Nietzsche: On Theognis of Megara

Nietzsche’s topic for his valedictorian dissertation at the school of Pforta was the poet Theognis, focusing on his life in Megara, his lyrical production, and his views on the gods, morality, and politics. Nietzsche saw Theognis as the intellectual champion of the defeated Megarian aristocracy, who sought to preserve the Dorian spirit and its noble virtues. The interests that guided Nietzsche transcended scientific philology and embraced a concern for the social and political context he saw present in Theognis’s work. Nietzsche: On Theognis of Megara argues convincingly for this early Nietzschean text as a work of rudimentary political philology, and the contributors show how Theognis’s aristocratism determined and guided Nietzsche’s critique of the moral point of view and his conception of an aristocratic state.