Thanks for commenting. Nietzsche’s doctrine of the “eternal recurrence of the same” is interpreted in many different ways, but I tend to take it as a call to embrace life to the fullest—whether in sufferings or joy–a call to be a Yes-sayer, not a nay-sayer. In short, rather than take the doctrine in an overly literal way, I see it as an existential challenge to embrace life and to make one’s choices count—keeping front and center that what one chooses will in some sense be one’s eternal destiny (as one of my professors noted (R. Wood), you can think of it (though Nietzsche would hate the comparison) as a kind of a secularized version of heaven or hell.

On whether N’s concepts of night vs. day wisdom affect his rejection of pity—honestly, I’ve never thought about it; it’s a great question. Do you have any thoughts as to how it might tie in to his negative take on pity?