vergeblich - in vain

I was just now looking at Nietzsche's "Late Notebooks," also familiar under the title "Will to Power." The difference between the older and more widely distributed "Will to Power" version (trans. Kaufmann) and the one I'm reading (ed. Bittner; trans. Sturge; CUP) is that the latter is organized by notebook and date, while the Kaufmann version assembles scattered aphorisms under thematic headings. Thus it could be argued the Bittner and Sturge version is a more straightforward presentation of Nietzsche's thoughts.

Anyway, I'm reading along in Notebook 5, summer 1886 - autumn 1887. I get to aphorism 59, p. 113.

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Deserving jibes at Sartre, included

This space has been on an absolute roll lately. Go see. Courtesy of, and since we're watching film, the following may be of interest, particularly in light of recent conversations:

Online Videos by Veoh.com

we must take the matter pretty deep

Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, Book I, Part IV, Section VI, "Of personal identity"

There are some philosophers who imagine we are every moment intimately conscious of what we call our SELF; that we feel its existence and its continuance in existence; and are certain, beyond the evidence of a demonstration, both of its perfect identity and simplicity. The strongest sensation, the most violent passion, say they, instead of distracting us from this view, only fix it the more intensely, and make us consider their influence on self either by their pain or pleasure. To attempt a farther proof of this were to weaken its evidence; since no proof can be deriv'd from any fact, of which we are so intimately conscious; nor is there any thing, of which we can be certain, if we doubt of this.

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Semi-homemade cooking grows out of the barrel of a gun

Writing is my greatest pleasure when it comes to production, but with the reign (or perhaps I should say the irresistible temptation) of the computer, it's not particularly a tactile pleasure. When it comes to sensuous productive enjoyment, it's cooking for me. Now I am a rank amateur, knowing little about chemistry and disdaining cookbooks—indeed, one of these boorish reactionaries who thinks you can cook with a free intelligence, without sullying your brain with theory! (Don't worry, I harbor no similar illusions about reading/writing.)

On weekends, I watch the Food Network. My favorite show is called something like Home Cooking with Paula Dean, a sassy white-haired fat southern lady who puts a few sticks of butter in everything.

(During the commercials was one for the army: a young man playing pool with dad, insisting that he was only joining the reserves, that they'd train him locally until they needed him, that he wanted to be part of something greater. The ad ended with text encouring parents to “help them grow.” Damn you, selfish parents! How dare you keep your children to yourselves when we need them as precious ingredients in our savory home-cooked dish of war! But yeah, they'll train him locally till they need him, then when he's scattered across a sidewalk in a city he's helping to demolish, they'll zip him into a bag and throw him away and then lie to his parents though they were so selfless, so willing to contribute him. Man, fuck all these fuckers.)

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Ressentiment

Speaking of writers in the obscene, as if they were gourmet or fine wines, I'm wondering if Roland Barthes might not provide a nice digestivo after a plateful of Nietzsche. .  I might have the Nietzsche with my steak, and Barthes to follow, in a hammock on the porch.  As the necessary sentimental, romantic and subtle corrective to all those vaguely fascistic alpha-male overtones of glorified solitude and angst.  Although the need to carve a distinction betweeen the descriptive and prescriptive applies to Nietzsche if it ap-plies to anyone.  Not too concerned for canonical (mis)statements so much as selective unpickings and digestions, Barthes is one of those rare original readers who manages to be both ruthless and tender at once (never more tender than when ruthless, perhaps).  He is also, in my view, one proof among many (but hardly enough) that the obsessively literary may still avoid the merely pretentious, or an habitual kind of violence in their practices of reading (a certain bodily violence, even).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not about to swallow Barthes whole.  If his most famous student, Julia Kristeva, is any measure, there may be certain overly-used psychoanalytic categories, or a preponderant reliance on psychoanalytic vocabulary, we would, at some point, be better to do without.  But here's a swish (not swallow) of Barthes for now, if you're so inclined, preceeded by a simple bite of Nietzsche.

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