Written after Nietzsche had ended his friendship withRichard Wagner and had been forced to leave academic life through ill health,Human, All Too Human (1878) can be read as a monument to his personal crisis.

It also marks the point when he matured as a philosopher,rejecting the German romanticism espoused by Wagner and Schopenhauer andinstead returning to sources in the French Enlightenment.

Here he sets out his unsettling views in a series of 638stunning aphorisms – assessing subjects ranging from art to arrogance, boredomto passion, science to vanity and women to youth.

This work also contains the seeds of concepts crucial toNietzsche’s later philosophy, such as the will to power and the need totranscend conventional Christian morality. The result is one of thecornerstones of his life’s work.

About the Author

Friedrich Nietzsche(1844-1900) was born nearLeipzig. When he was twenty-four he was appointed to the chair of classicalphilology at Basel University. He published many works, includingTheGay Science,Thus Spoke ZarathustraandBeyondGood and Evil. In 1889, Nietzsche collapsed and was subsequentlyinstitutionalized, spending the rest of his life in a condition of mental andphysical paralysis. Works published after his death includeWill toPowerand his autobiography,Ecce Homo.