When Nietzsche Wept (novel) - WikipediaWhen Nietzsche Wept (novel)
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When Nietzsche Wept is a 1992 novel by Irvin D. Yalom, Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry at Stanford University, an existentialist, and psychotherapist. The book takes place mostly in Vienna, Austria, in the year 1882, and relates a fictional meeting between the doctor Josef Breuer and the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. The novel is
- a review of the history of philosophy and psychoanalysis and
- some of the main personalities of the last decades of the 19th century, and
- revolves around the topic of "limerence".
Lou Salomé, who was involved with Friedrich Nietzsche, has written a letter stating that the future of the philosophy of Germany is at stake and that Nietzsche needs help desperately. The plot develops into a therapy in which Doctor Josef Breuer needs to have his soul treated to help him get over a patient whom he treated for hysteria and with whom he has fallen in love, while Nietzsche needs help with his migraines. Influenced by the revolutionary ideas of his young disciple Sigmund Freud, Josef Breuer starts the dangerous strategy that will become the origin of psychoanalysis. Thanks to their unusual relation, both of them will see how their perspective of life changes completely. The story also explains how Friedrich Nietzsche received the inspiration to write his famous book, Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
References to famous personalities[edit]
Yalom's book is fictional but contains many references to history and historical personalities: Josef and Mathilde Breuer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Lou Salome, Sigmund Freud, Bertha Pappenheim, Paul Rée as well as mentioning Franz Overbeck, and the composer Richard Wagner.
Adaptations[edit]
In 2007 Yalom's novel received a film adaptation by the director Pinchas Perry, starring Armand Assante, Ben Cross and Katheryn Winnick. This independent American drama was filmed in Bulgaria.
There is also a theatre play based on the novel, adapted by Luciano Cazaux. The roles of Friedrich Nietzsche and Josef Breuer are performed by the actors Luciano Suardi and Claudio Da Passano. The play reflects the intellectual and philosophical atmosphere of the novel, almost dreamlike sometimes. An example of those details is that the female characters of the play wear colorful dresses, while the male characters wear black or grey suits; that is because the play tries to represent its reality from the point of view of the intellectual men of that period. The theatre play has received positive reviews in general, commending the work of the actors and actresses.
See also[edit]
When Nietzsche Wept: A Novel of Obsession Paperback – November 10, 2020
by Irvin D. Yalom (Author)
4.5 out of 5 stars (4.5) 1,298 ratings
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From the acclaimed author of Love's Executioner and Schopenhauer’s Couch, comes a “fascinating…shrewd intellectual thriller” (Los Angeles Times Book Review) about pioneering Viennese psychoanalyst Josef Breuer and his intriguing patient—Friedrich Nietzsche
In nineteenth-century Vienna, a drama of love, fate, and will is played out amid the intellectual ferment that defined the era. Josef Breuer, one of the founding fathers of psychoanalysis, is at the height of his career. Friedrich Nietzsche, Europe's greatest philosopher, is on the brink of suicidal despair, unable to find a cure for the headaches and other ailments that plague him.
When he agrees to treat Nietzsche with his experimental “talking cure,” Breuer never expects that he too will find solace in their sessions. Only through facing his own inner demons can the gifted healer begin to help his patient. In When Nietzsche Wept, Irvin Yalom blends fact and fiction, atmosphere and suspense, to unfold an unforgettable story about the redemptive power of friendship.
Editorial Reviews
Review
“An intelligent, carefully researched, richly imagined novel.” — Boston Globe
“Strong and authentic. The element of surprise is a magical, jolting moment.” — Washington Post Book World
“When Nietzsche Wept is the best dramatization of a great thinker’s thought since Sartre’s The Freud Scenario.” — Chicago Tribune
From the Back Cover
In nineteenth-century Vienna, a drama of love, fate, and will is played out amid the intellectual ferment that defined the era. Josef Breuer, one of the founding fathers of psychoanalysis, is at the height of his career. Friedrich Nietzsche, Europe's greatest philosopher, is on the brink of suicidal despair, unable to find a cure for the headaches and other ailments that plague him.
When he agrees to treat Nietzsche with his experimental &;talking cure,&; Breuer never expects that he too will find solace in their sessions. Only through facing his own inner demons can the gifted healer begin to help his patient. In When Nietzsche Wept, Irvin Yalom blends fact and fiction, atmosphere and suspense, to unfold an unforgettable story about the redemptive power of friendship.
About the Author
Irvin D. Yalom, M.D., is the author of The Schopenhauer Cure, Lying on the Couch, Every Day Gets a Little Closer, and Love's Executioner, as well as several classic textbooks on psychotherapy. When Nietzsche Wept was a bestseller in Germany, Israel, Greece, Turkey, Argentina, and Brazil with millions of copies sold worldwide. Yalom is Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at Stanford University, and he divides his practice between Palo Alto, where he lives, and San Francisco, California.
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Product details
Publisher : Harper Perennial Modern Classics; Reprint edition (November 10, 2020)
Language : English
Paperback : 352 pages
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robin friedman
VINE VOICE
5.0 out of 5 stars
Learning To Love One's Life
Reviewed in the United States on May 28, 2008
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Irvin Yalom is a psychiatrist with a deep interest in philosophy. In works of fiction and non-fiction he has tried to combine these two disciplines for the insights they may jointly offer to people. "When Nietzsche Wept" (1992) is probably Yalom's most successful novel. In his book, Yalom imagines a lengthy encounter between Josef Breuer (1842-1925), a Viennese physician who, among other accomplishments helped found psychoanalysis, and the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.(1844 -1900)
Yalom's story is subtitled "A Novel of Obsession".
Both Nietzsche and Breuer are obsessed with a woman and with sexuality, as well as with their own loneliness, and their attempts to understand themselves and find meaning in their lives. The book is set in Vienna in 1882.
Breuer, age 40, and highly successful has ended the doctor-patient relationship with a woman in her early twenties, Bertha O., with whom he has been sexually obsessed. Breuer has been using talk-therapy with Bertha, the first time this technique had been attempted.
Breuer has been neglecting his wife, Mathilde, and their five children over his obsession with Bertha and with his heavy commitments to his medical practice and research.
While Breuer and Mathilde are on a brief holiday, Breuer is approached by the young, beautiful and highly self-willed Lou Salome who asks Breuer to help cure the suicidal tendencies of her friend and teacher Nietzsche. Nietzsche had, in fact, fallen in love with Salome, proposed to her, and been rejected. He is deeply despondent and, indeed, suicidal, and suffers from migraine headaches.
The first half of the book details how Breuer and Nietzsche make contact and shows their initial testy relationship. In the second part of the book, Breuer persuades a highly reluctant Nietzsche to enter a clinic for a short stay, where Breuer will attempt to cure Nietzsche's migraines and Nietzsche, in turn, will offer philosophical counseling to Breuer to try to help the physician understand his life, his obsession with Bertha, and his feelings about Mathilde.
In the course of their discussions, Breuer and Nietzsche gradually become friends and reveal some of their innermost feelings to each other.
Both men share a deep skepticism towards religion, with Nietzsche famous for his aphorism, "God is dead".
In Yalom's book, Nietzsche explains that the goal of his thought is to find meaning in live rather than nihilism or despair in the face of the denial of theism.
In the course of the book, the reader learns a great deal about Nietzsche's thought, with portions of his imaginary conversations with Breuer taken extensively from his writings.
Through his conversations with Nietzsche, Breuer comes to learn something of his fear of dying and of purposelessness, and, with great strain, he frees himself of his obsession with Bertha.
Nietzsche comes to understand Breuer, and he learns something of his relationship to Lou Salome. He recognizes more fully than he had done earlier the loneliness of his path in life, but he also recognizes his need for affection and friendship with others.
Nietzsche, with this new understanding, determines to follow through with the course he has set himself.
When the book concludes, Nietzsche is about to begin writing his masterwork, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra".
Yalom's book explores two difficult ideas of Nietzsche's:
the doctrine of eternal recurrence and
the, for Nietzsche, closely related injunction: "amor fati" -- to love one's fate or one's life.
With moments of trepidation and some highly surprising twists in the story Breuer, and Nietzsche too, learn to love their respective lives.
Yalom's book is an imaginative creation of the birth of "talk therapy" and it shows the relationship between philosophical concerns and the concrete issues of individuals that are explored in psychotherapy.
In addition to its portrayals of the two major characters, Yalom offers good portrayals of the young Sigmund Freud, a student and friend of Breuer, of Lou Salome, and of fictitious characters such as Breuer's long-suffering friend Max and Breuer's coachman, Fischmann.
Yalom has written a compelling philosophical novel about Nietzsche which helps show the impact Nietszche's thinking continues to exert on many readers.
The book may encourage readers to explore Nietzsche's difficult thought for themselves. In its own right, Yalom's book may help people think in a new way about their lives and to work towards "amor fati" --- living one's life so that one may understand, shape, and embrace one's destiny.
Robin Friedman
8 people found this helpful
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Daniel Jolley
HALL OF FAMEVINE VOICE
5.0 out of 5 stars
Intellectually Challenging and Personally Meaningful
Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2001
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This is one of the most intellectually stimulating, personally relevant, important books I have ever read. What a rare treat Yalom has given the world. That being said, this book may not be for everyone (but what is?). In many ways, I feel as if this novel was written just for me, and I feel sure that many other readers likewise come away feeling the book was written especially for them. Do you have to know Nietzsche in order to enjoy this book? You do not, but it will certainly appeal to you more if you do. I approached this book purely as a Nietzsche admirer, and I worried that my favorite philosopher might be portrayed poorly or unacceptably in its pages. In fact, he was not. No one can say whether this fictional treatment of Nietzsche is a true depiction of this great man, but it really does not matter. The importance of this book comes not through the descriptions of its characters, but from the meaning you as an individual take from its themes. These themes are grand and universal, the themes that Nietzsche addressed in his factual life--the meaning of life, fear of aging and death, each person's place in society, and both aloneness and loneliness. Everyone knows these themes, the emotions they stir up, the doubts they employ as daily hurdles on the living of one's life, the truly cosmic loneliness that each individual knows and combats at some point or points in his/her life. Not everyone can face these challenges or even acknowledge them; those who cannot will do well to stay away from this book.
What a joy it is to read a truly intellectually challenging work in these modern times. Don't read this book to be entertained. Read this book to seek understanding of life and your place in it. I cannot stress enough how personal the message of this book seems to be. In the final pages, Nietzsche revealed to Dr. Breuer his one great fear, and that fear was my own great fear, expressed in words that described it better than I ever could. I had to put the book down momentarily and just say "My God . . ." That gave this book incredible meaning for me. I should say that I did not come away overjoyed or overly burdened from the experience of finishing the book, but I certainly came away more in tune with my own thoughts and my own philosophy, challenged to remain steadfast in my own intellectual thoughts and pursuits, and buoyed (yet not elated) to know that at least one other person on earth has knowledge of the intellectual and emotional struggles that I sometimes resigned myself to believe were solely my own.
Please, do not start reading this book unless and until you are ready to devote yourself to it and to yourself. The first few chapters are not gripping and do not really offer a visionary glimpse of the meaning and magic of the book. The early conversations, particularly between Nietzsche and Breuer, are sometimes rather stilted and "phony." Do not be discouraged in the early stages of the read because intellectual stimulation and personal challenge await you soon thereafter, and I believe that you will find yourself hard pressed to stop reading until the very end. More importantly, the book will remain with you even after you have placed it back on the shelf. That is the greatest praise that a novel can be given.
117 people found this helpful
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mark jabbour
5.0 out of 5 stars
Nietzsche demystified
Reviewed in the United States on January 1, 2015
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Nietzsche demystified. Should you read this book? Yes, if you’re reading this review, because most likely, then, you’re interested in Friedrich Nietzsche’s ideas’, psychology, and/or psychoanalysis. It is strong on each of those topics. It is an interpretation, pure speculation, but the larger ideas – the philosophy of Nietzsche, the benefits of friendship, and the benefits of talking honestly and openly with someone, what I call “fearless communication,” are legitimate. Nietzsche is often not understood, or misunderstood; but
here is what I gleaned about the man’s ideas from Yalom’s novel.
1. God was invented by man (= humans.)
2. Religion is a dodge – a wrong path taken by weak minded people.
3. People benefit from their sicknesses and illnesses, always.
4. Altruism (helping others) is a power play that benefits the helper and weakens the helped – because it places the helped in debt to the helper, who then feels superior. Thus, it makes the helper feel good about him or herself, while robbing the helped the opportunity to become who they truly are.
Nietzsche’s main point: “Become who you are.”
5. Life is always a contest, i.e. a competition.
6. No pain, no gain.
7. No one embedded in a culture [social, say marriage; corporate, say any job; or institutional, say the police, military, and even academia] can choose freely.
8. A major problem is that people feel discomfort in the wrong thing.
9. Man is divided into two groups: Those who wish for peace; and those who wish for truth. One must choose between comfort and true inquiry.
10. Confessions are for the confessors benefit, not the recipients.
11. Despair is the price one pays for self-awareness.
12. Whatever does not kill you makes you stronger.
13. Become who you are.
14. The cause of your sickness, or illness, is secret to the self.
15. Women are false saviors.
16. Consciousness [normal everyday] is only the translucent skin covering existence: The trained eye can see through it—to primitive forces, instincts, to the very engine of the will to power. (see #5)
17. All motives spring from a single source – the drive to escape oblivion (= to be forgotten. To leave no clear trace that you were here.)
18. True Friendship is the joining together in the search for higher truths.
19. Your task is to die at the right time. ( = Be who you are and live as you should, by your own will. Consummate your life, and then you can ‘die at the right time’.)
20. Choose your life (= the way you live.) Don’t let it be assigned to you.
21. Time is a flat circle. You will live your life over and over again, an eternal recurrence, if you haven’t evolved to a place of freedom, wherein you actually choose and create your life. (= The Law of Attraction.)
22. Duty is a euphemism for using others for your own enlargement. (see# 4 &7, 17)
The plot/story is secondary to the revealing of Nietzsche’s philosophy. It posits that Freud might well have read Nietzsche, and together, with the intermediary, Breuer, they sort-of uncovered the unconscious, and the healing power of psychoanalysis. It, the plot, could have happened. In the end (of the story) Breuer and Nietzsche help each other understand their obsessions with what might be called ‘Phantom Lovers’; which is in itself intriguing. I loved this book.
Winter 2014
79 people found this helpful
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Kate Cohen-Posey
5.0 out of 5 stars
One Book Better than the Next
Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2018
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I have been remiss in writing reviews of Yalom’s books. I became a therapist in 1973 and soon after I read THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF GROUP PSYCHOTHERAPY, 1975 and not getting enough….then read EXISTENTIAL PSYCHOTHERAPY, 1980. Last fall at a therapy training, Yalom’s fiction was recommended to me and lickety-split I read THE SPINOZA PROBLEM, WHEN NIETZSCHE WEPT, and THE SCHOPENHAUER CURE, each book better than the one before, but all of them splendid!
I started with Spinoza because I’d always respected him for being true to himself and love historical fiction. Reading a Midrash (a story that fills in the gaps) of Spinoza’s life helped me realize that I too have a “Spinoza Problem” because I think I’ve become a therapist bereft of a “methodological” community having developed my own brand of psychotheray.
WHEN NIETZSCHE WEPT gave the juicy details of Breuer’s (Freud’s mentor) life and glimpses of a young Freud, not to mention an introduction to Nietzsche and his influence on psychology.
It puzzles me that many therapists, thinking Freud is passé, have no interest in studying their roots and discovering that psychoanalysis is in our DNA.
And finally—THE SCHOPENHAUER CURE.
I did not have a clue who Schopenhauer was and I thank Yalom for his “philosophy for dummies” books. But, will someone please tell me if Yalom is familiar with the enneagram because Philip Slate is the prefect ennea-type 5: self-sufficient, avoids intrusions, observes rather than experiences, and seeks wisdom and skills.
It helped me understand a significant other in my life—also a self-sufficient type. This last book, in its modern setting with flash-backs to the 1800s made me laugh, cry out loud, and is a candidate for the best book I ever read.
31 people found this helpful
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diaphinia
5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating read
Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2016
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Yalom is a fine writer, and this novel is a pleasure to read.
Especially after reading his nonfiction (The Gift of Therapy, The Theory and Practice of Group Therapy) as a student,
I appreciate this hypothetical vision of a relationship between one of the founders of modern psychology (Josef Breuer) and the philosopher whose work inspires many who study the human psyche (Friederich Nietzsche). This fictional extension of the development of the "talking cure" includes other forebears of today's counselors, such as Lou Salome and Freud. Anna O., the ostensible first recipient of the talking cure, is a palpable presence, though in absentia.
Yalom strives to improve people's lives through honest, empathetic, relationships as a counselor. It is no coincidence that his exploration of the origins of psychodynamic theory—which promoted the idea of the therapist as an impassive empty slate upon which the client was to project all desires—is all about relationship.
The doctor is forced, through unusual circumstance, to "treat" the philosopher not as a doctor but as a friend. Despite the future assertions of Breuer's younger colleague, "Siggy" Freud, Yalom depicts therapeutic transformation as a product not of technique but of relationship.
17 people found this helpful
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Jennifer K. Paweleck-Bellingrodt, Psy.D.
5.0 out of 5 stars Provocative and thoughtful
Reviewed in the United States on June 29, 2007
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this is the first novel of yalom's that i have read, and, like his field works, it does not disappoint. this book is appealing in so many ways. first, it's a great fictional read for those of us who read so many professional psychological resources. that is, it's a book that serves as an escape from textbook sort of study but stays enough in the field to maintain your attention and interest. it also encourages you to consider various personal and professional aspects. just reading about two of the greats in a hypothetical yet not too unrealistic setting is enjoyable. the book also provides an interesting--albeit somewhat exaggerated in some instances--metaphor for the therapy relationship. as a therapist, it is a reminder of how much we learn about ourselves both person
yalom's existentialism is certainly in the book, which is always a treat, but he also incorporates other schools of psychological thought and perspective. the book is very thought-provoking and intellectually stimulating with some interesting twists. this is a great book for a book club or other discussion, namely because it invites so many different interpretations and perspectives. my only regret is that freud's character was not more developed. that, however, could be a book unto itself.
4 people found this helpful
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d stanton
5.0 out of 5 stars Great read
Reviewed in the United States on March 25, 2022
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Full of deep dialogue and profound thoughts. This book brings to life two men who share brilliance and despair, leading to fascinating debates and connections.
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krebsman
VINE VOICE
5.0 out of 5 stars Something different
Reviewed in the United States on December 24, 2019
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Irvin Yalom is quite a clever fellow, and in this delightfully odd book, he creates an engrossing story about a relationship between historical characters who never met in real life. Part historical fiction, part fantasy, part self-help manual, WHEN NIETZSCHE WEPT is something new. And I’m a fan! The premise sounds farfetched (Nietzsche acts as Joseph Breuer’s psychoanalyst before psychoanalysis was invented), but go with it. I don’t want to say more, lest I be a spoiler. Just read it. And be sure to read the supplemental material at the end of the book. (Yalom writes about the writing of WHEN NIETZSCHE WEPT. This is excellent material about the creative process!) I was wowed. Five stars.
One person found this helpful
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Amethyst
185 reviews · 338 followers
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October 18, 2016
These days, I was thinking a lot about the obsession of Nietzsche and Brewer in the story, about the two men hiding behind the meaningless imaginations they make of the people around them (women) and magnify the problem in their mind and fall in love with that problem and finally in the mind They eat them and hate them, and those ignorant people live their lives everywhere; Breuer's and Nietzsche's obsessions are similar to what we sometimes do, we hide a huge amount of our inner fears and worries behind illusions and get so immersed in our wrong mental image that the confusion caused by it is worse. From what we have run away from, it finally takes hold of us and then we come to our senses and see that accepting that fear,
I am infatuated with this book, I am infatuated that the author has written the real characters of that era so beautifully together with an imaginary image of an interesting and attractive friendship between Nietzsche and Breuer with the same pen and makes it so real that if the explanation section at the end of the book We don't read it, we believe it, two great characters from two different angles to become human, to live and understand as a human being, and to be perfect and away from mental obsessions that only lead to the destruction of everyone, here these two famous characters are the beginning of a good story in They have brought us and they take us with them to the places where we search in ourselves among Nietzsche's famous sentences and involve us inside...
When Nietzsche Wept was one of those books that was still lovely due to the specialized terms and names that appeared next to the story, and it made me want to understand how this Nietzsche made with the author's mind made its way from Nietzsche. The one we know separates and rediscovers his life and is saved from his inner pain and comes alive again... it was interesting and very readable, read it and enjoy it...
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Ahmad Sharabiani
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July 31, 2021
When Nietzsche wept, Irvin D. Yalom
When Nietzsche Wept is a 1992 novel by Irvin D. Yalom.
The novel starts with Dr. Josef Breuer, sitting in a cafe in Venice, Italy waiting for Lou Salomé, who was involved with Friedrich Nietzsche.
She has written a letter stating that the future of the philosophy of Germany is at stake and that the German philosopher needs help desperately.
The plot develops into a therapy where Breuer needs to have his soul treated, i.e. to help him get over a patient who he treated for hysteria and with whom he has fallen in love, whereas Nietzsche needs help with his migraines.
Influenced by the revolutionary ideas of his young disciple Sigmund Freud, Josef Breuer starts the dangerous strategy that will mean the origin of the psychoanalysis. Thanks to their unusual relationship, both of them will see how their perspective of life changes completely.
The story also explains how Friedrich Nietzsche received the inspiration to write his famous book, Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
Titles printed in Iran: "And Nietzsche cried"; "When Nietzsche wept"; "When Nietzsche cried"; Author: Erwin D. Yalom; Date of first reading: One day in October 1994.
Title: And Nietzsche Wept; Author: Erwin D. Yalom; Translator: Mahshid Mirmoazi; Tehran, Nei Publishing House, second edition 2011, on 453 pages; Illustrated, photo, ISBN 9643126161; 13th edition of 2012; Topic: Stories by writers of the United States of America - 20th century
Title: When Nietzsche cried; Translator: Sepideh Habib; Tehran, Karvan, 1385, on 476 pages; ISBN 9648497435; Third edition 2017; Another edition of Tehran, Golshan Raz, 2019; ISBN 9789647522236; Another edition of Tehran, Nash Ghatre, 2011, 11th edition of 2011; 15th edition of 2013; ISBN 9786001192029; 22nd edition 2015;
Title: When Nietzsche cried; Translator: Amir Alijanpour; Tehran, Avai Maktoob, 2014, on 423 pages; ISBN 9786007364147;
Title: When Nietzsche Wept; ; Translator: Kiyomarth Parsai; Tehran, Jami, 1392, on 424 pages; ISBN 9786001760952;
It is a mixture of reality and imagination, a manifestation of love, destiny and will, in the rationalist city of "Vienna" of the 19th century AD, and on the threshold of the birth of psychoanalytic knowledge; "Friedrich Nietzsche", the greatest philosopher of "Europe", "Joseph Breuer", one of the founders of psychoanalysis and a medical student, a young man named "Sigmund Freud", all three elements are woven together in the structure of the novel, until the epic of forgetting. It is impossible to create an imaginary relationship between extraordinary illness and exceptional treatment; At the beginning of the novel, Le Salome, an unattainable woman, asks Brewer to rush to the help of a desperate Nietzsche, who is in danger of committing suicide, using the method of "talking therapy"; In this fascinating novel, two prominent and mysterious men of history go to the depths of their obsessions, and in this way, they reach the liberating power of friendship.
Date of update: 25/05/1399 AH; 05/07/1400 AH; A. Sherbiani
20th-century
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Thank you Mahmoud
724 reviews · 2,706 followers
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December 23, 2022
What greatness is this 😍
Although I hate all philosophy books, the book here is different...
The book talks about Nietzsche himself and focused more on the human side of his personality and tells his story when he was tired and being treated for depression when the girl he loved refused to marry him... Is
it in philosophy? Of course there is..but it came in the form of a very interesting dialogue between Nietzsche and the doctor who treated him..One
of the books in which you will read each sentence more than once..One of the books that you can read again..And certainly one of the books that is very difficult to forget..:)
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Ehsan
7 reviews · 24 followers
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July 16, 2008
One of the best books I've read in terms of the tension of the story that doesn't have words, but also full of psychological and philosophical concepts:
depression is the price one pays to know oneself. The deeper you look at life, the deeper you suffer.
People usually compensate their loneliness with their friends, and those who don't like with their God, but those who don't love and their God is dead. . . I don't know anyone who regretted reading it
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Sara Kamjou
584 reviews · 298 followers
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January 17, 2021
The enchanting book When Nietzsche Wept by Irwin Yalom is a book that everyone (especially any psychologist) should read at least once before they die.
When Nietzsche Wept is a wonderful combination of the novel, psychology and philosophy, and admirably the combination of the three is kept to the utmost in moderation, and none overpowers the other. In this book, Yalom takes us on a journey to the unconscious mind and teaches us in the form of a story how to proceed in order to reach self-awareness and self-exploration.
One of the best books I have read in my life...
--------------------
Lasting sentences of the book:
Hope is a necessity.
...
I don't know how much of my life I have lost just by not looking or by looking and not seeing.
...
The joy of being observed is so deep that perhaps the real suffering from old age, bereavement or having a longer life than those we love is the fear of continuing a life in which no one can observe us.
...
usually the most important question is the one that is not asked.
...
the truth itself is not sacred, what is sacred is the search we make to find our truth.
...
thought is a shadow of our feeling, darker, emptier and simpler.
...
What doesn't kill me makes me stronger.
Nietzsche
...
No one has ever done anything only for the sake of others, all our actions are selfish, everyone serves only himself, everyone loves only himself.
It seems that you are surprised by what I said. isn't it? Maybe you think about those you love. Ponder more to find that you don't love them: what you love is the pleasant feeling that comes from loving them! You love the passion, not the person who inspires the passion.
...
According to Breuer, a commitment made to a patient could not be taken back. When he took responsibility for the disease, he never failed to spend time and energy on him.
...
Revealing the source of each symptom, in a way, causes it to be resolved.
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one should learn to distance oneself and look at oneself from a distance.
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Farewell is usually accompanied by words that deny the continuation of the event.
...
If tension is the price to be paid for insight, let it be.
...
the counselor's personality characteristics predict his counseling method.
...
Philosophical therapy is to learn how to listen to your own voice.
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Christ: take from your parents and culture to reach perfection.
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If we climb enough, we will reach a height where the calamity no longer appears to be calamity.
...
there is a long distance between knowing something through reason and understanding it emotionally.
...
The suppression of anger makes a person sick.
Understanding
others means forgiving them.
...
Dostoevsky writes that there are things that should not be said, except to friends; There are things that should not be said, even to friends; And finally, there are things you should not say, even to yourself! Certainly, the things that Yosef has not even told himself until now have come out of him like this.
...
life is a spark between two voids, darkness before birth and darkness after death.
...
Ultimately, we experience ourselves only in the present.
...
I dream of a love in which a mutual desire to search for a higher truth emerges between two people. Maybe you shouldn't call it love. Maybe its real name is friendship.
...
Marriage should not be a prison, but a garden where something superior is cultivated.
...
everyone always dies alone with any number of companions.
...
"Don't give birth to a child unless you are able to create a creator."...
It is wrong to have children indiscriminately, it is wrong to have children to reduce your loneliness, it is wrong to aim your life by producing yourself. And it is wrong if we try to achieve immortality by reproduction, just because the sperm contains a part of our consciousness!
...
you can't rely on anyone but yourself.
...
To become strong, you must first sink your roots into nothingness and learn to face the loneliest loneliness.
...
we must live as if we are free. Although we cannot escape from fate, we must engage with it, we must will the outcome of our fate. We must love our destiny.
...
To truly relate to someone, you must first relate to yourself. If we cannot embrace our loneliness, we will benefit from another as a shield against isolation. Only when a person can live like a hawk - without needing the presence of another - will he find the ability to love.
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Isolation has meaning only in isolation. When you share it with someone else, it evaporates.
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Valeriu Gherghel
6 books · 1,257 followers
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April 1, 2023
A biographical fantasy without great literary virtues, but interesting and instructive, built on the eternal question What if ...? What if it was what it wasn't? What if it wasn't what it was? For example:
What would have happened if Lou Andreas-Salomé had actually asked Dr. Josef Breuer to examine Friedrich Nietzsche in November 1882? What would have happened if Nietzsche had spent (at least) a month in room 13 of the Viennese Lauzon clinic? What would have happened if Sigmund Freud had meditated (in 1882) on the psycho-somatic disorders of the classicist turned philosopher after the late reading of Schopenhauer's books? Nietzsche always presented himself as a philologist (cf. Noi, filologii ).
Naturally, no one can formulate a reasoned answer. But a fiction can start from these questions and offer some suggestions about an "alternative version" of history. Irvin D. Yalom presents, instead, a plausible picture of the birth of "word therapy" with the case of Anna O. The massive interest aroused by Yalom's "novel" here probably came. We do not know if a "word" treatment would have helped Nietzsche, if it would have delayed his fatal crisis on January 3, 1889. We also do not know for sure if Nietzsche's illness was inevitable.
In When Nietzsche Wept , Irvin D. Yalom has constructed a portrait of an innocent suffering for an inexplicable reason. In the incoherent letters that preceded the crisis of January 3, 1889, Nietzsche called himself the Crucified.
A few petty observations:
1. Joyful Science is by no means a tome, as Yalom writes, it is a tome of more than 300 pages.
2. Nietzsche's volume Morgenröte (1881) is better known to us under the title Aurora than under the title found by the translator Zorile ( The Dawn , in English by Irvin D. Yalom).
3. The statement "where I am, death is not; where there is death, it is not me" (precept quoted by Yalom and in the book Looking at the sun in the face , on p. 69) belongs to Epicurus and not to Lucretius.
4. In the endnote, Irvin D. Yalom does not question the diagnosis of Progressive General Paralysis (PGP, "tertiary syphilis") initially given to the patient. I will only say that this current diagnosis, typical of that era (in June 1883, Eminescu was judged by doctors in much the same way) was contested before and after August 25, 1900. But it is impossible to come up with a correct diagnosis in retrospect. The trials have fascinated doctors and biographers (see Sue Prideaux, I'm Dynamite! The Life of Nietzsche , pp.281-288): there is a huge (and perfectly useless) bibliography on this diagnosis. For the rest, ignoramus, ignorabimus... , the saying of the medievals.
5. Should I also say that there was no Lauzon clinic in Vienna in the 1880s - 90s?
P.SMy favorite character in this novel, however, remains Josef Breuer. Sigmund Freud is kind of wiped out...
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Dalia Nourelden
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February 8, 2023
When Nietzsche cried, this book will be included in the list of books that came at the right time and read at the right time.
For a while, I lost my concentration while reading. I regained it while reading Narcissus and Goldmund last month, and then I almost read without enthusiasm. I miss something that I cannot grasp and describe specifically, and I thought I need light readings to regain my energy, but I discovered that on the contrary, what I needed was reading that forces me to focus and makes me re-read sometimes. And after I had put another novel in my plan to read it, I found myself leaving it without starting it and moving on to this novel. I suddenly felt that it might be what I needed, and my feeling was correct 😍.
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The beginning was calm, giving the impression that the novel would be easy, but do not believe the ease of beginnings. I will be frank and admit that I felt stupid sometimes and not understood well. And I regained the feeling that I am a “donkey,” and this is how I feel when I read philosophy 🙈. But the style of the novel is wonderful, and I imagined that it would be more difficult, and I was ready for more complexity, but it mostly needs focus and thinking, but without overcomplication.
When Nietzsche cried is the beginning of my meeting with the writer and psychiatrist Erwin D. Jalom, and it certainly will not be the last. By the way, one of the reasons for my admiration for the book is the psychology part in it and talking about sensations, feelings and ideas, which mostly came from the doctor’s tongue, and he discussed with Nietzsche to present the philosophical aspect.
Perhaps because the writer is an emeritus professor of psychiatry at Stanford University and practices psychiatry, this psychological aspect came to be strong and distinctive.
When the patient turns into a doctor and the doctor into a patient , when a patient resorts to treatment, the doctor is forced to suggest and perhaps to reverse roles so that he can escape from the thick shell with which the patient protects himself from others. Nietzsche is not a cooperative patient.... He is a completely closed person with pride, and he will never admit that he needs help When the doctor begins to reveal his most accurate fears, details of his life and thoughts to attract his patient to reveal what is inside him, but then he finds himself transformed from a doctor into Already ill, the therapy sessions began to shift from an excuse to treat Nietzsche to an attempt to treat Joseph himself.
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Perhaps you should learn to speak to yourself more clearly. In the past few days, I have realized that the philosophical treatment involves learning to listen to your inner voice.
Sweep the chimney.. Sweeping her chimney means giving herself free rein so that she can ventilate her brain, purge her mind of all disturbing thoughts.
When you start the novel, you seek to read Nietzsche indirectly, and you meet Dr. Joseph Breuer, his life and words attract you more, perhaps because I felt him close to me, and I felt some of his fears and thoughts. As for Nietzsche, I felt his loneliness, his isolation, his distrust of others, and his self-closure. With the end approaching, I felt Nietzsche very close to me when he spoke from his heart, he made me weep despite, as Joseph said, “his distorted opinion.” about women.”
If one of my tears were felt, she would have said, in an audible whisper: I have finally been liberated. I was trapped all those years. This guy, this dry, jittery guy, has never let me gush before.
I will always be alone, but what a difference, what a difference it is if I choose what I do. Choose your destiny, then love your destiny
, and I loved their discussions and dialogues very much. Since my childhood, I have believed that life is a spark between two similar voids , . Life is a spark between two voids. Nice pic . But isn't it strange that we are preoccupied with the second space and do not think about the first space? As for the doctor, he is: Josef Breuer (born January 15, 1842 - died June 20, 1925) was an eminent physician who made fundamental discoveries in neurophysiology, and worked with his patient, Bertha Pappenheim, known as Anna or in the 1880s led to the development of talk therapy (the unloading method) and to establish the foundations of psychoanalysis developed by his protégé Sigmund Freud.
Medicine remembers Josef Breuer not only as an important researcher in the field of physiology of respiration and balance, but also as a prominent diagnostician of diseases, and he was the doctor of a whole generation of great figures in Vienna at the end of the future century, who knows when, perhaps fifty years later
? This talk therapy may become common. That 《Anxiety Medicine》 becomes a specialty, and they are trained in it in medical schools or perhaps in philosophy departments.
By the way, the character of Sigmund Freud was present in the novel, so Dr. Brewer was like a guide to him as he considered him a friend despite the age difference. He liked to discuss and talk with him, and he was considered a friend of the family.
The meeting of Nietzsche and Joseph Breuer is fictional, but there are real facts and ideas, and the characters are real, and the writer clarified this in his note at the end of the novel, explaining the real and the imaginary. Thank him for that.
A philosophical, psychological novel that raises many ideas and questions about life. It is certain that you will find yourself in many of these questions. Life, death, love, choices, success, personal, societal and family expectations, faith, isolation, loneliness, marriage, subconscious mind, dreams. , ... the pinnacle of life, you're right, Sieg. Peak, the highest peak in life climb! But the problem with peaks is that they lead to a slope. From the top I can see the remaining years of my life stretching out before me, and the sight does not please me. I only see old age, weakness, becoming a father, becoming a grandfather. Have you lived your life fully? Or did she live through you? Did you choose it? Or did she choose you? Did you love her? Or do you regret it? Don't you stand helpless, grieving for the life you didn't live?
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