John P's Reviews > Beyond Good and Evil

Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Nietzsche

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Nophoto-m-50x66
's review
Jun 19, 11

Read in June, 2011

First, there are quite a few punctuation errors, whether by the publisher, translator, or author matters not; context helps sort these out for the most part. Second, it is, after all, a translation and all the risks of such an endeavor apply; even more so due to the complex nature of the ideas expressed.

As to the ideas, let me say Mr. Nietzsche reminds of Hoffer in that Nietzsche offers blanket statements and unprovable conclusions by the dozens, except that Nietzsche's are unsupported by any detectable logic or data. He seems articulate enough but in a wordy, unnecessarily complicated way. His cause is further damaged by paragraphs containing no topic sentence and no resolution. Some paragraphs ramble on so long that even if there were a topic sentence, one would be hard pressed to remember it by the end. In a similar way, the chapter titles bear only a strained and glancing connection to chapter contents.

What is the purpose of the book? What are the main points? What are the arguments supporting? These are questions all unanswered by a first reading.

Hopefully, for Nietzsche's sake, the translation is at fault. For my part I shall likely never know. I got nothing out of this book and cannot now imagine opening another of his.


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