Friedrich_Nietzsche - Untimely_Meditations_(Cambridge_Texts_in_the_History_of_Philosophy__1997)

IntroductionIn 1886, after he had at last obtained the publication rights toall of his earlier writings, Nietzsche immediately began preparingnew, expanded editions and adding new prefaces and other newmaterial. The only exceptions were the Untimely Meditations andParts I-III of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which were reissued in theiroriginal forms (though Zarathustra I-III were bound in a singlevolume.) The 'new editions' of the four Untimely Meditations thatwere issued in late 1886 are therefore identical to the first editions.Though some commentators have interpreted Nietzsche's failureto provide the Meditations with new prefaces as a sign of hisrelatively low regard for them, the opposite would seem to be thecase. These four short works were (along with Zarathustra I-III)alone given the honour of being judged to stand in no need ofadditional introduction, defence or explanation. This is whyNietzsche could instruct his publisher, in a letter of 29 August1886, that 'the four Untimely Meditations are the only ones that Iwish to leave as they are'.tGiven the relative neglect of these four texts by commentatorsand interpreters, one might be surprised not only at the numberof references to them one finds in Nietzsche's later correspondenceand note books, but also at the profound personal significancehe evidently attached to his 'Unzeitgemiissen' or 'UntimelyOnes' (which is how he customarily referred to them). Not onlydid he repeatedly recommend them as essential documents forunderstanding the development of his thought, but he alsodescribed them as - and, indeed, claimed that he had explicitlyintended them to serve as - 'lures' or 'fish hooks' for attractingand capturing the attention of the readers he was so desperatelytrying to reach.23 Admittedly, Nietzsche viewed virtually all of hiswritings as, in this sense, 'bait'; but some bait is better than others,and of all of his writings none, in his view, was better-suited forthis important function than the Untimely Meditations, especiallythe third one. As he declared to Brandes, in a letter of 10 April1888: 'This short work serves as my sign of recognition: the personwho does not find himself addressed personally by this workwill probably have nothing more to do with me.'As mentioned, Nietzsche believed that the Untimely Meditationswere also especially useful for providing his readers (once'hooked', like Brandes) with essential insight into the developmentof his philosophy and with an understanding of what he wasxxiv