Aesthetic Transformations ― Taking Nietzsche at His Word

Countering postmodernists who praise Nietzche's relativism but neglect his certainty about the Übermensch (superman), Jovanovski (philosophy, Baldwin-Wallace College, Berea, Ohio) presents an analysis of the overlooked role that aesthetics played in his philosophy. Refraining from judging whether the Übermensch is a socially desirable objective today, his reading is that Nietzsche sought, e.g., in The Birth of Tragedy (1872), to replace the Socratic principles of Western ontology with a tragic consciousness informed by the Dionysian impulse, as a vehicle toward a cultural, political, and religious metamorphosis. The bibliography features Nietzsche's works in translation and critical literature on him. Annotation ©2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)