10 passages
When it got abroad among the sailors that Zarathustra was on board the ship—for a man who came from the Happy Isles had gone on board along with him,—there was great curiosity and expectation. But Zarathustra kept…
On the ship Zarathustra stays silent for two days, then is moved by the sailors' tales of distant voyages and begins to speak. He addresses the daring adventurers and begins to tell of a gloomy climb up a lonesome mountain path.
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Upwards:—in spite of the spirit that drew it downwards, towards the abyss, the spirit of gravity, my devil and arch-enemy. Upwards:—although it sat upon me, half-dwarf, half-mole; paralysed, paralysing; dripping lead in…
Climbing upward, Zarathustra is weighed down by the dwarf, who whispers that the stone he threw so high must fall back upon himself. The silence between them is more oppressive than being alone.
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But there is something in me which I call courage: it hath hitherto slain for me every dejection. This courage at last bade me stand still and say: “Dwarf! Thou! Or I!”— For courage is the best slayer,—courage which…
Zarathustra's courage bids him stand and challenge the dwarf: 'Dwarf! Thou! Or I!' He praises courage as the best slayer, overcoming pain, abysses, pity and death.
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Courage, however, is the best slayer, courage which attacketh: it slayeth even death itself; for it saith: “WAS THAT life? Well! Once more!”
Courage conquers death by answering it with a demand to live it all again.
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“Halt, dwarf!” said I. “Either I—or thou! I, however, am the stronger of the two:—thou knowest not mine abysmal thought! IT—couldst thou not endure!” Then happened that which made me lighter: for the dwarf sprang from…
Zarathustra throws down the dwarf and shows him a gateway called 'This Moment', where two eternal lanes meet. He reasons that all things, including the spider, the moonlight, and the two of them, must eternally return.
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The name of the gateway is inscribed above: ‘This Moment.’
Zarathustra names the gateway where the two opposite lanes of eternity abut.
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Thus did I speak, and always more softly: for I was afraid of mine own thoughts, and arrear-thoughts. Then, suddenly did I hear a dog HOWL near me. Had I ever heard a dog howl thus? My thoughts ran back. Yes! When I was…
Afraid of his own thoughts, Zarathustra hears a dog howl and recalls a similar howl from childhood under the full moon. The dwarf and gateway vanish, and he stands alone among rocks, where the dog is crying for help over a man lying there.
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And verily, what I saw, the like had I never seen. A young shepherd did I see, writhing, choking, quivering, with distorted countenance, and with a heavy black serpent hanging out of his mouth. Had I ever seen so much…
Zarathustra finds a young shepherd choking with a heavy black serpent fastened in his throat. Unable to pull it out, he cries 'Bite! Bite! Its head off!'
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Ye daring ones around me! Ye venturers and adventurers, and whoever of you have embarked with cunning sails on unexplored seas! Ye enigma-enjoyers! Solve unto me the enigma that I then beheld, interpret unto me the…
Zarathustra asks the sailors to interpret the vision: who is the shepherd, and who must come some day? The shepherd bites as bidden and spits the serpent's head far away.
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No longer shepherd, no longer man—a transfigured being, a light-surrounded being, that LAUGHED! Never on earth laughed a man as HE laughed! O my brethren, I heard a laughter which was no human laughter,—and now gnaweth…
The shepherd springs up, light-surrounded, laughing as no man has ever laughed. Zarathustra is left with an unquenchable longing for that laughter.
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What the critics said
Ludovici argues that the spirit of gravity, the dwarf Zarathustra carries and defies, stands for the sense of guilt and sin that Christian and Judaic values have bred into men's instincts, and that Nietzsche can affirm the recurrence of life only once he has cast this dwarf off, announcing the doctrine in defiance of him.
Ludovici argues that the spirit of gravity, the dwarf Zarathustra carries and defies, stands for the sense of guilt and sin that Christian and Judaic values have bred into men's instincts, and that Nietzsche can affirm the recurrence of life only once he has cast this dwarf off, announcing the doctrine in defiance of him.
Ludovici defines Nietzsche's 'spirit of gravity' as the oppressive, paralysing sense of guilt and sin.
Ludovici grants that much can be said for the hypothesis of eternal recurrence but judges it a very daring conjecture, and doubts whether Nietzsche ever properly estimated its effect as a dogma on men's minds.
Ludovici reads the shepherd as the man of today, the choking snake as the paralysing social values that threaten humanity, and 'Bite!' as Nietzsche's cry to mankind to change its values before it is too late.