Also Sprach Zarathustra I-III (first collected)

Leipzig: E.W. Fritzsch, 1886. first thus. Hardcover. Very good +. NIETZSCHE, Friedrich. Also Sprach Zarathustra I - III. E.W. Fritzsch, Leipzig, 1886. 3 parts in one. TP + 1 leaf + 5-114 + 2 leaves + 1-103 + 2 leaves + [1]-119 Octavo. First Edition, Second Issue. Schaberg 45.

The first appearance together of the first three parts of Nietzsche's masterpiece – one of the most influential works of German literature. This issue was created by using the left-over printed sheet from the first edition (which had previously been issued separately), canceling the original title-pages and adding a new single-volume title (“teils titelauflage”) to the first part and half-titles to the other two parts. (Part IV was not publicly printed until 1891).

Thus Spoke Zarathustra is one of Nietzsche's most famous works, and Nietzsche regarded it as among his most significant. Thoroughly studied and re-studied by scholars throughout the 20th century, the character of Zarathustra stands as a figure marking the end of Modernity by some (i.e., Heidegger), the beginning of Post-Modernity by others (i.e., Derrida); the text, a personal soteriological narrative of Nietzsche’s own self-overcoming, and a parable for others towards the same transformation. Though Thus Spoke Zarathustra attempts to destroy and replace the Judeo-Christian world-view, Nietzsche’s style borrows heavily from the Old and New Testament. Nietzsche also adopts myriad metaphors, invoking animals, earth, air, fire, water, celestial bodies, plants, all in the service of describing the spiritual transformation of Zarathustra, a solitary, reflective, exceedingly strong-willed, sage-like, laughing and dancing voice of self-mastery who, accompanied by a proud, sharp-eyed eagle and a wise snake, believed in a mode of being beyond the common human condition but without the need to posit a transcendent ‘other’ world. Nietzsche refers to this higher mode of being as “superhuman” (übermenschlich), one that embraces the doctrine of eternal recurrence, a doctrine for only the strongest who can love life in its entirety, who embrace their suffering and would only again will it to be thus!

CONDITION: Very good or better in contemporary 3/4 leather with plain boards. Gilt lettering to spine. Light edge wear. Minor hinge repairs. Light browning to endpapers and title page, as usual. Internally bright, clean, near fine. Wonderfully well-preserved copy.