Living with Suffering. Jaspers, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche as Artists of Suffering
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24310/EstudiosNIETen.vi22.15404Keywords:
Kierkegaard, Jaspers, limit situation, agonyAbstract
Philosophers like Sören Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche or Karl Jaspers have a special sense for suffering as a philosophical problem. That is because they themselves are great sufferers. Jaspers and Nietzsche are chronically ill, Kierkegaard suffers above all from melancholy. Against this background, it is not surprising that suffering is also an important theme in their works. For Jaspers, suffering is a basic condition of existence, a ‘limit situation’ (Grenzsituation) as he calls it. One must therefore come to terms with suffering, whether one wants to or not. More strongly than Jaspers, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche also make their personal distress a theme. Thus, they search for a philosophical way to live with their agony. For both perspectivism plays a decisive role. It always depends from which side one looks at one’s suffering and in which context one places it. So finally, both see in their suffering a necessary condition of their genius, which in turn is the necessary condition of their respective philosophical missions: Kierkegaard sees himself as a corrective of a conformist zeitgeist; Nietzsche considers himself an agent of a necessary reevaluation of values.
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