These--Yale. / Photocopy of typescript. Bibliography: leaves [169]-172.

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My study is not concerned with all the implications of Nietzsche’s nihilism, but deals specifically with the challenge his nihilism poses for philosophical conceptions of ethics and morality. My interest lies in the possibilities for conceptualizing an ethical nihilism. By this I mean that I want to remain focused on Nietzsche’s own understanding of nihilism (and Foucault’s development of its implications) in my search for possible ways of moving beyond nihilism’s destruction of traditional morality, instead of trying to ‘save’ morality or ethics by moving beyond nihilism as such. The aim of this study is thus to gauge whether an ethical theory can be developed making constructive use of nihilism and its methodologies. I conceptualize the possibility of ethical nihilism within four chapters. In chapter one I undertake an analysis of the methodology that nihilism provides and demonstrate the theory of knowledge that it underpins. This theory of knowledge results in a diagnosis of the human condition and knowledge within Western modernity. Here the central question is: What does Nietzsche’s theory concerning the formation of knowledge look like? In chapter two I discuss the perspective of so-called passive nihilism, which represents Nietzsche’s diagnosis of the illness or crisis facing humans in Western modernity. Passive nihilism denotes both the illness itself and one particular response to this crisis, namely one of denial. Passive nihilists fixate on holding onto a specific identity as well as a specific form of knowledge as being essential, i.e. as ‘given’, or ‘discovered’. One form of knowledge which emanates from passive nihilism is traditional morality. I will investigate how passive nihilism and the associated form of morality impact on the concrete body of one’s fellow human being, i.e. the Other. As the result of the impact of morality the Other is viewed as a formation in the sense that she is made up of aspects that simply mirror the Self’s privileged compilation of knowledge as it is anchored within the identity of the Self. Here the central question will be: How does passive nihilism problematize the formation of the Other? In chapter three I discuss the remedy to the crisis of modernity as proposed by Nietzsche, namely his vision of so-called active nihilism. Active nihilism considers knowledge and identity as ‘constructed’ and ‘invented’. This perspective holds many interesting implications for one’s own concrete body, i.e. the Self. I will investigate the manner in which active nihilism empowers the Self, which is also viewed as a formation in the sense that her own identity is made up of aspects inhering within a certain privileged compilation of knowledge. Here the central question will be: How does active nihilism problematize the formation of the Self? Chapter four serves as the conclusion to this study. I will discuss Foucault’s elaboration on the remedy that Nietzsche proposes to the nihilist crisis. In light of what Foucault has to say I answer in the affirmative the central question underpinning the research problem of this study: Is a form of ethical, active nihilism possible? In response to this question I propose in some detail a new form of ethics that takes its cue from the insights provided by active nihilism, following my Nietzschean reading of Foucault. / Dr. H. Louise du Toit Prof. Johan J. Snyman

Nous avons opté pour l’étude du vide et du nihilisme dans l’œuvre de Maurice Blanchot, un écrivain-penseur qui suscite actuellement un intérêt grandissant tant en France qu’à l’étranger. En effet, notre présente étude recouvre une période très riche de mutations politiques, historiques, économiques, sociales, culturelles s’étendant de la deuxième moitié du XIXe siècle jusqu’à la fin de ce qu’on appelle l’époque postmoderne. Au sein de ces mutations qui ont marqué l’histoire de l’Occident à cette époque, l’homme occidental se trouve en crise, étonné, choqué par ce désordre qui commence à s’infiltrer dans sa vie, il a recours à l’enfermement et à la solitude pour pouvoir oublier ce drame qui a déjà pris part dans sa vie personnelle, il est soumis devant le vide qui l’écrase et le nihilisme qui n’hésite pas à porter atteinte à sa quiétude. Il commence alors à ressentir un vide existentiel qui le mène à poser des questions infinies : pourquoi suis-je là ? À quoi sert ma vie ? Pourquoi vivre alors que la mort nous attend à la fin et que la vie ne vaut pas la peine d’être vécue ? La scène se révèle tragique et la vie renvoie alors à l’inanité et à l’absurdité. / We chose the study of the void and the nihilism in the writing of Maurice Blanchot, a writer-thinker who currently arouses an interest growing both in France and abroad. Indeed, our present study covers a very rich period with political, historical, economic, social and cultural changes extending from the second half of the XIXth century until the end of the postmodern time. In order to be able to analyze the presence of the nihilism and the void in the novels and the accounts of Maurice Blanchot, our research will be related to the prints of modernity in its writs as well as the questioning of the author by some of his contemporaries (writers or philosophers) and its engagement to the cultural and political life of its time. Within these changes, which marked the western history that time, the Western man was in crisis, astonished, shocked by this disorder which started to infiltrate during this period, it led to insulation and loneliness that to forget the drama which already took a share in his personal life, it had been subjected, in front of the void, which crushed it, and the nihilism which didn’t not hesitate to carry reached to its quietude. Then, it started to feel existential empty, which carries out to raise infinite questions: why am I there? For what is used my life? Why live whereas death waits us at the end and until the life is not worth the sorrow to be lived? The scene appears tragic and the life returns then to the inanity and the nonsense.

This thesis examines the relationship between nihilism and postmodernism in relation to the sublime, and is divided into two parts: theory and literature. Beginning with histories of nihilism and the sublime, the Enlightenment is constructed as a conflict between the two. Rather than promote a simple binarism, however, nihilism is constructed as a temporally-displaced form of sublimity that is merely labelled as nihilism because of the dominant ideologies at the time. Postmodernism, as a product of the Enlightenment, is therefore implicitly related to both nihilism and the sublime, despite the fact that it is often characterised as either nihilistic or sublime. Whereas prior forms of nihilism are 'modernist' because they seek to codify reality, postmodernism creates a new formulation of nihilism – 'postmodern nihilism' – that is itself sublime. This is explored in relation to a broad survey of postmodern literature through a series of interconnected themes. These themes – apocalypse, the absurd, absence, and space – arise from the debates presented in the theoretical chapters of this thesis, and demonstrate the ways in which nihilism and the sublime interact within postmodern literature. Because of the theoretical and literary debates presented within it, this thesis concludes that it cannot be a thesis at all.

Addressing the meaning of Martin Heidegger's much-discussed concept of 'authenticity',this study challenges the view, put forward by Charles Guignon and others, that that concept chiefly concerns the significance that an individual life can acquire. Emphasizing the crucial distinction between relational and transcendant meaning, the study sees that distinction as critical to Heidegger's treatment of authenticity, and, more broadly, to the manner in which authenticity figures in the situating of Being and Time in the general context of nihilism and belief Drawing on arguments put forward by Hubert Dreyfus, and especially attuned to Kierkegaard's influence on Heidegger, the study repositions the concept at the point where Heidegger's existential analytic and the all too human desire for deeper meaning meet. The result serves at once to clarify the concept and refine understanding of its place in larger histories.

This thesis outlines one's overcoming of nihilism by consulting two figures, Martin Heidegger and John Dewey. Each thinker holds a pivotal role for art, such that, a turn to the aesthetic allows the individual to overcome this nihilistic age. I intend to show that Heidegger and Dewey mutually inform each other's project. Heidegger is able to shed light on Dewey's project; however, Dewey ultimately takes Heidegger's thought a step further. Heidegger understands the current age to be overcome with nihilism as a consequence of modern technological enframing as well the end of classical religious sensibilities. Heidegger, like Dewey, relies on aesthetics to correct this dilemma. Because of Heidegger's diagnosis of the problem, we can see a new context for Dewey's thought. Dewey does not speak in the language of nihilism, however, through Heidegger, we can see that they share a similar concern. Where Dewey takes Heidegger's thought a step forward is in regard to Dewey's emphasis on personal experience. This emphasis shifts the responsibility of overcoming nihilism away from Heidegger's poet and onto the individual. Dewey understands aesthetics to be a process of experience and art to be the culmination of this experience. This shift in responsibility is placed upon the individual because the individual is the arbiter of their doings and sole recipient of their undergoings. Consequently, the individual bears the consequences, and therefore the responsibility, of their experiences. Meaning, each individual holds the tools necessary to overcome nihilism inherent in one's own experience. The name for the process of properly weathering one's doings and undergoings is called the aesthetic life. The turn to personal responsibility, in the aesthetic life, allows the people to be the genesis of change rather than necessitating a leader, or poet. A community of people engaged in the aesthetic life is understood as democracy. Dewey's formulation of democracy, then, is not only a work of art but it also prevents the return of nihilism through the creation of a society always creating more possibility for its citizens.

Addressing the meaning of Martin Heidegger's much-discussed concept of 'authenticity',this study challenges the view, put forward by Charles Guignon and others, that that concept chiefly concerns the significance that an individual life can acquire. Emphasizing the crucial distinction between relational and transcendant meaning, the study sees that distinction as critical to Heidegger's treatment of authenticity, and, more broadly, to the manner in which authenticity figures in the situating of Being and Time in the general context of nihilism and belief Drawing on arguments put forward by Hubert Dreyfus, and especially attuned to Kierkegaard's influence on Heidegger, the study repositions the concept at the point where Heidegger's existential analytic and the all too human desire for deeper meaning meet. The result serves at once to clarify the concept and refine understanding of its place in larger histories.

Originally presented as the author's thesis, Freie Universität, Berlin. / Bibliography: p. 216-233.