Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book draws primarily on his published works and, provides the anachronic nature of unconscious memoir, eschews any retrospective and hence to some extent contrived periodization. It focuses on the parable of the ropedancer and shows how the latter's ignominious fall at the hand of the buffoon prefigures Zarathustra's ultimate mortification by the scourge of bad conscience. The book examines Zarathustra's emblematic eagle (proud imagination) and serpent (cunning reason), and discloses the extent to which Zarathustra's deep-rooted ressentiment is reliant upon a proud and deceptive consciousness. It demonstrates the way in which the seven 'higher men' personify the effects and affects of decadence which infest Zarathustra's soul. The decadent soul turns penitent and casts its shadow across the pilgrim's path; in its grim reflection of the anarchy obtaining within Zarathustra's soul, this shady spectre is seen to foreshadow the death of hope.