"A Book for All and None"

When Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra was first published in the 1880s by E. W. Fritzsch in Leipzig, it carried the subtitle "ein büch für alle und keinen," ("a book for all and none").

The philosopher Karl Jaspers wrote of Thus Spake Zarathustra in his introduction to Nietzsche's philosophy, "What Nietzsche regarded as his magnum opus resists all traditional means of classification; it is to be taken as poetry as well as prophecy and philosophy; and still it cannot be viewed as precisely any of these (emphasis added).

Scholars dispute whether any one of Nietzsche's books really encapsulate the Nietzschean philosophy. In any event, as you read this month's selection, ask yourself, "Why is this 'for all and none'?"