Nietzsche: A Selected Annotated Bibliography

The Gay Science

Schacht, Richard.  “Nietzsche’s Gay Science, Or, How to Naturalize Cheerfully,” in Reading Nietzsche, ed. Robert C. Solomon and Kathleen M. Higgins. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 68-86.   JFD 89-2052

For Schacht, the Gay Science is Nietzsche’s most comprehensive attempt to trace the consequences of the “death of God.”  The results are the “de-deification of nature” and the naturalization of humanity.

Allison, David B.  Reading the New Nietzsche: The Birth of Tragedy, The Gay Science, Thus Spake Zarathustra, and On the Genealogy of Morals. ( Lanham, Md: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001), 71-110.  JFE 01-4401

Allison is superb at weaving in incidents of Nietzsche’s life and his letters to show us why Nietzsche thought The Gay Science was his most personal work.