This week continues to be a bit lumpy. Doctor Who rather knocked my chocks out, I think. Typically, when Real things go wrong I have some Fiction to fall back on - but obviously right now, that's not the case, as the Fiction is as bad or worse than anything Real can reasonably throw at me. I suppose there's always Blake's 7, that bastion of love, optimism and happy endings. And lots of bad Real stuff is going down too: everything has gone wrong this week. The highlight was probably almost getting electrocuted. Has my dad mortally offended Morgoth or something?

It doesn't help that I've been set a presentation of perennial emo-fave Nietzsche. I feel like I've finally become a teenager, and am going through my existentialist, t-shirt-icon, pretentiously pessimistic phase. I'm even listening to the Manic Street Preachers.

The Birth of Tragedy - by Mr Nietzsche. I can see the Doctor written all over it. Because of my associative mind, I tend to link up absolutely everything. This time last year, when the news of Tennant's departure came out, I remember reading about Aristotle, pain and fear, catharsis, and why we enjoy watching miserable drama the very next day. Now obviously the topics are related, but in retrospect (lovely Latinate word, that...) it was probably mostly my preoccupations colouring things. In the year which Tarantino and Shakespeare shared my obsessions, I remember a fantastic debate which occured about Reservoir Dogs AND Hamlet simultaneously. I'm sure it made sense at the time - I think I was criticising suspense and second act problems. I suppose no theory of art is comprehensive if it doesn't include low-art as well, and I was most struck with this:

"Because the Apollonian impulses of the Greek tragedians give form to the Dionysian rituals of music and dance, the death of the hero is not a negative, destructive act but rather a positive, creative affirmation of life through art."

Which is what I was trying to express last post. By Dionisian, he means wild, primal, frenzy, suffering, the reality of life. By Apollonian he means contained, light, dreamlike and detatched. His theory for perfect art is that the two should be balanced. On the one hand, I'm handling the full Dionysian brunt of that episode with my emotional response. But my inner Apollonian is very satisfied with the "form" of the thing - the way it mirrors Planet of Fire, the completion of arcs, the evolution of characters. Not sure what to say about the second half though. You'll be able to see me affirming the creative nature of life through art at the bottom of my second bottle and third Kleenex box on Boxing Day.

No one really knows what Nietzsche stands for, aside from a vague idea that he's a miserable sod who killed off God. Having read some I feel myself moved, impressed and with a huge boost to my morale, due to positive and beautiful philosophy. Am I doing this wrong? I feel like I've missed something, or else the universe has done Mr N. a huge disservice all these years. This is Sparknotes' summary:

"For Nietzsche, art is not just a form of human activity but is rather the highest expression of the human spirit. The thrust of the book is well expressed in what is perhaps its most famous line, near the end of section 5: “it is only as an aesthetic phenomenon that existence and the world are eternally justified.” One of Nietzsche’s concerns in The Birth of Tragedy is to address the question of the best stance to take toward existence and the world. He criticizes his own age (though his words apply equally to the present day) for being overly rationalistic, for assuming that it is best to treat existence and the world primarily as objects of knowledge. For Nietzsche, this stance makes life meaningless because knowledge and rationality in themselves do nothing to justify existence and the world. Life finds meaning, according to Nietzsche, only through art. Art, music, and tragedy in particular bring us to a deeper level of experience than philosophy and rationality. Existence and the world become meaningful not as objects of knowledge but as artistic experiences. According to Nietzsche, art does not find a role in the larger context of life, but rather life takes on meaning and significance only as it is expressed in art."

I think you can see why I'd find that appealing. Oscar Wilde said something similar about nature: we only understand it as beautiful because Art has told us a blissful hill is beautiful. In truth, it's scratchy and uncomfortable and there are insects everywhere. And much like my witterings about decay and mundanity being "ugly" purely because we don't expect to find it beautiful.

My whirlwind romance with Nietzche was, however, not to last. Turns out the World was right about him being a misery guts. This was an early work, and he goes on to describe it as:

"badly written, ponderous, embarrassing, image-mad and image-confused, sentimental, saccharine to the point of effeminacy, uneven in tempo, [and] without the will to logical cleanliness"

Which is funny when you consider that would also be a perfect description of your humble authoress. Of course, the whole point of the essay is how Socrates invented rational thinking and therefore destroyed art - a valid point. I wouldn't blame Socrates, but then, with a bit of luck I won't have to give a damn what Socrates thinks very, very soon. More details as they emerge. I think I've just been rescued.