Reading this text reminded me a lot of the beginning of first term – a deceptively small book filled with unfamiliar phrases laid out in a seemingly order-less fashion. In any case, I feel nervous writing this blog post, because I’m not sure if I really understand most of this text, let alone have opinions about it. However, after the lecture today, I feel much less unprepared to write. In the interest of not appearing as confused as I actually am, I’m going to talk about some of the aphorisms that I found interesting or appealing.

I enjoyed Epigrams and Arrows 11 (p. 6). Not only was it funny, but if I understand it correctly, it is self-deprecating, as well as fairly calling into question the abilities of philosophers and philosophy in general (which ties into the theme of the book as a whole).

I also noticed #20 (p. 8), just as I was rereading it after today’s discussion on misogyny. It seems to me that this (and perhaps a few others that I didn’t understand as well, namely 16) would support this view, but I’m also not sure how that affects my perception of the rest of the text.

As I think about it now, it seems to me that most of my confusion arises from the openness of the text. Spaces in the text were discussed in lecture so I won’t reiterate here, but it seems to me that the purpose of this, and what I appreciate about Nietzsche, is that although he criticizes (a lot) and brings into question traditional philosophies and religions, he doesn’t really dictate a full on philosophy or dogma, as much as he tries to evoke independent thought, albeit thought that is somewhat guided by the format of his questions and supposings. Although I wish he would engage in more understandable structure, I can admire this approach to philosophy.

• Nietzsche