Man is something that shall be overcome.
Friedrich Nietzsche Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Prologue, §3 (1883) Translated by R. J. Hollingdale
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When and why it was written
- When
- Published in 1883, in Zarathustra's first speech.
- Why
- Nietzsche is introducing the Übermensch and needs to state what it stands in relation to.
What it means
The grammar carries the argument. Man is named as a stage, something to be got past, not a condition to be improved within.
In the same speech Nietzsche calls man a rope stretched between animal and Übermensch. The overcoming is not self-improvement; it is being superseded.
Read the source
Thus Spoke Zarathustra, 1883
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Your turn
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