Beyond Good and Evil - Friedrich Nietzsche

Reasoning

I felt like this would be a useful book to read as I've read that it covers the topics of imagination, self-assertion, originality, and creation of values.

What I Gained

I found this book to be very useful in terms of providing me with ideas that could help me link the idea of the overman to the practice of pastiche, as well as some clear criticisms of Christianity, preaching, and preachers, which I can relate to the First Things First Manifesto by comparing them with Nietzsche's reasoning.

Potentially useful quotes:

Next Steps

Having read what I believe to be the three most appropriate of Nietzsche's books for my project (on the basis of the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy), I want to read Ecce Homo to see what Nietzsche has to say on these particular books.

Re-Visiting Thus Spoke Zarathustra - Friedrich Nietzsche

Reasoning

After reading Danto's book and the Roudledge Critical Thinkers book I know have a better idea of what Nietzsche's key thoughts were, and by revisiting certain chapters in Thus Spoke Zarathustra that came up in the two books might be helpful as I have a better idea of what to look for in the text. I want to re-read Of the Three Metamorphoses, Of the Thousand and One Goals, Of the Tarantulas, Of the Spirit of Gravity, and The Convalescent.

My previous notes on Thus Spoke Zarathustra can be found here.

What I Gained

I didn't gain as much from this as I had hoped, mainly: 

1. How important Of the Three Metamorphoses is in regards to how is ideas are introduced to the rest of book.
2. Nietzsche's insistence that religion is itself an old morality.

Potentially useful quotes:

Next Steps

Beyond Good and Evil is the next book that I want to read, as I feel that there's probably not much more I can now take from a book about Nietzsche. I feel that this one in particular should be worth reading because of how the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy says it talks about imagination, self-assertion, originality and creation of values.

Nietzsche as Philosopher, an Original Study - Arthur C. Danto

Reasoning

At times I felt that the Routledge Critical Thinkers book was quite hard to read because of unnecessarily long sentences and words. Despite it's usefulness, I found that it didn't offer much subjectivity. I was attracted to this book in particular because it claimed to be "an Original Study", which suggests some subjectivity. I hoped that this would give me an idea of how some of Nietzsche's ideas could be interpreted and/or linked in a less objective manner.

The author, Arthur C. Danto was a philosopher, so probably had a fairly strong knowledge of Nietzsche's thoughts. He was also an art critic, so there may be some quotes in the book about Nietzsche's approach to art that could carry across to Graphic Design, which would be useful.

What I Gained

I found this book very useful, with some of the key points being: 

1. Society has been scared to stop following religion because they're scared that the morality will disappear with it, and they're unable to create new values.
2. Nietzsche felt that Christianity placed humanity in a debt to God that couldn't be repaid apart from through suffering, which lead to the 'Death of God'.
3. Nietzsche taught that pity made suffering infectious and contagious.
4. Nietzsche was scared of the eternal recurrence because it stops 'true creation', although it also renders the idea of a higher world (heaven) or the idea that there is a given goal to life. This allows man to live to his own ends.
5. All life is the will to power, and a living creatures could be interpreted as various wills acting in the same direction - a means to the will-to-power's end.
6. Nihilism is needed in order to make room for creation, so Nietzsche's nihilism was just a means to an end. Whereas religious nihilism has no end.

Potentially useful quotes:

Next Steps

I found this book incredibly useful to read. The reason there aren't as many quotes as from Spinks' introduction to Nietzsche is that at this point, as my understanding of Nietzsche has developed, the scope for something to be 'potentially useful' has shrunk.

I now intend to re-visit certain parts of Thus Spoke Zarathustra with my developed understanding of Nietzsche in the hope that the selected bits make more sense and are more useful in a subjective sense.

The Gay Science - Friedrich Nietzsche (with commentary by Walter Kaufmann)

Reasoning

Having been referenced a lot in the previous book I read, it made sense to read The Gay Science while the references were still fresh in my mind.

What I Gained

The main things I took from this book were:

1. An understanding of the will-to-powers relationship with religion.
2. Nietzsche makes clear that our current morality was created and affirmed by people because of their needs, and isn't an instinctual thing.
3. The Christianity makes people think of the consequences of their lives in the form of an overworld, which makes it more difficult for their followers to endure the eternal recurrence as they don't live by their own values.
4. In order to become the overman, one must accept and embrace the eternal recurrence.

Potentially useful quotes:

Next Steps

Given how useful I found it to read a secondary text after Thus Spoke Zarathustra, I intend to read another one now, in the hope that it will further increase my understanding.

Friedrich Nietzsche - Lee Spinks (Routledge Critical Thinkers)

Reasoning

The Routledge Critical Thinkers series is described by the series editor as being "designed for students who need an accessible introduction to the key figures in contemporary critical thought," which fits my needs perfectly.

What I Gained

There were three main things I took from reading this book:

1. It helped me distinguish between the superman and the 'higher men', which was a source of confusion towards the end of Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
2. It introduced the concept of eternal recurrence in a less cryptic sense, which shed some light on a few parts of Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
3. It highlighted to me that Nietzsche's key thoughts were the will-to-power, the eternal recurrence, and the overman.

Potentially useful quotes:

Next Steps

The book made a lot of references to Nietzsche's The Gay Science, considerably more so than any of his other books. I decided that my next step should be to read The Gay Science, as I feel like this book has given me a solid foundation of knowledge to continue primary reading from.

Thus Spoke Zarathustra - Friedrich Nietzsche

Reasoning

I found through various sources that it generally doesn't matter what order you read Nietzsche's books in because of his lack of a clear order or system in his writings, and that Thus Spoke Zarathustra was Nietzsche's most popular book, given to the German soldiers in WW1 alongside the Bible as inspirational reading. I felt that this would be a good starting point in my investigation into Nietzsche because, having read parts of the Bible in the past, it would be a good way to start comparing Nietzsche's teachings to those of Christianity.

What I Gained

It would be difficult to clarify what I gained from this book as I had nothing to measure it against. Primarily it gave me a unique opportunity in this module, to have a truly first-hand reading of the book, which can only assist the critical aspect of the project.

It particularly made clear the below two things:

1. The similarities between Thus Spoke Zarathustra and the Bible. It could therefore be argued that Thus Spoke Zarathustra is an alternate, anti-moral (although not necessarily immoral) Bible.
2. Zarathustra is a character representative of Nietzsche himself, and the 'story' (as it could possibly be interpreted as) of Thus Spoke Zarathustra is essentially Nietzsche writing up a fictitious account of how he saw society at the time and how it would've reacted to his teaching.  

Potentially useful quotes:

Next Steps

I found myself to be somewhat confused at times throughout the book, having only previously been introduced to the fact the Nietzsche criticised Christianity for being a religion of pity. However, I feel like this has put me in a good position to develop my own opinion of Nietzsche as my first impressions of him were my own rather than someone else's.

Because of this slight confusion I will be reading a book on Nietzsche rather than by him in order to gain a more rounded knowledge and understanding on him. A series that was suggested was the Routledge Critical Thinkers books. The book on Nietzsche in particularly is written by Dr Lee Spinks, a senior lecturer in English Language at the University of Edinburgh.

Dissertation Methodology and Planning

Methodology

I will use a Nietzschean methodology in my research and writing, if such a thing is possible. This will mean looking at the First Things First Manifesto solely from a Nietzschean perspective, allowing me to come to a conclusion that is critical and truly 'Nietzschean'. This seems like an appropriate method to take given that my initial understanding of Nietzsche is that his based around the celebration and achievement of the individual, and so raising points from a different perspective seems counter-productive and unnecessary in this sense. The large amount of primary reading also increases the scope for criticality than just reading secondary texts.

Paradoxically, this means that one of the biggest flaws in this essay will be it’s general lack of discussion of an approach to FTF 2000 other than a Nietzschean one. However, given that the whole premise of this essay is philosophical, it would be different to include more than one perspective in detail within the word count, so exploring this one outlook in depth is just as valid a route, especially given the Nietzsche-specific focus of the question.

Literature Review

Key Texts: Texts that I intend on reading in full or close to in full to give me a solid understanding of Nietzsche's thoughts and the First Things First Manifesto. Reading Nietzsche's books first will allow me to read First Things First from a Nietzschean perspective.

The Gay Science - Friedrich Nietzsche

Beyond Good and Evil - Friedrich Nietzsche

The Antichrist - Friedrich Nietzsche

Thus Spoke Zarathustra - Friedrich Nietzsche

Ecce Homo - Friedrich Nietzsche

Nietzsche as Philosopher - Arthur C. Danto

Friedrich Nietzsche - Lee Spinks

1964 First Things First Manifesto - Ken Garland

2000 First Things First Manifesto - Adbusters

Supporting Texts: Texts that I'll read suitable bits from or in full if they're smaller. These will provide more variation in my citations, increasing the strength of the triangulation by supporting the arguments made from my readings of the key texts.

Human, All Too Human - Friedrich Nietzsche

Fear and Trembling - Soren Kierkegaard

Practice in Christianity - Soren Kierkegaard

On the Suffering of the World - Arthur Schopenhauer

The Wisdom of Life - Arthur Schopenhauer

Moral Man and Immoral Society - Reinhold Niebuhr

10 Footnotes to a Manifesto - Michael Bierut

First Things First Revisited - Rick Poynor

Good: An Introduction to Ethics In Graphic Design - Lucienne Roberts

Research Plan

1. Read the books from Danto and Spinks as an introduction to Nietzsche.
2. Read the Nietzsche books to develop my own critical thoughts.
3. Read the Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard, and Niebuhr books to be able to initially triangulate some of Nietzsche's ideas with others that support him.
4. Analyse the First Things First Manifesto's to try and match up some of the notes I've taken on Nietzsche's thoughts with the Manifesto. 
5. Read the Bierut, Poynor, and Roberts texts to try and triangulate these thoughts.
6. Structure my points in a dissertation plan, highlighting areas where examples of graphic design will be appropriate as an example of a point.
7. Find said examples of graphic design. This will ideally be done through a natural progression of sources I use that start from Bierut, Poynor and Roberts, although I may have to look at design blogs if this doesn't materialise. Design blogs are appropriate sources because they generally display the sort contemporary work that First Things First is either for or against dependent on it's context.
8. Use these examples along with the points brought up in my essay plan to come up with a suitable proposal for a practical project supporting the essay.

Practical Work

At this moment in time I don't know enough about Nietzsche's theories or the main content of my essay to solidly plan or propose a practical element that would be necessarily be appropriate, but my current idea to write up a Nietzschean manifesto to design in direct response to First Things First based on the content of my essay, and produce pieces of design that follow the Nietzschean ones in response to the examples I'll have used in the essay. This is something that is subject to change, and will be addressed more thoroughly as I approach the end of my reading.

CoP 3 Proposal