I'm about to start proofreading my latest production and expect to be done by the end of the week or sometimes during the next. Looking towards the near future, I'd like to work next on Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra.
PG: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1998
Scans: https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/101906138
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I think I’ve found a good cover for this one.
Original (with CC0 proof): https://dams.birminghammuseums.org.uk/asset-bank/action/viewAsset?id=19682
Once cropped and built, it would look like this:
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Before I get started in earnest, I need some guidance—and it requires some context first.
The transcription contains a preface and appendix. The preface can be found in all editions of the Thomas Common translation that I could find, but the appendix is only present in one of them.
I prefer to ask about the appendix later. I’ve only skimmed through it at this point. As for the preface, it was written by Elizabeth Förster-Nietzsche, Nietzsche’s sister.
There’s a rather interesting story here: while the two grew up close, it seems that they had a falling out when they both reached adulthood. Elizabeth became a proto-Nazi, and married a prominent anti-Semite. They attempted to create a “pure” German colony in Paraguay. It failed and her husband committed suicide rather than face bankruptcy and scandal. Soon after her return to Germany, her brother underwent the mental breakdown from which he never recovered and she became his guardian and literary executor.
From this point on, she tried to turn her brother into the national hero her late husband never became. She showcased his work in a nationalistic light, often at odds with his own writing—whether she didn’t understand his work or simply didn’t care to is open for debate. She even went as far as forging letters and documents as well as only releasing parts of unpublished manuscripts that would serve her ideology.
She’s the reason why Nietzsche has for so long been associated with Nazism and fascism. Rather tellingly, Adolf Hitler attended her funeral.
More information can be found here: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Elisabeth-Forster-Nietzsche
Which brings me to my question: what should I do with her preface?
I’m against censorship and sanitisation; I believe that a work should stand on its own, no matter how problematic it can be at times. But here we have Nietzsche’s sister attempting to create her own legacy by exploiting and altering her brother’s.
I’m in favour of eschewing it altogether. I don’t believe that it brings anything interesting to the work and, besides, whatever anecdote Elizabeth can give about Nietzsche and his approach to Zarathustra is suspicious in light of her fraudulent actions.
We can also keep it as part of the historical work, possibly with a note briefly explaining this. Whatever the decision, this is something that should probably be part of the long description, but in the meantime I prefer to ask what to do with it.
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Another proposal for the cover (with PD proof): https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/10158
Cropping only the mountain peak would give this:
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