character The rope-dancer
The tightrope walker who falls in the market-place and dies; buried by Zarathustra.
2 passages
Then, however, something happened which made every mouth mute and every eye fixed. In the meantime, of course, the rope-dancer had commenced his performance: he had come out at a little door, and was going along the…
A buffoon leaps over the rope-dancer, who falls beside Zarathustra. The dying man fears the devil and hell. Zarathustra says there is neither and promises to bury him.
Read in the book →
Meanwhile the evening came on, and the market-place veiled itself in gloom. Then the people dispersed, for even curiosity and terror become fatigued. Zarathustra, however, still sat beside the dead man on the ground,…
Zarathustra reflects that he has caught a corpse and not a man. The buffoon warns him to leave town. He is mocked by grave-diggers, fed by a hermit, and lays the dead man in a hollow tree.
Read in the book →