ABSTRACT
I AS in so many other things, Nietzsche was most ambiguous also in his attitude towards women. The rough manliness he was so fond of putting on when speaking about the fair sex should never be taken literally: there was a romantic behind it all, even a sentimental dreamer, much too shy to be a ladies’ man, let alone a heart-breaker. The women he felt more at home with were elderly spinsters (but not of the ‘bluestocking’ variety), in whose company sex hardly mattered at all. How much he really yearned for that loving care which only women can give was shown by his attachment to his self-reliant sister Elisabeth, in whom he found (until she married) a friend, a nurse and the substitute for a wife in one.
