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October 17, 2007
As we know postmodernist theories emerged from left-wing interpretations of Nietzsche, that Deleuze and Foucault played a crucial role in this process, and that the different kinds of “leftist Nietzscheanism” succeeded in “superannuating ” a Marxist critique of capitalism. Jan Rehmann in Towards a Deconstruction of Postmodern Nietzscheanism in Situations says that Deleuze reading and transformation of Nietzsche in his early book, Nietzsche and Philosophy, is crucial.
Deleuze’s book on Nietzsche is directed against any kind of dialectics. According to him, Nietzsche convincingly opposes the “principle of negation” by the “principle of affirmation,” and overcomes the concept of dialectical contradictions by the principle of difference and of pluralism. As early as 1962, long before the Nouveaux Philosophes make their first appearance, we see an image of Nietzsche as a representative of plural differences raising his voice against the “totalitarianism” of dialectics. The language of this “new Nietzsche” has already the
postmodernist melody of joy, lightness and dance: “Nietzsche’s ‘yes’ is opposed to the dialectical ‘no;’ affirmation to dialectical negation; difference to dialectical contradiction; joy, enjoyment to dialectical labor; and lightness, dance to dialectical responsibilities.”
So we have the postmodernist concept of difference used as a battle cry against a dialectical totalitarianism. Nietzsche becomes a nomadic rebel
Rehmann is not persuaded by this.
Deleuze’s argument is flawed in several respects. First, he draws a caricature of what dialectics is or might consist, i.e. a hermeneutics which allows the conceptualization of a moving and contradictory context is reduced to a set of the most speculative principles detached from any reality. Secondly, Deleuze’s interpretation that Nietzsche’s approach was essentially anti-dialectic is, at the least, very one-sided, since Nietzsche uses all forms of dialectical incorporation when it suits his pleasure.
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I'm not so down with leftist Nietzscheanism. For one Nietzsche did not care for the leftists and do-gooder socialists of his day.
He may have denounced the prussians and extreme anti-semites around Wagner, but his sympathies still remain somewhat "conservative", tho' that's not stupid American conservativism, but more like stoicism and Aristotelian conservativism. FN falls closer to say Edmund Burke or a Ezra Pound than many realized: against the herd mind and slave morality of socialism, and somewhat in fear of leftist revolt.
That's not to say one should worship Ezra Pound, but I think EP's close to the Nietzschean spirit, if a bit more drawn to belle-lettres. But I strongly doubt FN would have ever sided with the likes of Foucault.