To his old friend Paul Ree, Nietzsche wrote about himself: “You could have seen a man leaping up and down in the room like a satyr, waving his arms around like one possessed.
Back in his hotel, he wrote in his notebook: “ experiencing a menacing, heart-rending attack of desire and savage, pent-up surges of emotion … moments of sudden madness when the lonely man embraces the first man to come his way and treat him as a precious gift from heaven.”Īpparently this reclusive man of letters was not shy about sharing such “surges of emotion” with several men with whom he shared a deep and abiding intimacy. He cruised the sandy shores in white slacks, a healthy tan, and a Panama hat. AT THE PEAK of his vitality, age 38, German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche was sojourning in Genoa, Italy.
