When Nietzsche Wept by Irvin D. Yalom
IF A HEALING LOWERS THE HEALER, CAN IT POSSIBLY RAISE THE PATIENT?
There must be a higher way.
Letter to Lou Salomé from Friedrich Nietzsche, December 1882
My dear Lou,
Don’t write letters like that to me! What do I have to do with this wretchedness? I wish you could raise yourself up before me so that I didn’t have to despise you.
But, Lou! What kind of letters are you writing? Revengeful-lustful schoolgirls write like that! What do I have to do with this pitifulness? Please understand, I want you to raise up before me, not that you reduce yourself. How can I forgive you if I don’t recognize that being in you again for which you could ever possibly be forgiven?
No, my dear Lou, we are a long way still from forgiving. I can’t shake forgiving out of my shirtsleeves after the offense had four months’ time to work its way into me.
Goodbye, my dear Lou, I won’t see you again. Protect your soul from such actions and make good to others and especially my friend Rée what you couldn’t make good to me.
I didn’t create the world and, Lou, I wish I had—then I would be able to bear all the guilt that things turned out between us the way they did.
Goodbye, dear Lou, I didn’t read your letter to its end but I’d read too much already. . . .
F.N.
CHAPTER 19
“WE’RE NOT GETTING ANYWHERE, Friedrich. I’m getting worse.”
Nietzsche, who had been writing at his desk, had not heard Breuer enter. Now he turned around, opened his mouth to speak, yet remained silent.
“Do I startle you, Friedrich? It must be confusing to have your physician enter your room and complain that he is worse! Especially when he is impeccably attired and carries his black medical bag with professional assurance!
“But, trust me, my outward appearance is all deception. Underneath, my clothes are wet, my shirt clings to my skin. This obsession with Bertha—it’s a whirlpool in my mind. It sucks up my every clean thought!
“I don’t blame you!” Breuer sat down next to the desk. “Our lack of progress is my fault. It was I who urged you to attack the obsession directly. You’re right—we do not go deep enough. We merely trim leaves when we should be uprooting the weed.”
“Yes, we uproot nothing!” Nietzsche replied. “We must reconsider our approach. I, too, feel discouraged. Our last sessions have been false and superficial. Look at what we tried to do: discipline your thoughts, control your behavior! Thought training and behavior shaping! These methods are not for the human realm! Ach, we’re not animal trainers!”
“Yes, yes! After the last session I felt like a bear being trained to stand and dance.”
“Precisely! A teacher should be a raiser of men. Instead, in the last few meetings, I’ve lowered you and myself as well. We cannot approach human concerns with animal methods.”
Nietzsche rose and gestured toward the fireplace, the waiting chairs. “Shall we?” It occurred to Breuer, as he took his seat, that though the future “doctors of despair” might discard traditional medical tools—stethoscope, otoscope, ophthalmoscope—they would in time develop their own accoutrements, beginning with two comfortable fireside chairs.
“So,” Breuer began, “let’s return to where we were before this ill-advised direct campaign upon my obsession. You had advanced a theory that Bertha is a diversion, not a cause, and that the real center of my Angst is my fear of death and godlessness. Maybe so! I think you may be right! Certainly it’s true that my obsession about Bertha keeps me pasted to the surface of things, leaving me no time for deeper or darker thoughts.
“Yet, Friedrich, I don’t find your explanation entirely satisfying. First, there’s still the riddle of ‘Why Bertha?’ Of all the possible ways to defend myself against Angst, why choose this particular, stupid obsession? Why not some other method, some other fantasy?
“Second, you say Bertha is merely a diversion to misdirect my attention from my core Angst. Yet ‘diversion’ is a pale word. It’s not enough to explain the power of my obsession. Thinking about Bertha is preternaturally compelling; it contains some hidden, powerful meaning.”
“Meaning!” Nietzsche slapped his hand sharply against the arm of his chair. “Exactly! I’ve been thinking along identical lines since you left yesterday. Your final word, ‘meaning,’ may be the key. Perhaps our mistake from the beginning has been to neglect the meaning of your obsession. You claimed you cured each of Bertha’s hysterical symptoms by discovering its origin. And also that this ‘origin’ method was not relevant to your own case because the origin of your Bertha obsession was already known—having begun after you met her and intensifying after you stopped seeing her.
“But perhaps,” Nietzsche continued, “you’ve been using the wrong word. Perhaps what matters is not the origin—that is, the first appearance of symptoms—but the meaning of a symptom! Perhaps you were mistaken. Perhaps you cured Bertha by discovering not the origin, but the meaning of each symptom! Perhaps”—here Nietzsche almost whispered as if he were conveying a secret of great significance—“perhaps symptoms are messengers of a meaning and will vanish only when their message is comprehended. If so, our next step is obvious: if we are to conquer the symptoms, we must determine what the Bertha obsession means to you!”
What next? Breuer wondered. How does one go about discovering the meaning of an obsession? He was affected by Nietzsche’s excitement and awaited instructions. But Nietzsche had settled back in his chair, taken out his comb, and begun to groom his mustache. Breuer grew tense and cranky.
“Well, Friedrich? I’m waiting!” He rubbed his chest, breathing deeply. “This tension here, in my chest, grows every minute I sit here. Soon it will explode. I can’t reason it away. Tell me how to start! How can I discover a meaning that I myself have concealed?”
“Don’t try to discover or solve anything!” Nietzsche responded, still combing his mustache. “That will be my job! Your job is just to chimneysweep. Talk about what Bertha means to you.”
“Haven’t I already talked too much about her? Shall I wallow once again in my Bertha ruminations? You’ve heard them all—touching her, undressing her, caressing her, my house on fire, everyone dead, eloping to America. Do you really want to hear all that garbage again?” Getting up abruptly, Breuer paced back and forth behind Nietzsche’s chair.
Nietzsche continued to speak in a calm and measured manner. “It’s the tenacity of your obsession that intrigues me. Like a barnacle clinging to its rock. Can we not, Josef, just for a moment, pry it away and peer underneath? Chimneysweep for me, I say! Chimneysweep about this question: What would life—your life—be like without Bertha? Just talk. Don’t try to make sense, even to make sentences. Say anything that comes to your mind!”
“I can’t. I’m wound up, I’m a coiled spring.”
“Stop pacing. Close your eyes and try to describe what you see on the back of your eyelids. Just let the thoughts flow—don’t control them.”
Breuer stopped behind Nietzsche’s chair and clutched its back. His eyes closed, he rocked to and fro, as his father had when he prayed, and slowly began to mumble his thoughts:
“A life without Bertha—a charcoal life, no colors—calipers—scales—funerary marbles—everything decided, now and for always—I’d be here, you’d find me here—always! Right here, this spot, with this medical bag, in these clothes, with this face which, day by day, will grow darker and more gaunt.”
Breuer breathed deep, feeling less agitated, and sat down. “Life without Bertha?—What else?—I’m a scientist, but science has no color. One should only work in science, not try to live in it—I need magic—and passion—you can’t live without magic. That’s what Bertha means, passion and magic. Life without passion—who can live such a life?” He opened his eyes suddenly. “Can you? Can anyone?”
“Please chimneysweep about passion and living,” Nietzsche prodded him.
“One of my patients is a midwife,” Breuer went on. “She’s old, wizened,
“And you, Josef?”
“I’m like that midwife! I want to be close to mystery. My passion for Bertha isn’t natural—it’s supernatural, I know that—but I need magic. I can’t live in black and white.”
“We all need passion, Josef,” Nietzsche said. “Dionysian passion is life. But does passion have to be magical and debasing? Can’t one find a way to be the master of passion?
“Let me tell you about a Buddhist monk I met last year in the Engadine. He lives a spare life. He meditates half his waking hours and spends weeks without exchanging a word with anyone. His diet is simple, only a single meal a day, whatever he can beg, perhaps only an apple. But he meditates upon that apple until it’s bursting with redness, succulence, and crispness. By the end of the day, he passionately anticipates his meal. The point is, Josef, you don’t have to relinquish passion. But you have to change your conditions for passion.”
Breuer nodded.
“Keep going,” Nietzsche urged. “Chimneysweep more about Bertha—what she means to you.”
Breuer closed his eyes. “I see myself running with her. Running away. Bertha means escape—dangerous escape!”
“How so?”
“Bertha is danger. Before her, I lived within the rules. Today I flirt with the limits of those rules—perhaps that’s what the midwife meant. I think about exploding my life, sacrificing my career, committing adultery, losing my family, emigrating, beginning life again with Bertha.” Breuer slapped himself lightly on the head. “Stupid! Stupid! I know I’ll never do it!”
“But there’s a lure to this dangerous teeter-tottering on the edge?”
“A lure? I don’t know. I can’t answer that. I don’t like danger! If there’s a lure, it’s not danger—I think the lure is escape, not from danger but from safety. Maybe I’ve lived too safely!”
“Maybe, Josef, living safely is dangerous. Dangerous and deadly.”
“Living safely is dangerous.” Breuer mumbled the words to himself several times. “Living safely is dangerous. Living safely is dangerous. A powerful thought, Friedrich. So is that the meaning of Bertha: to escape the dangerously deadly life? Is Bertha my freedom wish—my escape from the trap of time?”
“Perhaps from the trap of your time, your historical moment. But, Josef,” he said solemnly, “do not make the mistake of thinking she will lead you out of time! Time cannot be broken; that is our greatest burden. And our greatest challenge is to live in spite of that burden.”
For once, Breuer did not protest Nietzsche’s assumption of his philosopher’s tone. This philosophizing was different. He didn’t know what to do with Nietzsche’s words, but he knew they reached him, moved him.
“Be assured,” he said, “I have no dreams of immortality. The life I want to escape is the life of the eighteen eighty-two Viennese medical bourgeoisie. Others, I know, envy my life—but I dread it. Dread its sameness and predictability. Dread it so much that sometimes I think of my life as a death sentence. Do you know what I mean, Friedrich?”
Nietzsche nodded. “Do you remember asking me, perhaps the first time we talked, whether there were any advantages to having migraine? It was a good question. It helped me think about my life differently. And do you remember my answer? That my migraine forced me to resign my university professorship? Everyone—family, friends, even colleagues—lamented my misfortune, and I am certain history will record that Nietzsche’s illness tragically ended his career. But not so! The reverse is true! The professorship at the University of Basel was my death sentence. It sentenced me to the hollow life of the academy and to spend the rest of my days providing for the economic support of my mother and sister. I was fatally trapped.”
“And then, Friedrich, migraine—the great liberator—descended upon you!”
“Not so different is it, Josef, from this obsession that descends upon you? Perhaps we are more alike than we think!”
Breuer closed his eyes. How good to feel so close to Nietzsche. Tears welled up; he pretended a coughing fit in order to turn his head away.
“Let us continue,” said Nietzsche impassively. “We’re making progress. We understand that Bertha represents passion, mystery, dangerous escape. What else, Josef? What other meanings are packed into her?”
“Beauty! Bertha’s beauty is an important part of the mystery. Here, I brought this for you to see.”
He opened his bag and held out a photograph. Putting on his thick glasses, Nietzsche walked to the window to inspect it in better light. Bertha, clothed from head to toe in black, was dressed for riding. Her jacket constricted her: a double row of small buttons, stretching from her tiny waist to her chin, struggled to contain her mighty bosom. Her left hand daintily clasped both her skirt and a long riding whip. From her other hand, gloves dangled. Her nose was forceful, her hair short and severe; and on it perched an insouciant black cap. Her eyes were large and dark. She did not trouble to look into the camera, but stared far into the distance.
“A formidable woman, Josef,” said Nietzsche, returning the photograph and sitting down again. “Yes, she has great beauty—but I don’t like women who carry whips.”
“Beauty,” Breuer said, “is an important part of Bertha’s meaning. I’m easily captured by such beauty. More easily than most men, I think. Beauty is a mystery. I hardly know how to speak about it, but a woman who has a certain combination of flesh, breasts, ears, large dark eyes, nose, lips—especially lips—simply awes me. This sounds stupid, but I almost believe such women have superhuman powers!”
“To do what?”
“It’s too stupid!” Breuer hid his face in his hands.
“Just chimneysweep, Josef. Suspend your judgment—and speak! You have my word I do not judge you!”
“I can’t put it into language.”
“Try to finish this sentence: ‘In the presence of Bertha’s beauty, I feel——’ ”
“ ‘In the presence of Bertha’s beauty, I feel—I feel—’ What do I feel? I feel I’m in the bowels of the earth—in the center of existence. I’m just where I should be. I’m in the place where there are no questions about life or purpose—the center—the place of safety. Her beauty offers infinite safety.” He lifted his head. “See, I tell you this makes no sense!”
“Go on,” said Nietzsche imperturbably.
“For me to be captured, the woman must have a certain look. It’s an adoring look—I can see it in my mind now—wide-open, glistening eyes, lips closed in an affectionate half-smile. She seems to be saying—oh, I don’t know——”
“Continue, Josef, please! Keep imagining the smile! Can you still see it?”
Breuer closed his eyes and nodded.
“What does it say to you?”
“It says, ‘You’re adorable. Anything you do is all right. Oh, you darling, you get out of control, but one expects that of a boy.’ Now I see her turning to the other women around her, and she says, ‘Isn’t he something? Isn’t he dear? I’ll take him into my arms and comfort him.’ ”
“Can you say more about that smile?”
“It says to me I can play, do whatever I want. I can get into trouble—but, no matter what, she’ll continue to be delighted by me, to find me adorable.”
“Does the smile have a personal history for you, Josef?”
“What do you mean?”
“Reach back. Does your memory contain such a smile?”
Breuer shook his head. “No, no memories.”
“You answer too quickly!” Nietzsche insisted. “You started to shake your head before I finished my question. Search! Just keep watching that smile in your mind’s eye and see what comes.”
Breuer closed his eyes and gazed at the scroll of his
“Who else? Have you forgotten your mother’s smile?”
“Haven’t I told you? My mother died when I was three. She was only twenty-eight, and she died after giving birth to my younger brother. I’m told she was beautiful, but I have no memories of her, not one.”
“And your wife? Does Mathilde have that magical smile?”
“No. Of that I can be certain. Mathilde is beautiful, but her smile has no power for me. I know it’s stupid to think that Mary, at age ten, has power, while Mathilde has none. But that’s the way I experience it. In our marriage, it is I who have power over her, and it is she who desires my protection. No, Mathilde has no magic, I don’t know why.”
“Magic requires darkness and mystery,” Nietzsche said. “Perhaps her mystery has been annihilated by the familiarity of fourteen years of marriage. Do you know her too well? Perhaps you cannot bear the truth of a relationship to a beautiful woman.”
“I begin to think I need another word than beauty. Mathilde has all the components of beauty. She has the aesthetics, but not the power, of beauty. Perhaps you’re right—it is too familiar. Too often I see the flesh and blood under the skin. Another factor is that there’s no competition; no other men have ever been in Mathilde’s life. It was an arranged marriage.”
“It puzzles me that you would want competition, Josef. Just a few days ago, you spoke of dreading it.”
“I want competition, and I don’t. Remember, you said I didn’t have to make sense. I’m just expressing words as they occur to me. Let me see—let me collect my thoughts—ϒes, the woman of beauty has more power if she is desired by other men. But such a woman is too dangerous—she will scald me. Maybe Bertha is the perfect compromise—she’s not yet fully formed! She is beauty in embryo, still incomplete.”