Life as a game and art as a craft in Simonides and Nietzsche: the existence of risk in appearance

Abstract

Simonides of Ceos was a Greek lyric poet whose work is characterized by the attention to the issue of human existence and whose distinction is the view of the poetic exercise as a human activity. Nietzsche had great admiration for Simonides from the years of his intellectual formation, as reveal his correspondence from the sixties. Besides, in his notebooks and in two aphorisms of his published work, the philosopher present interesting reflections on the poet. In one of them, he claims that Simônides advised the Greeks to take life as a game. Such an understanding is a theme approached in this essay. Another theme is the discussion on certain proximity between the conceptions of Simonides and Nietzsche on the art as a craft, derived from their critical dialogue, respectively, with the archaic poetic tradition and the aesthetical and philosophical tradition. The convergence of both on these themes is connected to a common trait: the rooting of human existence in appearance.