And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
-- Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) Nietzsche may have rejected Hegel and Hegelian Dialectic Philosophy but to me, Nietzsche remains a supreme 'dialectic philosopher' for two main reasons:
1. There was no better philosopher than Nietzsche at 'dialectically uniting and integrating the mind and heart';
2. Nietzsche's first work 'The Birth of Tragedy (BT)' was totally dialectic in its structure and process(which Nietzsche asserted later was to the detriment of the book, as he began to move away from Hegel and the dialectic perspective -- Not so says this philosopher here: it was to Nietzsche's detriment and to the detriment of Nietzsche's philosophy that he moved away from Hegelian Dialectic Philosophy and 'The Birth of Tragedy' which can be viewed as a precursor to 'The Birth of Psychoanalysis' -- and indeed all of 20th Century Clinical Psychology in its emphasis on the principle of 'homeostatic or dialectic balance'.
Nietzsche once wrote: 'Extreme positions are not succeeded by moderate ones, but by contrary extreme positions.' This too, is a strongly Hegelian (or post-Hegelian) perspective, and Nietzsche proved this point in his own life and philosophy.
Specifically, in philosophically walking away from BT, Nietzsche became obsessed with 'Dionysus' (The Greek God of wine, dancing, celebration, and pleasure) at the expense of ignoring 'Apollo' (The Greek God of law and order, ethical restraint, justice, truth and reason...). He did the same thing in tearing down Christianity and Religion without being able to see and/or acknowledge that Christianity and Religion in general play important 'life-serving' functions in human society in terms of bringing people together in harmony under one roof with one essential united, integrated cause (family, community, roots, and mutual 'I-WE' support...). Instead, Nietzsche could only see the 'pathological-self-destructive' elements in Christianity and Religion -- and offered a 'counter-extremist philosophical position'.
In essence, Nietzsche became 'The Anti-Christ' and in so doing he may have 'freed' many people from their religious chains but in so doing, Nietzsche was at least partly opening up a new 'Pandora's Box': The Pandora's Box of The Anti-Christ: live fast, die fast -- drugs, alcohol, partying, sex...party til you drop...the life and death of my ex-common-law (of 11 years) girlfriend's sister - so pretty with a beautiful smile in her young life, the party queen, the life of the party: she got into 'crack/coke' in her mid to late 20s and died horrendously, like an AIDS patient, her internal organs shutting down, putting her into a coma, then being taken off life support, at 39.
I say this not to look down on my sister-in-law's life and death, or to wave a righteous finger at her bad choices (we all make bad choices, some worse than others), but simply to contrast the beauty of her young life and smile -- indeed, the beauty of all life -- with the bad, stupid choices we all can make and/or do make, from time to time in our life, which can most grieviously cut off a beautiful life in a Kierkgaardian moment, or in a culmination of Kierkgaardian moments, in a culmination of bad -- and worse -- choices that can quickly and/or slowly turn the most beautiful of lives into the most horrific of deaths.
I'm thinking now of that South American beauty queen, and her death after four amptuations from a 'vaccine-resistant' bacteria. And I'm thinking now of all the brutal things that have happened in the Middle East, and are still happening -- soldiers, husbands and wives, women and children dying once again in the most horrific of different ways but mainly by guns and bombs -- all the culmination of man's individual and collective stupidity relative to religious, political, and/or economic righteousness and narcissism. There are no winners in war, just losers, victims of death and dying, families of death and dying...and crying...crying when we can stop distancing ourselves from what this series of Middle East wars is really doing to people's individual and collective spirits and souls...
I could easily die myself within a couple of years through bad choices -- spending too much time at the bar, too much alcohol for my seriously compromised liver, if I let 'my internal Dionysus' completely take over my life; fortunately, I believe, I generally have a decent working balance between my internal Apollo and Dionysius -- and an even more solidly balanced 'Apollonian-Dionysian' girlfriend pulling me back from the precipice whenever I start to 'stare too deeply into the Dionysian/Nietzschean abyss'. Most of us tend to have a feeling of indestructibility when we are 20 or 30, we generally start to wisen up in our late 40s and early 50s --if we make it that far.
'Balance' was where Nietzsche started before he unfortunately abandoned the solidly post-Hegelian, dialectic philosophical principles of BT. BT was the little 'romantic-mythological' book that took the best of Hegelian Dialectic Philosophy and applied this perspective to the 'Apollonian-Dionysian' workings of the human psyche which would clearly foreshadow the work of Freud, 'The Birth of Psychoanalysis', and Freud's philosophical-psychological model and function of 'The Ego' which in Freud's model was always attempting to dialectically negotiate -- and integrate - the restraining Apollonian 'Superego' with the impulsive, sensual and sexual Dionysian 'Id'.
Some do better than others but the Nietzschean solution and resolution of 'Dionysian Extremism' takes most people to 'Hell on Earth rather than Heaven on Earth' just as Christian or any type of religious, righteous extremism can do the same from the opposite human polarity.
As Aristotle wisely noted the best path is usually the 'middle path'. This is the philosophical, psychological, biological, and political path of -- homeostatic (dialectic-democratic-harmonious-united Spinozian) balance. This is the path - and the fleeting, evasive philosophical destination that DGB Philosophy is constantly seeking.
As passionate and as brilliant a man as Nietzsche was, in the end, in my opinion, Nietzsche philosophically and existentially missed the boat. He jumped into the deep Dionysian waters - and he died either in the process and/or as a result of doing this.
I've done the same -- jumped into the deep Dionysian waters of Lake Ontario under the influence of about 5 cocktail Black Russians...and I was lucky to have the help to get back out again...That was a rather stupid Black Russian moment (there have been a few of them)...probably thought that I was Nietzsche's 'Superman' -- except that I did't really know Nietzsche too well back then, in the 1980s. I think of others like the woman I mentioned above who wasn't nearly so lucky. And like Trudeau's youngest son, Michel, dying in an avalanche in the mountains of British Columbia.
Then I get an eery chill when I remember reading one of Pierre Trudeau's earliest ('Nietzschean-Romantic') writings...written in 1939...I first read this small piece at a cafe overlooking Fairy Lake in downtown Newmarket on a sunny, summer Sunday afternoon in 2008...Now in February, 2009, as I went upstairs to fetch the passage...and found it...Trudeau's words come back even more haunting than ever...like a ghost...like stories of the death of Tom Thomson, the famous Canadian painter...
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These are the last four paragraphs of...'Relative Utopia'...by Pierre Elliott Trudeau (1939)
'...The Skier is a god who makes toys of mountains, who takes gravity into his own hands to do with it what he will, who laughs off the abyss and takes ferocious pleasure in taunting it. The Skier knows the joy of the explorer and scientist and superman. Pressed ahead, by his haversack, his shoulders rounded, his knees tightly held together, his hands close to his thighs, his cheeks whipped by the dry air, and his tuque worn low over his eyes, he clears a path through imprecise nature, leaving behind a long whirlwind of pulverized clarity.
It seems incredible but it is nonetheless true that the Skier should fear ecstasy. His gaze fails, he abandons his body to all unknown forces and drifts infallibly in the pathways of space and time. What a magnificent sport, what an incomparable thing to do: one mogul was enough to send me hurtling into the sky, and from the sky neither mountain nor valley could be seen, only the lights of the village that glowed like a handful of pearls at the bottom of a lake or the Big Dipper hanging like a sign in the sky and th numberless stars like snowflakes.
...Alas! It is the fate of mortals that they can cast off reality for only a brief moment. Blessed is he who completes his heavenly flight with a drop into th coolly real but soft snow.
It falls on others to fall otherwise: a leg rapturously envelops a maple tree, followed by forty days in a cast. Skis of ash, crutches of oak. Utopia is no more.
Brebeuf monthly (1939)
Translated by George Tombs
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We all can be too impulsive...
We all can be too restrained...
DGB Philosophy seeks to dialectically balance...
Dionysian sensory impulsiveness...and romantic aliveness...
With wise, Apollonian ethical idealism and restraint...
Looking for that balanced harmony in the middle...
Where we can all live dialectically passionate, exciting, sensual but sensitive and sensible, Romantic-Enlightenment, Humanistic-Existential lives.
Rather than the discord, divisionism, and/or tragedy...
That is usually found at the polar, righteous, and/or narcissistic...
Extremes...
-- DGBN, Feb. 2nd, 2009
-- David Gordon Bain
-- David Goes Beyond Nietzsche...
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Avalanche education needs to continue: Trudeau
Updated Mon. Jan. 12 2004 6:29 AM ET
CTV.ca News Staff
Although another death was recorded in an avalanche this past week, Justin Trudeau hopes that greater educational efforts will mean fewer winter mountain adventures end in tragedy.
"What we need to do is understand where those risks are so that we can make the smart choice about doing it safely," he said after participating in a mock rescue.
To that end, Trudeau -- son of former prime minister Pierre Trudeau -- convinced the B.C. government in October to put $125,000 towards the Canadian Avalanche Centre that would co-ordinate regional updates and education across the country.
The Trudeau family has a deeply personal interest in the subject.
Justin's brother Michel died in a back country avalanche in the southern Kootenay Mountains in 1998, his body swept into a deep alpine lake.
A chalet was opened in his memory in B.C.'s Kokanee Pass this past summer.
Last year 24 people died in avalanche accidents in B.C., including seven in one accident. An additional five died elsewhere in Canada.
A coroner's report released in November recommended all commercial ski and snow tour companies which operate on crown land should subscribe to a daily avalanche threat bulletin produced by the Canadian Avalanche Centre.
It also recommended all backcountry lodge and hut operators create their own association -- in part to establish safety standards.
Tim Jones, a rescue worker on Vancouver's north shore, is less worried about a national centre than he is about getting very local forecasts.
"The avalanche advisory for Mount Seymour today," he said. "That would be great if we could have that, please."
Right now, he can get that information faster by calling the mountain directly.
"Our weather system might be different from the coastal mountains. We need to have a local update; real time, too," he said.
Money for new avalanche services would help, but people also need to know what they require to stay safe. For the experts, that means a shovel, backpack, beacon -- and common sense.
Monday, February 2, 2009
Sunday, October 12, 2008
(In Process) Faceoff: DGB Philosophy vs. Nietzsche: Part 1: The Birth of Tragedy
'The Birth of Tragedy' -- Nietzsche's first book -- marked a turning point, or perhaps better stated as a 'building-point' or 'bridge' , between Hegel and Schopenhauer on the one hand and Freud and Jung on the other hand. This is what makes this often over-looked book so important in the evolution of Western history and culture.
It was also the starting-point for Nietzsche's ultimate 'Dionysian-existential' message, which is the crux of the critisism that DGB Philosophy will lay back on Nietzsche's lap.
Nietzsche would complain years later that the book was 'too Hegelian'. My chief complaint against the book is that it is 'not Hegelian enough'. And this complaint, I aim at Nietzsche in even stronger and more relevant fashion, the more that Nietzsche's later work moved further and further away from Hegel's influence, and the more that Nietzsche's 'unbridled, narcissistic, Dionysian, existential extremist' message evolved.
You see, it is one thing to claim that 'we all need to live each and every day as passionately as we can live it because life is a blessing and we never usually know just exactly when our time is going to run out, nor the time of those who we are closest to'. Similarily, the positive side of Nietzsche's message is that we all should aim to live our lives up to our 'highest possible potential' -- to live our lives as 'Supermen' (or 'Superwomen) as it were. And similarily also, it can be very enlightening and therapeutic to talk about, and to strive for, 'self-empowerment' as a means to 'self-fulfillment' or 'self-actualization'.
These are all important, meaningful, elements of the 'positive, constructive' side of Nietzsche's 'humanistic-existential' message.
Even the 'deconstructive' side of Nietzsche's social, political commentary remains an important part of Nietzsche's overall message and legacy. Rhetorically, Nietzsche was a gifted, powerful, intellectual writer -- a 'writing hurricane' -- and Nietzshe was just getting his writing force started, his 'hurricane in motion' if you will, in 'The Birth of Tragedy'. There would be many Nietzschean writing hurricanes still to come, and all written before he turned 46. (For what it's worth, almost all of my philosophy writing has come after I turned 46.)
Let me clarify the way DGB Philosophy distinguishes between the use of the two terms 'destructive' and 'deconstructive'.
I use the word 'destructive' in the negative side of the word. Same with the word 'self-destructive'. If I say something like, 'Unbridled narcissism is ultimately self-destructive', or 'Unbridled imperialism is ultimately self-destructive', or 'Unbridled unilateralism is ultimately self-destructive.', in each of these cases I am making a 'negative' editorial association and commentary.
The word 'deconstructive' -- borrowed from the philosopher Jacques Derrida, 1930-2004 (and used by me, in word and/or in concept, in all of my 'Faceoff' essays) -- is meant to imply something more 'positive and constructive' than the word 'destructive' would normally imply, particularly in its most negative sense.
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Jacques Derrida
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the documentary film, see Derrida (film).
Jacques Derrida Western Philosophy
20th-century philosophy
Full name Jacques Derrida
Birth July 15, 1930(1930-07-15)
Death October 8, 2004 (aged 74)
School/tradition Deconstruction
Main interests Philosophy of language · Literary theory · Ethics · Ontology
Notable ideas Deconstruction · Différance · Phallogocentrism
Influenced by
Kierkegaard · Blanchot · Foucault · Heidegger · Barthes · Bataille · Husserl · Lévinas · Nietzsche · Saussure · Freud · Marx · Levi-Strauss
Influenced
Foucault · de Man · Stiegler · Nancy · Lacoue-Labarthe · Laclau · Butler · Eisenman · Said · Bhabha · Spivak · Caputo · Critchley
Jacques Derrida (pronounced [ʒak dɛʁida][1]) (July 15, 1930 – October 8, 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher, known as the founder of deconstruction. His voluminous work has had a profound impact upon literary theory and continental philosophy. His best known work is Of Grammatology.
..............................................................................
It was also the starting-point for Nietzsche's ultimate 'Dionysian-existential' message, which is the crux of the critisism that DGB Philosophy will lay back on Nietzsche's lap.
Nietzsche would complain years later that the book was 'too Hegelian'. My chief complaint against the book is that it is 'not Hegelian enough'. And this complaint, I aim at Nietzsche in even stronger and more relevant fashion, the more that Nietzsche's later work moved further and further away from Hegel's influence, and the more that Nietzsche's 'unbridled, narcissistic, Dionysian, existential extremist' message evolved.
You see, it is one thing to claim that 'we all need to live each and every day as passionately as we can live it because life is a blessing and we never usually know just exactly when our time is going to run out, nor the time of those who we are closest to'. Similarily, the positive side of Nietzsche's message is that we all should aim to live our lives up to our 'highest possible potential' -- to live our lives as 'Supermen' (or 'Superwomen) as it were. And similarily also, it can be very enlightening and therapeutic to talk about, and to strive for, 'self-empowerment' as a means to 'self-fulfillment' or 'self-actualization'.
These are all important, meaningful, elements of the 'positive, constructive' side of Nietzsche's 'humanistic-existential' message.
Even the 'deconstructive' side of Nietzsche's social, political commentary remains an important part of Nietzsche's overall message and legacy. Rhetorically, Nietzsche was a gifted, powerful, intellectual writer -- a 'writing hurricane' -- and Nietzshe was just getting his writing force started, his 'hurricane in motion' if you will, in 'The Birth of Tragedy'. There would be many Nietzschean writing hurricanes still to come, and all written before he turned 46. (For what it's worth, almost all of my philosophy writing has come after I turned 46.)
Let me clarify the way DGB Philosophy distinguishes between the use of the two terms 'destructive' and 'deconstructive'.
I use the word 'destructive' in the negative side of the word. Same with the word 'self-destructive'. If I say something like, 'Unbridled narcissism is ultimately self-destructive', or 'Unbridled imperialism is ultimately self-destructive', or 'Unbridled unilateralism is ultimately self-destructive.', in each of these cases I am making a 'negative' editorial association and commentary.
The word 'deconstructive' -- borrowed from the philosopher Jacques Derrida, 1930-2004 (and used by me, in word and/or in concept, in all of my 'Faceoff' essays) -- is meant to imply something more 'positive and constructive' than the word 'destructive' would normally imply, particularly in its most negative sense.
...................................................................
Jacques Derrida
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the documentary film, see Derrida (film).
Jacques Derrida Western Philosophy
20th-century philosophy
Full name Jacques Derrida
Birth July 15, 1930(1930-07-15)
Death October 8, 2004 (aged 74)
School/tradition Deconstruction
Main interests Philosophy of language · Literary theory · Ethics · Ontology
Notable ideas Deconstruction · Différance · Phallogocentrism
Influenced by
Kierkegaard · Blanchot · Foucault · Heidegger · Barthes · Bataille · Husserl · Lévinas · Nietzsche · Saussure · Freud · Marx · Levi-Strauss
Influenced
Foucault · de Man · Stiegler · Nancy · Lacoue-Labarthe · Laclau · Butler · Eisenman · Said · Bhabha · Spivak · Caputo · Critchley
Jacques Derrida (pronounced [ʒak dɛʁida][1]) (July 15, 1930 – October 8, 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher, known as the founder of deconstruction. His voluminous work has had a profound impact upon literary theory and continental philosophy. His best known work is Of Grammatology.
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From The Internet (SparkNotes): The Birth of Tragedy
The Birth of Tragedy Friedrich Nietzsche
Summary
The Birth of Tragedy is divided into twenty-five chapters and a forward. The first fifteen chapters deal with the nature of Greek Tragedy, which Nietzsche claims was born when the Apollonian worldview met the Dionysian. The last ten chapters use the Greek model to understand the state of modern culture, both its decline and its possible rebirth. The tone of the text is inspirational. Nietzsche often addresses the reader directly, saying at the end of chapter twenty, "Dare now to be tragic men, for ye shall be redeemed!" These kinds of exclamations make it more difficult to take his text seriously. However, if we look beyond the flowery words, we find some very interesting ideas. At the same time we confront Nietzsche's enormous bias, particularly when deciding when something is or is not "art." Nietzsche forms a very strict definition of art that excludes such things as subjective self-expression and the opera. Despite his criticisms of human culture, however, Nietzsche has great faith in the human soul and urges us to drop our Socratic pretenses and accept the culture of Dionysus again.
Nietzsche describes the state of Greek art before the influence of Dionysus as being naive, and concerned only with appearances. In this art conception, the observer was never truly united with art, as he remained always in quiet contemplation with it, never immersing himself. The appearances of Apollo were designed to shield man from the innate suffering of the world, and thus provide some relief and comfort.
Then came Dionysus, whose ecstatic revels first shocked the Apollonian man of Greek culture. In the end, however, it was only through one's immersion in the Dionysian essence of Primordial Unity that redemption from the suffering of the world could be achieved. In Dionysus, man found that his existence was not limited to his individual experiences alone, and thus a way was found to escape the fate of all men, which is death. As the Dionysian essence is eternal, one who connects with this essence finds a new source of life and hope. Nietzsche thus shows Dionysus to be an uplifting alternative to the salvation offered by Christianity, which demands that man renounce life on earth altogether and focus only on heaven. For, in order to achieve salvation through Dionysus, one must immerse oneself in life now.
However, while man can only find salvation in Dionysus, he requires Apollo to reveal the essence of Dionysus through his appearances. The chorus and actors of tragedy were representations, through which the essence of Dionysus was given voice to speak. Through them, man was able to experience the joys of redemption from worldly suffering. These Apollonian appearances also stood as a bulwark against the chaos of Dionysus, so that the viewer would be completely lost in Dionysian ecstasy. Nietzsche emphasizes that in real tragic art, the elements of Dionysus and Apollo were inextricably entwined. As words could never hope to delve into the depths of the Dionysian essence, music was the life of the tragic art form.
Music exists in the realm beyond language, and so allows us to rise beyond consciousness and experience our connection to the Primordial Unity. Music is superior to all other arts in that it does not represent a phenomenon, but rather the "world will" itself.
Nietzsche sees Euripides as the murderer of art, he who introduced the Socratic obsession with knowledge and ultimate trust in human thought into the theater. By focusing entirely on the individual, Euripides eliminated the musical element that is crucial to the Dionysian experience. Euripides threw Dionysus out of tragedy, and in doing so he destroyed the delicate balance between Dionysus and Apollo that is fundamental to art. In the second half of his essay, Nietzsche explores the modern ramifications of this shift in Greek thought. He argues that we are still living in the Alexandrian age of culture, which is now on its last legs. Science cannot explain the mysteries of the universe, he writes, and thanks to the work of Kant and Schopenhauer, we must now recognize this fact. The time is ripe for a rebirth of tragedy that will sweep away the dusty remains of Socratic culture. Nietzsche sees German music, Wagner in particular, as the beginning of this transformation. While German culture is decrepit, the German character is going strong, for it has an inkling of the primordial vitality flowing in its veins. Nietzsche has great hope for the coming age and has written this book to prepare us for it.
The Birth of Tragedy Friedrich Nietzsche
Glossary of Important Terms
Appearance - Nietzsche's term for the nature of Apollonian phenomena. Everything that we see around us is appearance, as it is only a veil behind which lies true reality. Likewise, the images in dreams represent the appearance of appearance. Nietzsche contrasts the co ncept of Apollonian appearance, or illusion, to the Dionysian suffering, or reality. Appearance is necessary in order to shield us from the full truth of human suffering which otherwise would crush us with its magnitude.
Chorus - The core of Greek Tragedy, originally called the satyr (half man, half goat) chorus. The chorus was made up of a number of men who watched and commented on the action of the tragedy. Their speech was often far more poetic and difficult to understand than that of the actors. Nietzsche argues that the chorus embodies the soul of music that is the life-blood of tragedy. Without it, tragedy would be nothing.
Euripides - The fifth century Athenian playwright and friend of Socrates who Nietzsche blames for the death of tragedy. Euripides was the third of the great Athenian tragedians, following Aeschylus and Sophocles, and is traditionally considered the most modern. His c haracters are far closer to those found in modern plays than those of Aeschylus, who is still very close to the ritual/religious form of tragedy. Euripides's Bacchae puts Dionysus up on stage in a deadly battle with Pentheus, the ultimate rationali stic king. Needless to say, Dionysus wins. Nietzsche jumps on this and says that Euripides wants to turn his audiences away from Dionysus. However, one could also interpret this to mean that Dionysus should be respected and feared wherever he appears.
Greek Cheerfulness - The unflaggingly chipper optimism of the Greeks. Originally, this cheerfulness was not the superficial result of a shallow mind, but rather the Apollonian reaction in the face of Dionysian suffering. The cheerfulness is a mask, a protective measure agains t the dark and powerful forces of Dionysus. Nietzsche insists that these particular cheerful Greeks were in fact very serious about art, whereas the post-Socratic cheerful Greeks were an entirely different breed. The cheerful characters that we find in Eu ripides are shallow, and the cheerful optimism of post-Socratic culture was a disaster for both Greek myth and tragedy.
Ideal Spectator - Schlegel's term for the role of the chorus in Greek tragedy. Nietzsche disagrees with this idea on the grounds that the chorus could never have been drawn from the crowd of general spectators and so elevated to 'ideal' status. Furthermore, a true spectato r must be aware that he is viewing a work of art, whereas the Greek chorus acted from within the world of the tragedy, as if they were viewing real events. Nietzsche then modifies his criticism and admits that the chorus is the ideal-spectator in the sens e that it is the only 'beholder' of the visionary world of the play.
Naive artist - Term for the artist who is completely absorbed in the beauty of appearance. This state of being is a complete victory of the Apollonian illusion. Homer is the greatest naive artist, for his forms are the most beautiful. Nietzsche clearly views this form o f artist as inferior to the tragic artist, but also superior to the operatic artist. The naive artist is pure one hundred percent Apollonian, which, although unbalanced, is far better than being emotive and degenerate.
Principium Individuationis - Principle of individuation. Apollo champions the unshaken faith in this principle of the individual. Nietzsche contrasts this with the Dionysian immersion in the world will, in order to show how opposite those two art-deities really are. Implicit in the c oncept of the principium individuationis are the boundaries that separate men from the world and from each other. These boundaries are necessary in order to ensure the healthy functioning of society. When these boundaries begin to break down, we can be su re that Dionysus is near.
Primal Unity - The universal bosom to which we can all return through the influence of Dionysus. When filled with ecstatic joy brought on by Dionysus, men forget the differences between themselves and act as a community. Furthermore, they gain access to the undercurrent of universal will that flows beneath all appearances. It is in this space that they may return to the primordial unity and be suffused with a glow of cosmic oneness. It's like going to Woodstock. This may sound like a flippant comparison, but it is not s o far off the mark. Large concerts, raves, and festivals are very much in the Dionysian spirit of common revelry. It is in these venues that one can lose oneself in the common experience and transcend individual suffering for at least a short time.
Theoretical Man - The new man that emerged from the Socratic lust for knowledge. The theoretical man loves to remove the veils from the world, ripping them off with his logic and unflagging faith in the power of the human mind to discover truth. This man suffers under the profound Socratic illusion that thinking can reach to the depths of being and modify it. He strives to make existence seem intelligible, and thus justified. For him, knowledge is virtue. No part of the universe can hold its secrets in the face of his scru tiny, and there is nothing that is fundamentally beyond his logical understanding. This entire concept is an anathema to Nietzsche, as it squashes intuition and denies the existence of miracles and mysteries beyond individual man's reach. Glossary of Greek Names and Terms
Aeschylus - First major Attic tragedian. 525–456 BCE. He is particularly famous for his Oresteia trilogy, which comprises the Agamemnon, the Libation Bearers, and the Eumenides.
Antigone - One of the two daughters of Oedipus, she was the subject of Sophocles's tragedy called Antigone.
Archilochus - Greek iambic and elegiac poet active in the seventh century BCE. Although he makes his personal affairs the subject of his work, it is disputed as to whether his poems were intended as emotional self-expression in the modern sense.
Atlas - The Titan brother of Prometheus who had to hold up the sky on his shoulders.
Cadmus - Legendary founder of Thebes. He is a character in ##The Bacchae## of Euripides.
Cassandra - Mythical Trojan princess to whom Apollo gave prophetic powers in return for sexual favors. When she then changed her mind, he cursed her so that she was always disbelieved.
Cynics - Those who followed the school of Cynicism, which advocated an extremely primitive interpretation of the principle 'live according to nature.'
Delphi - One of the four great pan-Hellenic sanctuaries. It was a famous shrine to Apollo that produced oracles.
Demeter - Greek goddess of the harvest.
Dithyrambic Chorus - Chorus that sings in honor of Dionysus. The Dithyramb was a musical form developed specifically for this.
Eleusis - The most famous deme of Athens. There was a theater of Dionysus and the sanctuary of Demeter and Kore. Every year, initiates from across the Greek world came to celebrate the mysteries, about which we know almost nothing.
Heracles - Legendary semi-diving hero of Greek myth. He was known for his phenomenal strength.
Heraclitus of Ephesus - Compiled a book of aphorisms c.500 BCE. One central tenant of his is strife. He says that nature is like a taut bow, with tensions in both directions.
Lamiae - Monstrous mythical women who stole and killed the children of other women.
Oceanides - Minor ocean deities
Omphale - Queen of Lydia, to whom Heracles was sold as a slave for a year as punishment for the killing of Iphitus.
Orpheus - The most famous singer of myth, son of Apollo and a Muse. His song had incredible powers to enchant his listeners.
Philemon - Very successful New Comedy poet from the fourth century BCE.
Pindar - Lyric poet, born in the sixth century BCE. He was extremely successful and is one of the defining poets of Lyric verse.
Plato - Plato (429–347 BCE) was Socrates's most famous student, and immortalized Socrates's ideas in the Platonic Dialogues. He was insistent in his demands for morality in the life of the individual.
Satyric Chorus - Satyrs were mythical half-human, half-goat figures who inhabited the wild. They were known for their love of wine and sex. In fifth century drama, a group of young satyrs, with Silenus as their head, would have made up the chorus.
Sophocles - Fifth century BCE Athenian tragic playwright. He is most famous for his Oedipus cycle, around which Freud based much of his analysis. He is the second of the 'big three' tragedians (coming between Aeschylus and Euripides.)
Tartarus - The deepest realm of the underworld, where evil men are punished.
Thyrsus - A wooden staff with an acorn affixed to the top carried by the followers of Dionysus who were called Bacchants.
Tireseus - The famous old prophet of Thebes. He and Cadmus are old men in Euripides's Bacchae, and serve in as commentators.
Titans - The generation of gods that preceded the Olympic gods. The Titans are incredibly strong beings who were only defeated after a bloody battle. They are said to have torn apart Dionysus, but then he was put back together again.
Zagreus - The name for Dionysus in his incarnation as the god being torn apart by the Titans.
The Birth of Tragedy Friedrich Nietzsche
Philosophical Themes
Aritstic Tention between Apollo and Dionysus
The opposition between Apollo and Dionysus is both the backbone of Nietzsche's argument and its greatest flaw. While at first it seems that Nietzsche uses the traits associated with these gods as a metaphor for his aesthetic program, it soon becomes clear that he intends to first pin his artistic analysis on the Greeks, and then to argue that this analysis is ancient and thus carries authority. Nietzsche gives no evidence for his claim that Apollo and Dionysus were on either side of the artistic spectrum, nor does he ever discuss the main artistic models for the Greeks: the Muses. While Apollo was associated with the lyre and tonal music, and Dionysus was the patron god of Attic tragedy, the deities first and foremost on any poet's mind were the Muses. Ev ery poet invoked them, either as a group or individually. The Greeks thought of creativity as being a kind of diving substance; the word inspire comes from the Latin "to breathe in," as they thought that when someone had a great idea, they had literally b reathed in the spirit of the god, who then spoke through them. So, in order to create anything, one had to invoke the Muses, who would breathe song into the poet's lips. Wishing to keep his argument simple, Nietzsche makes no mention of this.
Thus, from the outset, we must understand that Nietzsche is bending the Greek consciousness to his aesthetic program. While much of what he says about Apollo and Dionysus is consistent with ancient beliefs, the strong opposition between the god of light a nd the god of ecstasy is mostly Nietzsche's invention. To put this in less harsh terms, we may say that Nietzsche simplified the Greek system to suit his philosophical aims.
Furthermore, we should note that for Nietzsche, a typical late 19th century German, the Greeks were the aesthetic model. In his first sentence, Nietzsche writes that the "continuous development of art is bound up with the Apollonian and Dionysian d uality." He presents this not as a theory, but "with the immediate certainty of intuition." Nietzsche sees it as part of his aesthetic task to clear away the cluttered thinking of the past 2500 years and forges a direct link between Germans and Greeks, wh o he sees as superior to all intervening cultures.
Music
Music is a key concept for Nietzsche, as is in its highest degree a universal language. This universality allows it to connect to the Dionysian essence. Music surpasses all other arts with its power to access the will directly, without attempting to copy the phenomena of the will. This is equivalent to saying that music does not need secondary sources, and thus can go strait to the original. Nietzsche suggests that music is not the medium through which the essence of Dionysus flows, but rather that it is the embodiment of Dionysus. It is only through the spirit of music in tragedy that we can experience joy in the annihilation of the individual, for music carries us beyond individual concerns. The tragic hero, whose annihilation we witness, is a phenomeno n of the world-will. His death signifies only the death of the phenomenon, not of the will itself. Man may not comprehend this truth logically, but he can feel it in the music.
Having established that music is the soul of the tragic myth, Nietzsche then demonstrates how modern German music has the potential to affect a rebirth of tragedy. Music is a central theme in this work, as it is one of the few constants that is able to co nnect Greek and German cultures. Nietzsche sees music as the key to the soul of a people. Because the German character is still connected to the vital primitive power that precedes civilized life, German music is of necessity a new incarnation of the Dion ysian in art.
Suffering
In his discussion of the sufferings of the Greeks, Nietzsche shows that he understands them from his own pessimistic standpoint. The Greeks had a problem, he argues, and tragedy fixes it. That problem was that the Greeks were a particularly sensitive peop le, and so they had difficulty reconciling themselves with the suffering of the world. While all cultures experience this dilemma of suffering, the Greeks were more seriously affected and so more urgently strove to solve the problem of their suffering. Th eir first solution was the creation of the Olympian gods, but they were mere Apollonian appearances and did not satisfy the soul. Under the influence of Apollo, man was still aware that his destiny was controlled by dark forces, despite the beautiful thin gs with which he surrounded himself.
Nietzsche tells the story of King Midas, who finally caught the satyr Silenus and asked him what was the best of all things for man. His answer was, as Nietzsche puts it, "Oh, wretched ephemeral race, children of chance and misery, why do ye compel me to tell you what it were most expedient for you not to hear? What is best of all is beyond your reach forever: not to be born, not to be, to be nothing. But the second best for you—is quickly to die." The ancient world was a rough place; war was a constant reality, disease was rampant and often incurable, and outside of a city's walls no law was assured. In the face of this, and in addition to the awareness that there is some mysterious force driving one's fate in strange directions, the Greeks would have perished, had they not created first the Olympian gods; but this still was not enough.
Dionysus offered real salvation from suffering, not by covering it up with pretty images, but by absorbing the individual into the great community of the unconscious. In the 'bosom' of Primal Unity, as Nietzsche calls it, man found deliverance from his in dividual fate, joined as he was to the souls of so many others. Existential suffering is a product of the individual who thinks he suffers alone, and can see no meaning in existence. Dionysus removes the veil from men's eyes, showing them the grand, dark chaos that sits in their hearts, and in the hearts of all men. Dionysus urges man to rejoice in this chaos, to lose himself, and thus to grow beyond his suffering.
Summary
The Birth of Tragedy is divided into twenty-five chapters and a forward. The first fifteen chapters deal with the nature of Greek Tragedy, which Nietzsche claims was born when the Apollonian worldview met the Dionysian. The last ten chapters use the Greek model to understand the state of modern culture, both its decline and its possible rebirth. The tone of the text is inspirational. Nietzsche often addresses the reader directly, saying at the end of chapter twenty, "Dare now to be tragic men, for ye shall be redeemed!" These kinds of exclamations make it more difficult to take his text seriously. However, if we look beyond the flowery words, we find some very interesting ideas. At the same time we confront Nietzsche's enormous bias, particularly when deciding when something is or is not "art." Nietzsche forms a very strict definition of art that excludes such things as subjective self-expression and the opera. Despite his criticisms of human culture, however, Nietzsche has great faith in the human soul and urges us to drop our Socratic pretenses and accept the culture of Dionysus again.
Nietzsche describes the state of Greek art before the influence of Dionysus as being naive, and concerned only with appearances. In this art conception, the observer was never truly united with art, as he remained always in quiet contemplation with it, never immersing himself. The appearances of Apollo were designed to shield man from the innate suffering of the world, and thus provide some relief and comfort.
Then came Dionysus, whose ecstatic revels first shocked the Apollonian man of Greek culture. In the end, however, it was only through one's immersion in the Dionysian essence of Primordial Unity that redemption from the suffering of the world could be achieved. In Dionysus, man found that his existence was not limited to his individual experiences alone, and thus a way was found to escape the fate of all men, which is death. As the Dionysian essence is eternal, one who connects with this essence finds a new source of life and hope. Nietzsche thus shows Dionysus to be an uplifting alternative to the salvation offered by Christianity, which demands that man renounce life on earth altogether and focus only on heaven. For, in order to achieve salvation through Dionysus, one must immerse oneself in life now.
However, while man can only find salvation in Dionysus, he requires Apollo to reveal the essence of Dionysus through his appearances. The chorus and actors of tragedy were representations, through which the essence of Dionysus was given voice to speak. Through them, man was able to experience the joys of redemption from worldly suffering. These Apollonian appearances also stood as a bulwark against the chaos of Dionysus, so that the viewer would be completely lost in Dionysian ecstasy. Nietzsche emphasizes that in real tragic art, the elements of Dionysus and Apollo were inextricably entwined. As words could never hope to delve into the depths of the Dionysian essence, music was the life of the tragic art form.
Music exists in the realm beyond language, and so allows us to rise beyond consciousness and experience our connection to the Primordial Unity. Music is superior to all other arts in that it does not represent a phenomenon, but rather the "world will" itself.
Nietzsche sees Euripides as the murderer of art, he who introduced the Socratic obsession with knowledge and ultimate trust in human thought into the theater. By focusing entirely on the individual, Euripides eliminated the musical element that is crucial to the Dionysian experience. Euripides threw Dionysus out of tragedy, and in doing so he destroyed the delicate balance between Dionysus and Apollo that is fundamental to art. In the second half of his essay, Nietzsche explores the modern ramifications of this shift in Greek thought. He argues that we are still living in the Alexandrian age of culture, which is now on its last legs. Science cannot explain the mysteries of the universe, he writes, and thanks to the work of Kant and Schopenhauer, we must now recognize this fact. The time is ripe for a rebirth of tragedy that will sweep away the dusty remains of Socratic culture. Nietzsche sees German music, Wagner in particular, as the beginning of this transformation. While German culture is decrepit, the German character is going strong, for it has an inkling of the primordial vitality flowing in its veins. Nietzsche has great hope for the coming age and has written this book to prepare us for it.
The Birth of Tragedy Friedrich Nietzsche
Glossary of Important Terms
Appearance - Nietzsche's term for the nature of Apollonian phenomena. Everything that we see around us is appearance, as it is only a veil behind which lies true reality. Likewise, the images in dreams represent the appearance of appearance. Nietzsche contrasts the co ncept of Apollonian appearance, or illusion, to the Dionysian suffering, or reality. Appearance is necessary in order to shield us from the full truth of human suffering which otherwise would crush us with its magnitude.
Chorus - The core of Greek Tragedy, originally called the satyr (half man, half goat) chorus. The chorus was made up of a number of men who watched and commented on the action of the tragedy. Their speech was often far more poetic and difficult to understand than that of the actors. Nietzsche argues that the chorus embodies the soul of music that is the life-blood of tragedy. Without it, tragedy would be nothing.
Euripides - The fifth century Athenian playwright and friend of Socrates who Nietzsche blames for the death of tragedy. Euripides was the third of the great Athenian tragedians, following Aeschylus and Sophocles, and is traditionally considered the most modern. His c haracters are far closer to those found in modern plays than those of Aeschylus, who is still very close to the ritual/religious form of tragedy. Euripides's Bacchae puts Dionysus up on stage in a deadly battle with Pentheus, the ultimate rationali stic king. Needless to say, Dionysus wins. Nietzsche jumps on this and says that Euripides wants to turn his audiences away from Dionysus. However, one could also interpret this to mean that Dionysus should be respected and feared wherever he appears.
Greek Cheerfulness - The unflaggingly chipper optimism of the Greeks. Originally, this cheerfulness was not the superficial result of a shallow mind, but rather the Apollonian reaction in the face of Dionysian suffering. The cheerfulness is a mask, a protective measure agains t the dark and powerful forces of Dionysus. Nietzsche insists that these particular cheerful Greeks were in fact very serious about art, whereas the post-Socratic cheerful Greeks were an entirely different breed. The cheerful characters that we find in Eu ripides are shallow, and the cheerful optimism of post-Socratic culture was a disaster for both Greek myth and tragedy.
Ideal Spectator - Schlegel's term for the role of the chorus in Greek tragedy. Nietzsche disagrees with this idea on the grounds that the chorus could never have been drawn from the crowd of general spectators and so elevated to 'ideal' status. Furthermore, a true spectato r must be aware that he is viewing a work of art, whereas the Greek chorus acted from within the world of the tragedy, as if they were viewing real events. Nietzsche then modifies his criticism and admits that the chorus is the ideal-spectator in the sens e that it is the only 'beholder' of the visionary world of the play.
Naive artist - Term for the artist who is completely absorbed in the beauty of appearance. This state of being is a complete victory of the Apollonian illusion. Homer is the greatest naive artist, for his forms are the most beautiful. Nietzsche clearly views this form o f artist as inferior to the tragic artist, but also superior to the operatic artist. The naive artist is pure one hundred percent Apollonian, which, although unbalanced, is far better than being emotive and degenerate.
Principium Individuationis - Principle of individuation. Apollo champions the unshaken faith in this principle of the individual. Nietzsche contrasts this with the Dionysian immersion in the world will, in order to show how opposite those two art-deities really are. Implicit in the c oncept of the principium individuationis are the boundaries that separate men from the world and from each other. These boundaries are necessary in order to ensure the healthy functioning of society. When these boundaries begin to break down, we can be su re that Dionysus is near.
Primal Unity - The universal bosom to which we can all return through the influence of Dionysus. When filled with ecstatic joy brought on by Dionysus, men forget the differences between themselves and act as a community. Furthermore, they gain access to the undercurrent of universal will that flows beneath all appearances. It is in this space that they may return to the primordial unity and be suffused with a glow of cosmic oneness. It's like going to Woodstock. This may sound like a flippant comparison, but it is not s o far off the mark. Large concerts, raves, and festivals are very much in the Dionysian spirit of common revelry. It is in these venues that one can lose oneself in the common experience and transcend individual suffering for at least a short time.
Theoretical Man - The new man that emerged from the Socratic lust for knowledge. The theoretical man loves to remove the veils from the world, ripping them off with his logic and unflagging faith in the power of the human mind to discover truth. This man suffers under the profound Socratic illusion that thinking can reach to the depths of being and modify it. He strives to make existence seem intelligible, and thus justified. For him, knowledge is virtue. No part of the universe can hold its secrets in the face of his scru tiny, and there is nothing that is fundamentally beyond his logical understanding. This entire concept is an anathema to Nietzsche, as it squashes intuition and denies the existence of miracles and mysteries beyond individual man's reach. Glossary of Greek Names and Terms
Aeschylus - First major Attic tragedian. 525–456 BCE. He is particularly famous for his Oresteia trilogy, which comprises the Agamemnon, the Libation Bearers, and the Eumenides.
Antigone - One of the two daughters of Oedipus, she was the subject of Sophocles's tragedy called Antigone.
Archilochus - Greek iambic and elegiac poet active in the seventh century BCE. Although he makes his personal affairs the subject of his work, it is disputed as to whether his poems were intended as emotional self-expression in the modern sense.
Atlas - The Titan brother of Prometheus who had to hold up the sky on his shoulders.
Cadmus - Legendary founder of Thebes. He is a character in ##The Bacchae## of Euripides.
Cassandra - Mythical Trojan princess to whom Apollo gave prophetic powers in return for sexual favors. When she then changed her mind, he cursed her so that she was always disbelieved.
Cynics - Those who followed the school of Cynicism, which advocated an extremely primitive interpretation of the principle 'live according to nature.'
Delphi - One of the four great pan-Hellenic sanctuaries. It was a famous shrine to Apollo that produced oracles.
Demeter - Greek goddess of the harvest.
Dithyrambic Chorus - Chorus that sings in honor of Dionysus. The Dithyramb was a musical form developed specifically for this.
Eleusis - The most famous deme of Athens. There was a theater of Dionysus and the sanctuary of Demeter and Kore. Every year, initiates from across the Greek world came to celebrate the mysteries, about which we know almost nothing.
Heracles - Legendary semi-diving hero of Greek myth. He was known for his phenomenal strength.
Heraclitus of Ephesus - Compiled a book of aphorisms c.500 BCE. One central tenant of his is strife. He says that nature is like a taut bow, with tensions in both directions.
Lamiae - Monstrous mythical women who stole and killed the children of other women.
Oceanides - Minor ocean deities
Omphale - Queen of Lydia, to whom Heracles was sold as a slave for a year as punishment for the killing of Iphitus.
Orpheus - The most famous singer of myth, son of Apollo and a Muse. His song had incredible powers to enchant his listeners.
Philemon - Very successful New Comedy poet from the fourth century BCE.
Pindar - Lyric poet, born in the sixth century BCE. He was extremely successful and is one of the defining poets of Lyric verse.
Plato - Plato (429–347 BCE) was Socrates's most famous student, and immortalized Socrates's ideas in the Platonic Dialogues. He was insistent in his demands for morality in the life of the individual.
Satyric Chorus - Satyrs were mythical half-human, half-goat figures who inhabited the wild. They were known for their love of wine and sex. In fifth century drama, a group of young satyrs, with Silenus as their head, would have made up the chorus.
Sophocles - Fifth century BCE Athenian tragic playwright. He is most famous for his Oedipus cycle, around which Freud based much of his analysis. He is the second of the 'big three' tragedians (coming between Aeschylus and Euripides.)
Tartarus - The deepest realm of the underworld, where evil men are punished.
Thyrsus - A wooden staff with an acorn affixed to the top carried by the followers of Dionysus who were called Bacchants.
Tireseus - The famous old prophet of Thebes. He and Cadmus are old men in Euripides's Bacchae, and serve in as commentators.
Titans - The generation of gods that preceded the Olympic gods. The Titans are incredibly strong beings who were only defeated after a bloody battle. They are said to have torn apart Dionysus, but then he was put back together again.
Zagreus - The name for Dionysus in his incarnation as the god being torn apart by the Titans.
The Birth of Tragedy Friedrich Nietzsche
Philosophical Themes
Aritstic Tention between Apollo and Dionysus
The opposition between Apollo and Dionysus is both the backbone of Nietzsche's argument and its greatest flaw. While at first it seems that Nietzsche uses the traits associated with these gods as a metaphor for his aesthetic program, it soon becomes clear that he intends to first pin his artistic analysis on the Greeks, and then to argue that this analysis is ancient and thus carries authority. Nietzsche gives no evidence for his claim that Apollo and Dionysus were on either side of the artistic spectrum, nor does he ever discuss the main artistic models for the Greeks: the Muses. While Apollo was associated with the lyre and tonal music, and Dionysus was the patron god of Attic tragedy, the deities first and foremost on any poet's mind were the Muses. Ev ery poet invoked them, either as a group or individually. The Greeks thought of creativity as being a kind of diving substance; the word inspire comes from the Latin "to breathe in," as they thought that when someone had a great idea, they had literally b reathed in the spirit of the god, who then spoke through them. So, in order to create anything, one had to invoke the Muses, who would breathe song into the poet's lips. Wishing to keep his argument simple, Nietzsche makes no mention of this.
Thus, from the outset, we must understand that Nietzsche is bending the Greek consciousness to his aesthetic program. While much of what he says about Apollo and Dionysus is consistent with ancient beliefs, the strong opposition between the god of light a nd the god of ecstasy is mostly Nietzsche's invention. To put this in less harsh terms, we may say that Nietzsche simplified the Greek system to suit his philosophical aims.
Furthermore, we should note that for Nietzsche, a typical late 19th century German, the Greeks were the aesthetic model. In his first sentence, Nietzsche writes that the "continuous development of art is bound up with the Apollonian and Dionysian d uality." He presents this not as a theory, but "with the immediate certainty of intuition." Nietzsche sees it as part of his aesthetic task to clear away the cluttered thinking of the past 2500 years and forges a direct link between Germans and Greeks, wh o he sees as superior to all intervening cultures.
Music
Music is a key concept for Nietzsche, as is in its highest degree a universal language. This universality allows it to connect to the Dionysian essence. Music surpasses all other arts with its power to access the will directly, without attempting to copy the phenomena of the will. This is equivalent to saying that music does not need secondary sources, and thus can go strait to the original. Nietzsche suggests that music is not the medium through which the essence of Dionysus flows, but rather that it is the embodiment of Dionysus. It is only through the spirit of music in tragedy that we can experience joy in the annihilation of the individual, for music carries us beyond individual concerns. The tragic hero, whose annihilation we witness, is a phenomeno n of the world-will. His death signifies only the death of the phenomenon, not of the will itself. Man may not comprehend this truth logically, but he can feel it in the music.
Having established that music is the soul of the tragic myth, Nietzsche then demonstrates how modern German music has the potential to affect a rebirth of tragedy. Music is a central theme in this work, as it is one of the few constants that is able to co nnect Greek and German cultures. Nietzsche sees music as the key to the soul of a people. Because the German character is still connected to the vital primitive power that precedes civilized life, German music is of necessity a new incarnation of the Dion ysian in art.
Suffering
In his discussion of the sufferings of the Greeks, Nietzsche shows that he understands them from his own pessimistic standpoint. The Greeks had a problem, he argues, and tragedy fixes it. That problem was that the Greeks were a particularly sensitive peop le, and so they had difficulty reconciling themselves with the suffering of the world. While all cultures experience this dilemma of suffering, the Greeks were more seriously affected and so more urgently strove to solve the problem of their suffering. Th eir first solution was the creation of the Olympian gods, but they were mere Apollonian appearances and did not satisfy the soul. Under the influence of Apollo, man was still aware that his destiny was controlled by dark forces, despite the beautiful thin gs with which he surrounded himself.
Nietzsche tells the story of King Midas, who finally caught the satyr Silenus and asked him what was the best of all things for man. His answer was, as Nietzsche puts it, "Oh, wretched ephemeral race, children of chance and misery, why do ye compel me to tell you what it were most expedient for you not to hear? What is best of all is beyond your reach forever: not to be born, not to be, to be nothing. But the second best for you—is quickly to die." The ancient world was a rough place; war was a constant reality, disease was rampant and often incurable, and outside of a city's walls no law was assured. In the face of this, and in addition to the awareness that there is some mysterious force driving one's fate in strange directions, the Greeks would have perished, had they not created first the Olympian gods; but this still was not enough.
Dionysus offered real salvation from suffering, not by covering it up with pretty images, but by absorbing the individual into the great community of the unconscious. In the 'bosom' of Primal Unity, as Nietzsche calls it, man found deliverance from his in dividual fate, joined as he was to the souls of so many others. Existential suffering is a product of the individual who thinks he suffers alone, and can see no meaning in existence. Dionysus removes the veil from men's eyes, showing them the grand, dark chaos that sits in their hearts, and in the hearts of all men. Dionysus urges man to rejoice in this chaos, to lose himself, and thus to grow beyond his suffering.
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