I can’t recall reading anything about what he thought about death.
All I can remember is the part I Zarathustra which talks about dying at the right time.
I do a google search and, of course, only see hits on ‘the death of god’.
So can anyone point me to or explain to me, pref with references, Nietzsche’s views on death? What he thought of it and what happens when you die, how it relates to living one’s life etc.
I would guess that Nietzsche’s views on death would remain similar to Schopenhauer’s views on death - in that there is neither eternal pain nor eternal suffering, we simply cease.
The only thing I know about Nietzsche re: death was that he was an atheist and thought there was no afterlife. I also know he felt we should die with dignity when we could no longer live with dignity. Kind’ve ironic considering he was almost a vegetable for 11 years 
not really, because obviously he was incapable of ending his own life. im sure if he had been capable of doing so, he would have.
The Nietzsche channel is your only man for these things never mind google!!
Good for you - I applaud you tsunami =D> =D>
What makes you think he would have ended his own life?
The human Nietzsche was very different from his philosophy. He was a shy, introverted scholar and wrote with a flair that was not present in his personality. So I wonder if he would actually be able,to have the “guts”, so to speak, of committing suicide.
he lived a life of constant suffering. he put up with academic and personal rejection throughout his life, and he dealt with constant serious physical and mental medical ailments. in addition to that, he spent a good deal of his mid and later years wandering the country side on his own, from place to place, with no nationality. living on his own in this manner, travelling like a hermit through the wilderness, is not something that someone with no “guts” could do and still survive.
and im not saying he WOULD have ended his own life… im saying its likely that, because of his views on life and death, if he had known in advance that “tomorrow you will suffer a mental collapse and be an unthinking vegatable for 10 years” he probably would have decided to take his own life. in many ways, Nietzsche DID live his philosophy, and in that sense, he wrote about “choosing when you die” as in choosing when your life’s purpose has been achieved, and i see no reason to believe otherwise that he would have followed that belief himself, had he actually had the opportunity to do so.
I’m very aware of Nietzsche’s suffering. He had a very hard life, no doubt about it. But given his views on how suffering could be turned around into something better, how the only people worth something were those that could “endure”, his views on amor fati, the eternal reccurence and his pro life philosophy, I doubt he would have ended it soon. In addition, Nietzsche was sure of his fate as one of the most important figures that ever lived.
Also, I didn’t mean to say that Nietzsche wasn’t brave. I can’t imagine what being his level of genius would be like.
But in the man there is more of the child than in the youth, and less melancholy: he knows better how to die and to live. Free to die and free in death, able to say a holy No when the times for Yes has passed: thus he knows how to die and to live.
That your dying be no blasphemy against man and earth, my friends, that I ask of the honey of your soul. In your dying, your spirit and virtue should still glow like a sunset around the earth: else your dying has turned out badly.
Thus I want to die myself that you, my friends, may love the earth more for my sake; and to earth I want to return that I may find rest in her who gave birth to me.
Verily, Zarathustra had a goal; he threw his ball: now you, my friends, are the heirs of my goal; to you I throw my golden ball. More than anything, I like to see you, my friends, throwing the golden ball. And so I still linger a little on the earth: forgive me for that.
[TSZ, I, On Free Death]
maybe youre right; i find it hard to believe that Nietzsche considered himself having fulfilled his goals. he didnt have many admirers, and im sure there wasnt anyone who he thought truly understood him, let alone was his student. so perhaps, even if he had suspected that his death was upcoming (which i believe he did, considering some things he wrote in EH), he still would have held on to the end, regardless of how much suffering it caused him, if only to hope for that final goal, to pass his knowledge on to a worthy student-- and to live to see that his death itself served his student’s journeys.
“Some men are born posthumously”.
Although Nietzsche had few admirers when he was alive, he knew he would be famous: “One day my name will be associated with the memory of something tremendous.”
Who knows for sure? It was a sad life though, not atypical for geniuses.
I actually wonder about that really. If he were truly capable of ending his own death, or managing to get someone to end it for him, would he really?
For a man who spoke about “overcoming” albeit his thought of “overcoming” might have been in ending it all, overcoming his fear of death and ending it all…but…
there is his “amor fati” - love of destiny - wouldn’t it be hypocrtical of him to wish for anything other than what he was indeed experiencing. Isn’t that amor fati – to wish for nothing but what our fate is in this moment?
Of course, there is this…suffering can indeed change us…I don’t know how he physically or emotionally suffered, but that suffering could have made him into a Nietzsche that was strange to himself…but we are human beings after all. Having said that, I know there are people who have suffered greatly physically and remain the same.
I have a feeling that perhaps Nietzsche wouldn’t have ended it all…but even if he had…it wouldn’t have negated his life. It would still have been his choice, thus affirming his life, especially had he no hope, there was no hope for him.
Ps. Tsunami, what the bloody hell did you do with that poor woman?