Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Rethinking Morality
The Superman and the Will to Power
Death of God and Christianity
Eternal Recurrence
Summary
Analysis
Beauty appeals to awakened souls and laughs at the so-called virtuous. Zarathustra teaches that virtue isn’t rewarded, not even by itself. Reward and punishment are lies—virtue is, in fact, the Self. The works of virtue travel forever, like a star’s light even after it's extinguished.
Traditionally “virtuous” people believe that virtue is rewarded, even if it’s not until an afterlife. Zarathustra teaches that virtue is simply the exercise of the will, which shines into the indefinite future, even after a person dies—there is no literal afterlife for the soul.
Themes
There are many different attitudes about virtue in the world. For some people, virtue is like the brakes on a heavy cart rushing downhill; to others, it’s like the tick-tock of a wound-up clock. To others still, it’s like sitting quietly in a swamp and holding the opinion one is taught, or holding an unvarying pose, while their heart knows nothing of virtue. Just about everyone, in fact, believes that they’re practicing virtue, calling themselves experts in “good” and “evil.” But Zarathustra has come so that people will grow tired of these mere words—virtue should instead be like the Self in action, like the mother in her child.
Zarathustra teaches that most attitudes about virtue are inauthentic and useless. They might temporarily restrain people; they might be unthinking or automatic; or they might not penetrate to a person’s heart. In the end, all of these approaches to so-called “virtues” are fruitless—they are separate from the individual. Zarathustra teaches a different approach to virtue: it simply means living according to the truest and highest version of one’s Self.
Themes
