Ecce Homo as Nietzsche's Honest Lie

Mitcheson, Katrina

Abstract

Once we recognize that for Nietzsche a new practice of truth aims to overcome ‘Truth’ as the ‘real world’, we can reconcile Nietzsche’s criticisms of ‘Truth’ with his praise of truth. If we are also to reconcile the importance of truthfulness, which Nietzsche declares in Ecce Homo, with the fictionalizations this text seems to contain, these fictions must be seen to serve this practice of truth. This essay claims that they do, and that Ecce Homo, therefore, operates as Nietzsche’s ‘honest lie’, which contrasts to the “lie of the ideal” (EH Preface 2).

Citation

Mitcheson, K. (2021). Ecce Homo as Nietzsche's Honest Lie. In Nietzsche’s “Ecce Homo” (139-152). Berlin/ Munich/ Boston: De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110246551-011

• Acceptance Date: Mar 27, 2017
• Publication Date: 2021-01
• Deposit Date: Feb 28, 2022
• Pages: 139-152
• Book Title: Nietzsche’s “Ecce Homo”
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110246551-011
• Keywords: Nietzsche, Plato, Ecce Homo, Truth
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/9084306