized Christianity and traditional metaphysics, and explored ideas such as the "death of God", the will to power, the Übermensch and eternal recurrence. His writing combined philosophical argument with aphorism, poetry, irony and psychological observation.
In January 1889, while living in Turin, Nietzsche suffered a severe mental collapse from which he never recovered. He spent the remaining years of his life under the care first of his mother and later of his sister Elisabeth. He died in Weimar on August 25, 1900, at the age of fifty-five.
