CHAPTER 3The Birth of
The Birth of Tragedy
The vortex of being · Fundamental cruelty · Nietzsche
goes to war · Slaves · Moral vs. aesthetic thinking · Fear
of uprising · Glimpses into the innermost secrets of culture- Bright lights and blinders in the face of enormity ·
Dionystan wisdom
0 V JULY 2, 1868 , Nietzsche confessed to Sophie Ritschl, the
wife of his esteemed teacher of classical philology and sponsor, that he
was seeking an opportunity to combine philology and music. "Maybe 1
will find a philological subject that can be treated musically, and then I
will babble like an infant and heap up images like a barbarian who has
fallen asleep in front of an antique head of Venus, and still be in the right
despite the 'flourishing haste' of the exposition" (Β 2,299). This letter
was written before Nietzsche met Wagner. The young classical philolo-
gist, who had already mastered his profession to the point that it bored
him "to write down sober trains of thougjht with the requisite discretion
and alia breve" (B 2,299), began to indulge in daydreams of this sort.
Treating philological material "musically" implies more than simply
introducing musical themes. It requires the production of music, "which
happens to be written with words instead of notes" (2? 2,298). Nietzsche
sought a theme that would allow him to create music with words. After
59