r/Nietzsche • u/Responsible_Dot_2619 • Jun 14 '26
Question Nietzsche reading order for beginners?
Never really read any philosophy books, I thought Friedrich Nietzsche would be a good starting point since I already have a good collection of his books
-Ecce homo
-Beyond good and evil
-The twilight of idols
-Human, all to human
-Thus spake Zarathustra
-on the generology of morals
What's the best order to read them? I've seen people recommend starting with Twilight of the Idols, while others suggest reading chronologically. Given that these are the only Nietzsche books I currently own, what order would you recommend and why?
Also am I too naive for these books? Can I just start reading anyway or is there's something I should look into before that?
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u/cognitivemachine_ Jun 14 '26
If you've never read any philosophy books, Nietzsche is not a good starting point.
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u/IsraelsTopGooner Jun 15 '26
This isn’t true in the slightest. Nietzsche is writing against modernity; you don’t need to read about it to understand the context, you’re already living it.
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u/Equal-Doctor-4913 Amoralist Jun 14 '26
Start with Twilight of the idols, then Human all too human, then ecce homo, beyond good and evil and after that thus spoke Zarathustra or on the genealogy of morals. DO NOT read BGE, TSZ or the genealogy as your first Nietzsche book, start with any other
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u/InterrogatingEros Jun 17 '26
The Genealogy (especially the first book) is an excellent introduction to Nietzsche's thinking and is often used in university courses for that exact reason.
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u/Tomatosoup42 Apollonian Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26
Sorry to everyone commenting here but Twilight of the Idols is a horrible suggestion. I know it was said somewhere, maybe by Nietzsche himself or someone other, that it was supposed to be a summary of his philosophy, but it requires a lot of pre-existing knowledge of his ideas and arguments. They are not laid out in full or explained further in this book, they are only, really, summarized or hinted at in cryptic utterances which are impossible to understand for a beginner.
The texts that they got us started with Nietzsche at university were his early essays On the Use and Abuse of History for Life and On Truth and Lies in a Non-Moral Sense. Those are written in a more "normal" language than the later ones and they're not as compressed, the ideas are laid out in a continous manner and are much easier for a beginner to grasp. They're also very interesting and still portray Nietzsche's characteristic type of thinking. I think they're good starting points for getting one hooked on this brilliant, artistic kind of philosophizing. They certainly got me hooked.
EDIT:
Never really read any philosophy books, I thought Friedrich Nietzsche would be a good starting point
I actually think Nietzsche is a good starting point for getting into philosophy, because he is an excellent writer and easy to appreciate. You may not understand him right at the start - that will require a lot of study of previous philosophers he reacts to - but you will certainly be smitten by his great style which is incredibly fun to read, and that cannot be said of other, more "traditional" philosophers, such as Kant, Hegel, or even Aristotle, who are very dry and technical. You'll most likely get confused by Nietzsche, but you'll be intrigued.
EDIT 2: Sorry, should have read your whole post. Start with Human, All Too Human. This is where he still explains a lot of his ideas and doesn't count with his readers knowing what he's talked about in his previous books.
I also recommend getting an explanatory book for it: Ruth Abbey's Nietzsche's Human, All Too Human (2019) is excellent.
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u/Straight-Drop3659 Jun 17 '26
As someone who started with Twilight of the Idols I heavily agree. Not to say it didn't impact me upon my first read but I had to revisit it a couple of times to fully wrap my head around some of his greater ideas and references.
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u/d0ming00 Jun 14 '26
I'd recommend to read in chronological order to properly comprehend his evolution of thought. Seems the most fruitful and interesting path for me. That way, starting with "Die Geburt der Tragödie", which is written with stark Schopenhauerian and Wagnerian influence, you'll understand more organically his ongoing battles against metaphysics, pessimism, nihilism, christianity and so on, as those are partly consequences of his departure from said idols.
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u/AliceCarole Jun 14 '26
Exactly!
I think it's better to start chronologically and eventually skip some chapters at first. It's better than starting with Zarathustra.
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u/d0ming00 Jun 14 '26
To respond according to your current collection: of course it's okay to to just read/watch a good analysis on Nietzsches first book as you don't own it yet (I'd always recommend Weltgeist or essentialsalts) and to continue with "Human, all-too human" after that
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u/FrostyAttitude1206 Jun 14 '26
Twilight is the easiest start. Nietzsche is very direct and blunt about his thoughts in that book. Then, BGE can be next as other people have said.
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u/Party_Banana_52 Jun 14 '26
Start with beyond good and evil, it was my first and not a terrible experience
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u/CattlePastoralist Jun 14 '26
Start with the Greeks. Always start with the Greeks. Even just read up on ancient Greek culture and have a rough chronology of their history. Makes everything easier. The intuitive parts, at least.
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u/Efficient-Heat904 Jun 14 '26
If you’ve never read any philosophy, I’d start with a secondary text, even something like Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction from Oxford Ubifersity press.
Nietzsche is very easy to misinterpret, and properly interpreting him requires a good baseline of the philosophical and historical context he was working on. If you do want to dive in, having some secondary sources handy (even the excellent Nietzsche Podcast) to contextualize the texts will help your understanding immensely.
Also: worth being aware that a lot of early English translations of him are terrible. Make sure you have Kauffman and Hollingsdale.
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u/needs-more-metronome Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26
The Republic, Schopenhauer’s Will & Representation, Kant’s Prolegomena, then Nietzsche’s Genealogy of Morals (you could sub Prolegomena out for any basic Kant primer). Plato is absolutely critical though.
Nietzsche is not necessarily difficult to read in the same way that Kant, Spinoza, Hegel, etc. But he is in so much conversation with other philosophers that it doesn’t make a lot of sense to read him in a total vacuum imo. Plato/Schopenhauer are not difficult and will add so much to Genealogy.
And genealogy is the best place to start
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u/Psychonaugh0604 Godless anti-metaphysician Jun 14 '26
I started with the genealogy. Human all to human into the gay science wouldn’t be a bad path either. TBH I wouldn’t start with BGE. As you dive more into his philosophy going back into the text you’ve previously read will be profoundly different and rewarding in my experience so far.
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u/Leonyliz Jun 14 '26
Don’t start reading philosophy with Nietzsche. His whole thing is that he’s tearing down most of what came before by “philosophising with a hammer.” Trust me, my first philosophy book was BGE when I was about 15, and I didn’t get a damn thing.
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u/JuanValdez999 Jun 14 '26
I was just now looking at that mustache and thinking how much his dentist must have hated him.
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u/Independent-Talk-117 Jun 15 '26
I feel like the genealogy of morals best lays a foundation to understand his worldview
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u/tinytheSTONEDgiant Jun 15 '26
I am currently reading Beyond good and Evil and it is the hardest to understand book I have ever read
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u/n3wsf33d Jun 16 '26
Start with the antichrist (the first and only book of his proposed magnum opus that he finished and published). Then go to human all too human for a survey if his thinking during his middle period. Then you can go to chronologically from there probably. But idk that I would read TSZ until you were done with everything. From a learning perspective, it's not a good return on investment compared to his other works.
But definitely start with his essay on truth and lies.
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u/balakay1738 Jun 16 '26
I read genealogy of morals -> BGE -> TSZ -> TGS
Not gonna make any claims about this being definitively the best order, but I will say it worked for me.
GOM is more limited in scope and Nietzsche writing in a different style than is characteristic elsewhere, making him a bit easier understand in GOM than in BGE and much easier than TSZ.
BGE is also more limited in scope than TSZ & TGS, but also pretty indicative of his philosophical method (especially first 2 chapters).
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u/WhoReallyKnowsThis Human All Too Human Jun 18 '26
He never said that. Where did he write that? That's a poor translation.
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u/Maximum_Rough8062 Jun 19 '26
The first essay of the Geneology of Morals. Entitled "The Geneology of Morals." You can read it in one sitting. It will completely revolutionize how you look at justice and the law.
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u/MaverickRScepurek Jun 14 '26
once you figure out he's just an extremely devout christian, a monk who calls himself the antichrist and leads through his bad example, then you can read whatever.
i suggest part one of zarathustra, then a youtube video on genealogy, then carry around beyond for like a year, peek at ecce homo throughout, read the beginning of birth of tragedy, and then find out youre the ubermensch and that ubermensch lives by Godless values alone and that the most Godless concept of all is God.
fuck antisemetism, thank God for the great jewish polish fuck we call Nietzsche.
i write to be misinterpreted. push down all trees that cant stand on their own. whatever doesnt kill you makes you stronger. hes a better christian than us. we're so doomed and confused. funny guy.
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u/Soundandwaves Jun 14 '26
I started with thus spoke Zarathustra and it about blew my head off. Maybe start on a different one
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u/Draven-da Jun 14 '26
Whatever you do always try and keep thus spoke/will to power as the last ones. You can start with beyond good and evil but its going to get more fruitful if you keep returning to that specific book whenever you finish it and move on to another. Imo Beyond good and evil is the standard Nietzsche and maybe his ID card, so its quite good to keep going back to to it. Enjoy and try ur best to avoid videos on the guy because there is a lot of poor explanations to his ideas.