James Chester

Dionysia Metaphysica James Chester

The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche entitled the first draft of "The Birth of Tragedy" (BT) as "The Dionysian Vision of the World." Dionysia Metaphsyica presents a reiteration of BT as, indeed, a view of the world, specifically the inner world of man, which is a metaphysica. BT is not Nietzsche's scholarly view of ancient Greek culture during the time in history when the practice of tragedy arose as a new art form. But most books about BT have focused precisely on this scholarly view. Viewed instead as a metaphysica, and using a translation of Nietzsche's original writing word for word, this reiteration elucidates a theory of life within human being as art in the form of mythopoeia, or the creation of Self, founded on a process of growth arising out of an evolutionary interplay between the two realms of sensation and ideation. It also provides valuable insight into Nietzsche's invention of a new art form called dithyrambic drama as a vehicle with which to achieve a true representation of tragedy and therewith resurrect the practice of tragedy. As such, the reiteration also provides insight into how to read a dithyramb and how to practice dithyrambic drama for the purpose of undertaking the world's only dithyrambic tragedy, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra," which Nietzsche wrote.