The Superman by Dostoyevsky and NietzscheThe definition of übermensch, or superman, in Barron's Concise Student Encyclopedia makes anyone who has read Nietzsche's Zarathustra cringe - even from aphoristically, as I tried to do at the beginning. Barron's Encyclopedia defines a superman as someone who "gets his work together and gets things done." Of course, given that this is a summary of part of Nietzsche's ideas and that the encyclopedia reduces his entire philosophy to a short paragraph, this is not a bad definition. But this eliminates parts of Nietzsche's concept of superman, or superman, which are essential to understanding this idea. Walter Kaufmann provides a detailed analysis of Nietzsche's philosophy in his work Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, a book which Thomas Mann called "a work of great superiority to anything previously done in criticism and literature." 'interpretation of Nietzsche.' Kaufmann highlights several essential characteristics of the superman throughout the work. Perhaps the most important and central characteristic of the superman is that the superman is one who has overcome his nature as a normal man. "Man is something that must be conquered" is a phrase that recurs throughout Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, a work which (it seems to me) most fully developed the idea of ​​the superman of all Nietzsche's books. Nietzsche. (Zarathustra, I, Preface, 3)For Nietzsche, the vast majority of people have no value. This is repeated by Walter Kaufmann several times throughout his Nietzsche. At one point, Kaufmann, explaining Nietzsche, states that man's inherent value is "zero" and that only a few people have any value; in Kaufmann's words, "the gulf se...... middle of paper ......s. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Viking, 1954. Kaufmann, Walter. Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, Fourth edition. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1974. Mann, Thomas, quoted on the back cover of Nietzsche by Walter Kaufmann Nietzsche, Friederich Trans Walter Kaufmann New York: Vintage, 1966. Nietzsche, Friederich. . Trans. Clifton P. Fadiman New York: Dover, 1995. Nietzsche, Friederich, cited in Kaufmann's Nietzsche, Friederich The Portable Nietzsche et trans. the Concise Encyclopedia by Barron's student Friederich. Thus Spake Zarathustra in The Portable Nietzsche and Trans.., 1954.