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several old letters and envelopes are stacked on top of each other
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872 - Nietzscheana – Dite Collection
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Estimate €450 - €650
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Description
Nietzscheana – Dite Collection A collection of autographs by Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche (1846–1935), the sister and sole executor of her brother Friedrich Nietzsche’s (1844–1900) estate, dating from 1919 and 1926. Contains a letter dated 30 June 1919 to Bernhard Hempelmann (3 pp.), and a letter to Dr Baumgarten (4 pp.) dated 31 July 1919, each bearing the note ‘dictated’. - A postcard to Bernhard Hempelmann dated 25 June. A thank-you card dated 10 July 1926 marking the 80th birthday of Elisabeth Förster Nietzsche. - Each in its original envelope marked ‘Nietzsche Archive, Weimar’. This lot is subject to standard tax. A 24.95% buyer’s premium is payable on the hammer price, and 7% (Books and Art) or 19% VAT (Manuscripts, Screenprints, Offset Prints, Photographs) is payable on the final invoice amount within the European Union. This lot is subject to the standard tax regime. A 24.95% buyer’s premium applies to the hammer price, and 7% (books and art) or 19% VAT (manuscripts, screen prints, offset prints and photographs) applies to the final invoice amount within the European Union. The card dated 25 June (1919): The card is a printed business card on which Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche lists her name, the Nietzsche Archive, the address Luisenstraße 36 and her visiting hours: ‘Saturdays from 4–6.30 pm at home’. She has addressed Hempelmann by hand at the top: “My dear friends”. She asks whether the plan still stands for the Hempelmanns to visit her on Friday afternoon with their dear guests, thereby doing her a favour. The Friday appointment falls outside her usual Saturday visiting hours and was evidently a personal invitation. The visitor apparently also brought guests with them, whom she is looking forward to meeting. - The letter of 30 June 1919 to Bernhard Hempelmann: The letter begins by thanking him for the visit on Friday. It had “really done her a world of good” and, during the hours they spent together, had pulled her out of her “terrible melancholy”. She then expresses concern as to whether the guests had made it home without getting caught in the rain, and admits that she had been somewhat worried about this. She then regrets not having invited the family to her Saturday reception instead, as it is sometimes “quite amusing” there. She illustrates this with examples. Last Saturday’s gathering had been particularly well attended, as it was the last one before the holidays, when many people go away. Princess Wied of Albania had been very pleasant, as had her entourage. The pianist, Professor Scharwenka, was truly delightful, however, playing Chopin and Liszt so divinely that everyone was deeply moved. Hempelmann’s niece, the ‘charming young lady’, would have enjoyed seeing the archive in the midst of all the social activity. In the final paragraph, she turns to business matters. She asks ‘urgently today’ for his half-yearly invoice, as she wishes to settle her debts and put her financial affairs in order this week. Finally, she sends her regards to Hempelmann’s wife and niece and thanks him for his care. The passage about money shows that Hempelmann supplied her regularly and that the bill was settled every six months. The letter of 31 July 1919: to Dr Baumgarten: This letter is the most intellectually dense. It begins with thanks for two books by Pastor Stützer, which had given her great joy and real comfort. She admits that she had long resisted the gloom over the fate of her homeland, but that all her firm resolutions to shake it off were now of no help. Strangely enough, what helps her most is the memory of Paraguay – or, more precisely, the many difficulties of emigration. The subject is particularly relevant to her at the moment, as many fine young men are now forced to emigrate, given that all prospects for the future have diminished so drastically, particularly amongst the educated classes. Because she is often asked about Paraguay, she frequently finds herself transported back to her time in South America. She read the account of Pastor Stützer’s life with great interest. Whenever she could no longer bear the newspaper reports, she would put the paper aside and reach for the ‘red book’, which always brought to mind experiences very much like her own. The book had brought her many hours of escape from the present, and that meant respite. She then turns to personal matters. She is glad that she was still able to welcome the letter’s addressee and the Hempelmanns when she was fresher and had more strength to overcome these ‘awful times’. Now everything looks bleaker to her with each passing day, and she realises that she is too old to still believe in a better future for Germany. Youthful courage sees things differently, and so she wishes the charming young girl of twenty that joyful faith in the future which makes even the present bearable. At the end, she thanks her once more for the books and praises the excellent Hempelmanns, who continue to look after her in the friendliest possible manner. It does her good to know that good friends are mindful of her household and look after it at the right time, something she herself is not always able to do, as she is overwhelmed with academic work and sometimes forgets things. She will never forget this tender care in difficult times. - Förster-Nietzsche founded the Nietzsche Archive in Naumburg in 1894; it moved to Weimar in 1896. The villa on what was then Luisenstraße – now Humboldtstraße 36 – matches the address on the card. The Archive had a salon-like atmosphere, which fits with the Saturday receptions described in the letters. The Nietzsche Archive Foundation was established in 1908, but Förster-Nietzsche remained, in practice, the final authority. The letters reveal her role in everyday life: she entertained guests, maintained contacts and managed finances. This is consistent with her role as a hostess, as reported by her contemporaries. Her complaint of being ‘overwhelmed by scholarly work’ fits with a period in which the archive, under her leadership, continued to produce editions. The summer of 1919 falls between the end of the war and the Weimar Constitution. Her melancholy over ‘our beloved fatherland’ reflects the mood of many conservatives following the defeat. After 1918, a new wave of success for *Zarathustra* began, which she viewed with suspicion, as she did not want ‘the wrong people’ to invoke Nietzsche. In 1919–20, she joined the German National Party, and Oswald Spengler became a member of the foundation’s board. Her letter of 31 July contains no political statements, only a general lament about the times. The reference to Paraguay has biographical roots. She emigrated with her husband Bernhard Förster in 1886, moved to Nueva Germania in 1888 and returned in 1893. The fact that she was often asked about Paraguay in 1919 and read literature on emigration fits with the state of affairs at the time, about which she writes in the letter.
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About the sale Valuable books, prints, historical photographs
Auction location
Auction time 10/24/2026 at 10:00 AM
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