Nietzsche

Beyond Good & Evil

A Complete Beginner's Course

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Begins April 18th

Are you ready to finally understand Nietzsche?

Beyond Good & Evil provides the ideal starting point for understanding Nietzsche's thought.It is among the most comprehensive of Nietzsche's works, and touches on every major theme of his philosophy: nihilism, morality, religion, truth, history, psychology, value, art, and much more.If you are tired of trying and failing to "get through" Nietzsche on your own, or are looking for an initial entryway into his philosophy that isn't just a Youtube video, then this course is for you.I have specifically designed this course to provide a complete experience that gives you everything you need to not just "read" but understand Beyond Good & Evil and Nietzsche's thought in general.

Course Syllabus

This course will be a close reading of one of the major works of Nietzsche’s mature period:Beyond Good and Evil.We will discuss the major themes of his thought including: his conception of philosophy, philosophical method, his critique of morality, will to power, and his reflections on the nature of truth and knowledge.We will also consider Nietzsche's thought in relation to contemporary
philosophy and culture.Nietzsche is one of the most important and influential philosophers of our age, primarily because he is the most intransigent critic of modernity.The themes addressed in Beyond Good & Evil are more pressing than ever.

Reading Schedule

Course Requirements

There are a few simple requirements for the course.First, if you want to participate in the live calls, you will need a stable internet connection and consistent availability on Saturdays at 12PM EST (New York).Second, you will need the right translation. We will be using the Walter Kaufmann translation of Beyond Good & Evil which can be purchased for $10 on Amazon.This translation is required for the course.There are some free translations available online but they are terrible!

When You Join...

Anyone who enrolls in Beyond Good & Evil: A Beginner's Course will receive full-access to the following:

Anyone who enrolls also receives the following bonuses:

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A Personal Note ...

When I was 21, I was incredibly interested in studying Nietzsche.No philosopher, or writer, had ever gripped me so strongly as Nietzsche.Unfortunately, my university taught the very kind of philosophy that Nietzsche was deeply critical of, so there were never any courses about him.Around the same time, I had finished reading one of the best books written about Nietzsche by Alexander Nehamas, titled Nietzsche: Life As Literature.I was pleased to discover that Professor Nehamas was teaching a graduate seminar on Nietzsche at Princeton University, which was only a 45 minute train ride from me at the time.I emailed Professor Nehamas and requested to join his graduate course even though I was only an undergraduate at the time.Professor Nehamas agreed to let me take his course for credit, so I took the train to Princeton evey week.It was one of the most enriching intellectual experiences of my life.Nehamas' seminar met every week for 3 hours. During those 3 hours we poked and prodded Nietzsche's text, section by section, line by line.I miss the immersive feeling of working through a difficult text with a group of serious thinkers.And I know I'm not alone.There's a desire for serious culture that is not being satisfied.My own life was fundamentally changed by time spent in rigorous intellectual environments: I've met my best friends, transformed my worldview, and gained a better sense of what matters.So I decided to help organize what many crave: an intense seminar with a legendary Stanford professor to read one of the most important novels of the 20th century: The Man Without Qualities. This is a text I wish I had read in college, and I can't wait to read it together with you in an online seminar, which I will be personally attending.Maybe you're an autodidact. You read seriously, but know that you're leaving a lot on the table. You want guidance from someone with real expertise, and an experience of sharing your thoughts and ideas with others who take ideas as seriously as you do.Or maybe you're contending with civilizational malaise. The world and your life both feel a little unmoored. The institutions and frameworks that once supplied meaning have weakened or even collapsed. You see the signs everywhere: outrage without analysis, opinions without foundations, activity without direction. You don't want to simply react. You want to think clearly about where we are, how we got here, and what kind of life is actually worth living.Maybe you experienced intellectual passion so you know what it feels like. A class, or a person, that changed the way you thought. A time in your life when ideas felt urgent and alive. But that was years ago. You have resources, taste, and curiosity, but you've never been in a room where a truly brilliant mind guides you through a book about the condition you're living through.I hope to see you in class!Paul Musso
Philadelphia
April 2, 2026

Why Read BGE?

Beyond Good and Evil is one of the most comprehensive and explosive works ever written by Friedrich Nietzsche—a direct assault on morality, truth, religion, politics, and philosophy itself.Most philosophy tries to explain the world.Nietzsche's philosophy tries to destroy your assumptions about it.While his earlier work, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, presents his ideas in a poetic and symbolic form, Beyond Good and Evil delivers them with precision, clarity, and force.This is Nietzsche at his most philosophical—and his most dangerous.If you want to understand Nietzsche, this is the book.
• No major theme is missing
• Every central idea is developed more rigorously
• Hidden connections emerge between:
• psychology
• metaphysics
• morality
• politics
• human natureIt is not the easiest book he wrote.But it is one of the most revealing.In this single work, Nietzsche launches a sweeping critique of modernity challenging:
• Traditional morality (good vs evil)
• Religion and “progressive” belief systems
• Atheism that replaces faith with shallow certainty
• Science that claims objectivity without examining its assumptions
• Political ideologies across the spectrum
• Philosophy itselfNothing is left untouched.What if the difference between “good” and “evil” is not absolute but simply different expressions of the same underlying drives?What if truth, morality, and even reason are not neutral but creations shaped by deeper psychological forces?This is the threshold Nietzsche forces you to cross.Nietzsche is not trying to give you answers.He is trying to transform you into a different kind of thinker:
• Someone who questions what others accept
• Someone who sees through inherited beliefs
• Someone capable of creating their own valuesWhat he calls a “free spirit.”Why This Matters NowWe live in a time where:
• Old values are collapsing
• New ones feel unstable or artificial
• People are more informed than ever—but less certainNietzsche saw this coming.He called it a crisis of modernity.And he believed the solution was not better answers—but better thinkers.⸻What You’ll Actually LearnIn this course, you won’t just read Beyond Good and Evil.You’ll learn how to:
• Detect hidden assumptions in moral thinking
• Understand the psychological roots of belief
• See why most philosophy fails—and what replaces it
• Begin constructing your own framework for truth, value, and action⸻The Real Reason to Study This BookBecause if you don’t question your values—you will live according to someone else’s.

BGE is a book by philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche that covers ideas in his previous work Thus Spoke Zarathustra but with a more polemical approach.Nietzsche considered Thus Spoke Zarathustra his magnum opus, writing:With [Thus Spoke Zarathustra] I have given mankind the greatest present that has ever been made to it so far. This book, with a voice bridging centuries, is not only the highest book there is, the book that is truly characterized by the air of the heights—the whole fact of man lies beneath it at a tremendous distance—it is also the deepest, born out of the innermost wealth of truth, an inexhaustible well to which no pail descends without coming up again filled with gold and goodness.— Ecce Homo, "Preface" §4, translated by W. KaufmanAccording to translator Walter Kaufman, the title refers to the need for moral philosophy to go beyond simplistic black and white moralizing, as contained in statements such as "X is good" or "X is evil".[1] At the beginning of the book (§ 2), Nietzsche attacks the very idea of using strictly opposite terms such as "Good versus Evil".[1]Beyond Good and Evil is among the most comprehensive of Nietzsche’s
works. No significant themes are missing, and the discussion of many
topics is much more extensive (and often more “philosophical”) than is
found elsewhere. Beyond Good and Evil (let us just say Beyond) is thus
an ideal setting off point for understanding Nietzsche’s thought in general.
Moreover, its structure demands that we attempt to understand connections
that are not always apparent in other works, and thus are often
overlooked even in the literature on Nietzsche. I refer to the hidden
relationships that run between Nietzsche’s treatment of metaphysics,
psychology, philosophical methodology, style, the project of a history and
physiology of value, and political and social analysis. However, that Beyond
is an ideal starting point for studying Nietzsche does not necessarily mean
that it is the easiest of Nietzsche’s books to understand; indeed, Nietzsche
represented his own next book, Genealogy of Morality, as a “clarification”
of Beyond. Beyond Good and Evil thus contains in miniature the considerable
problem of reading Nietzsche in general: namely, reading him as at
least akin to a systematic philosopher.In this course, we will study two of the last, greatest works of Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil and Twilight of the Idols. In his Ecce Homo (the late writing in which he reviews his life’s work), Nietzsche says that Beyond Good and Evil is a “critique of modernity.” And hea calls Twilight of the Idols his “philosophy in a nutshell.” Our main order of business, then, will be to understand what Nietzsche is against and why. (His positive teaching is both very mysterious, very broad, and in some measure “to be determined” by a future creative being called the übermensch or “superman.”) The list is stunningly long. He opposes liberalism, socialism, and conservatism; religion (especially “progressive” religion) and “thoughtless” atheism; modern science (for not being scientific enough); utilitarianism; hedonism; and most philosophy as it has heretofore been practiced. “Heretofore” is a hint, then, at what he is for: philosophy done right. (He also loved hiking and music!) For only through philosophy done right (obviously his way, “beyond” morality) can we become “free minds” (the goal) and, perhaps, re-create
religion and a new world-wide political goal capable of “ennobling” humanity. As for his political thought: Nietzsche measures politics, not by its being “true” (there is no such standard for Nietzsche), but by its ability to produce a robust, demanding, fulfilling (and unique) way of life, for an entire people or society, not just for one individual. (This last point is routinely missed in all “summaries” of Nietzsche’s thought.)In Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche accuses past philosophers of lacking critical sense and blindly accepting dogmatic premises in their consideration of morality. Specifically, he accuses them of founding grand metaphysical systems upon the faith that the good man is the opposite of the evil man, rather than just a different expression of the same basic impulses that find more direct expression in the evil man. The work moves into the realm "beyond good and evil" in the sense of leaving behind the traditional morality which Nietzsche subjects to a destructive critique in favour of what he regards as an affirmative approach that fearlessly confronts the perspectival nature of knowledge and the perilous condition of the modern individual.The book is well-known for the often-quoted line: "He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee."[3][4][5]Of the four "late-period" writings of Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil most closely resembles the aphoristic style of his middle period. In it he exposes the deficiencies of those usually called "philosophers" and identifies the qualities of the "new philosophers": imagination, self-assertion, danger, originality, and the "creation of values". He then contests some of the key presuppositions of the old philosophic tradition like "self-consciousness", "knowledge", "truth", and "free will", explaining them as inventions of the moral consciousness. In their place, he offers the "will to power" as an explanation of all behavior; this ties into his "perspective of life", which he regards as "beyond good and evil", denying a universal morality for all human beings. Religion and the master and slave moralities feature prominently as Nietzsche re-evaluates deeply held humanistic beliefs, portraying even domination, appropriation and injury to the weak as not universally objectionable.In several places of the book, Nietzsche drops hints, and even explicit statements as to what the philosophies of the future must deal with.Beyond Good and Evil is among the most comprehensive of Nietzsche’s
works. No significant themes are missing, and the discussion of many
topics is much more extensive (and often more “philosophical”) than is
found elsewhere. Beyond Good and Evil (let us just say Beyond) is thus
an ideal setting off point for understanding Nietzsche’s thought in general.
Moreover, its structure demands that we attempt to understand connections
that are not always apparent in other works, and thus are often
overlooked even in the literature on Nietzsche. I refer to the hidden
relationships that run between Nietzsche’s treatment of metaphysics,
psychology, philosophical methodology, style, the project of a history and
physiology of value, and political and social analysis. However, that Beyond
is an ideal starting point for studying Nietzsche does not necessarily mean
that it is the easiest of Nietzsche’s books to understand; indeed, Nietzsche
represented his own next book, Genealogy of Morality, as a “clarification”
of Beyond. Beyond Good and Evil thus contains in miniature the considerable
problem of reading Nietzsche in general: namely, reading him as at
least akin to a systematic philosopher.In this course, we will study two of the last, greatest works of Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil and Twilight of the Idols. In his Ecce Homo (the late writing in which he reviews his life’s work), Nietzsche says that Beyond Good and Evil is a “critique of modernity.” And hea calls Twilight of the Idols his “philosophy in a nutshell.” Our main order of business, then, will be to understand what Nietzsche is against and why. (His positive teaching is both very mysterious, very broad, and in some measure “to be determined” by a future creative being called the übermensch or “superman.”) The list is stunningly long. He opposes liberalism, socialism, and conservatism; religion (especially “progressive” religion) and “thoughtless” atheism; modern science (for not being scientific enough); utilitarianism; hedonism; and most philosophy as it has heretofore been practiced. “Heretofore” is a hint, then, at what he is for: philosophy done right. (He also loved hiking and music!) For only through philosophy done right (obviously his way, “beyond” morality) can we become “free minds” (the goal) and, perhaps, re-create
religion and a new world-wide political goal capable of “ennobling” humanity. As for his political thought: Nietzsche measures politics, not by its being “true” (there is no such standard for Nietzsche), but by its ability to produce a robust, demanding, fulfilling (and unique) way of life, for an entire people or society, not just for one individual. (This last point is routinely missed in all “summaries” of Nietzsche’s thought.)In Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche accuses past philosophers of lacking critical sense and blindly accepting dogmatic premises in their consideration of morality. Specifically, he accuses them of founding grand metaphysical systems upon the faith that the good man is the opposite of the evil man, rather than just a different expression of the same basic impulses that find more direct expression in the evil man. The work moves into the realm "beyond good and evil" in the sense of leaving behind the traditional morality which Nietzsche subjects to a destructive critique in favour of what he regards as an affirmative approach that fearlessly confronts the perspectival nature of knowledge and the perilous condition of the modern individual.The book is well-known for the often-quoted line: "He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee."[3][4][5]Of the four "late-period" writings of Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil most closely resembles the aphoristic style of his middle period. In it he exposes the deficiencies of those usually called "philosophers" and identifies the qualities of the "new philosophers": imagination, self-assertion, danger, originality, and the "creation of values". He then contests some of the key presuppositions of the old philosophic tradition like "self-consciousness", "knowledge", "truth", and "free will", explaining them as inventions of the moral consciousness. In their place, he offers the "will to power" as an explanation of all behavior; this ties into his "perspective of life", which he regards as "beyond good and evil", denying a universal morality for all human beings. Religion and the master and slave moralities feature prominently as Nietzsche re-evaluates deeply held humanistic beliefs, portraying even domination, appropriation and injury to the weak as not universally objectionable.In several places of the book, Nietzsche drops hints, and even explicit statements as to what the philosophies of the future must deal with.

Musil Inspo

This seminar is about reviving and strengthening your capacity to think, and to think for yourself.You may be familiar with the feeling: you read, you have reactions, and you try to understand, but your thoughts don't develop. They just circle hopelessly instead of advancing productively.You can grasp the intellectual argument, but you cannot connect in an original, personal way. You know there's more to it, but you don't know how to get there.The aim of the course is to get you there.Over the course of ten weeks, you will find yourself unlocking new ways to reflect and engage with the world. Through the weekly group discussion, you'll have a chance to test your ideas in a lively intellectual environment and observe firsthand how ideas are developed. With the writing exercises and the individual tutoring you'll receive, you will refine and develop your own intellectual architecture.The philosophical term for what you’ll unlock is Gelassenheit: the sense of composure that comes from no longer just frantically jumping from idea to idea, because one has developed the capacity to think more coherently and built trust in one’s own reflections. Gelassenheit is what comes when you stop looking and start seeing. As Professor Gumbrecht himself puts it: “Gelassenheit could always be an anticipation, a blank cheque, so to speak, of that desire for (as I call it) "being in sync with the things of the world."

The Experience
A Private Ivy League Education
This is not a passive lecture series but a rigorous program of study designed to shape you as a person.

FAQ

Am I Qualified To Take This Course?

If anything on this page resonated with you, you're qualified to take the course and in the right place.

Do I Need To Have Already Read The Book?

No. Most participants will be encountering it for the first time. The course is designed to provide the historical context, intellectual framework, and personal support that makes a first reading extraordinary.

Which Translation Do I Need?

The correct translation of Nietzsche is critical. We will be using Walter Kaufmann's well-respected translation.

How Much Time Do I Need To Set Aside Each Week?

It should take you 45-80 minutes to read each week's material. There is also a 60-80 minute live class every week. Therefore, you should plan to spend 2-3 hours per week on the course until we finish the book.This is a serious personal and intellectual commitment, which is part of the point.

What If I Can't Make The Live Calls?

There will be recordings of the live sessions. I would also be happy to meet with you individually if possible to discuss the missed material.

I'm Not An Academic -- Will I Be Out Of My Depth?

No. The seminar is designed for a non-academic, but intellectually serious audience.

How Much Does The Course Cost?

Access to the course is through a subscription to The Micro-University, which is $80/month (and also gives you access to all other courses and resources offered, including the course on Heidegger).

What If I Fall Behind On The Reading?

You will have all of the guides, notes, and tips you need to catch up, or learn at your own pace if you fall behind. I encourage you to attend the live calls even if you didn't finish a particular reading for the week.

Can I Participate From Outside The US?

Yes. The seminars are live on Google Meet at 12PM EST (New York) which acommodates most time-zones.

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