Philosophy as involuntary self-confession: Lou Andreas-Salomé's Nietzsche

Abstract

This article explores the interpretation of Friedrich Nietzsche's work carried out by Lou Andreas-Salomé (1992) in her “Nietzsche in his Works”, focusing on her psychological and existential reading of the main Nietzschean concepts. Salomé proposes a deep connection between life and work, arguing that Nietzsche develops his philosophy as a personal response to the crisis of Western values. The article analyzes Lou Salomé's three main interpretative axes: a) the relationship between Nietzsche's personal experiences and his philosophy, seen as a kind of “involuntary self-confession”; b) the multifarious style of Nietzsche's work, which reveals a fragmented spirit resulting from the conflict and attempt at reconciliation between several distinct identities (the musician, the poet, the philosopher, the religious), in search of self-overcoming; c) the mystical dimension of Nietzsche's mature thought, which denounces a divine ideal of transcendence projected in concepts such as Eternal Return, Beyond-man and Will to Power. These analyzes are, in the end, situated in the community of Nietzsche interpreters and panoramically compared with the interpretations of commentators such as Walter Kaufmann, Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers, Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault, Gianni Vattimo and Alexander Nehamas, revealing the originality and influence of Salomé's perspective in the field of Nietzschean studies.