The Poverty of Left Nietzscheanism

What are we to make of Nietzsche’s versatility? Championed by anarchists, Nazis, post-modernists, liberals and leftists alike, his uses appear to be endless-but what does the constant reappearance and recuperation mean in political terms? Can his thought really serve all the diverse and contradictory ends of his many admirers? In The Poverty of Left Nietzscheanism Aymeric Monville takes up this question with characteristic wit and perceptiveness. Focussing on the question of Nietzsche’s purported 'Left' cheerleaders in France-Camus, Bataille, Deleuze, Foucault, Derrida among others-Monville argues that the 'eternal return' of Nietzsche is a symptom and cause of the pernicious irrationalism, individualism, and anti-communist consensus that, in his view, now runs from the Western Left to the far right.Monville asserts Nietzsche-and those that take up his mantle-have only ever served as a weapon with which to undermine the materialist tradition, and ultimately, the entire tradition of thought descending from Marxism and the workers’ movements. Part of the Anti-Imperialist Marxism (AIM) series.-From the introduction by Gabriel Rockhill: 'Monville... provides the reader not only with a deep understanding of the Nietzschean legacy and elements for a counter-history of French theory, but it also develops an insightful indictment of the dominant capitalist ideologies while clearly articulating the political path forward.'Praise for this edition:Aymeric Monville’s The Poverty of Left Nietzscheanism presents the reader immediately with a paradox: Why did the reactionary, anti-egalitarian, anti-socialist outlook of Friedrich Nietzsche become the chief source of inspiration for the postmodernist left after 1968? Monville’s startling answer (further amplified by Gabriel Rockhill’s introduction) is that Nietzsche’s use of classic philological methods to promote a culturalist philosophy of myth and irrationalism offered the requisite discursive cover for a rapidly retreating Western 'moral left' that had abandoned the class struggle in favor of the abstract notion of différence. In the process, the ideological ramparts preventing the return of fascism were tragically removed. This then is a book for our times.-John Bellamy Foster, author, Breaking the Bonds of Fate: Epicurus and Marx;