Love is murder

Nietzsche:

Man has created woman —out of what? Out of a rib of his god —of his “ideal”… [Twilight of the Idols, “Preface,” 1889, sec. 13. (Kaufmann trans.).]

Cf. Weininger:

The real psychology of the loved woman is always a matter of indifference. In the moment when a man loves a woman, he neither understands her nor wishes to understand her, although understanding is the only moral basis {249} of association in mankind. A human being cannot love another that he fully understands, because he would then necessarily see the imperfections which are an inevitable part of the human individual, and love can attach itself only to perfection. Love of a woman is possible only when it does not consider her real qualities, and so is able to replace the actual psychical reality by a different and quite imaginary reality. The attempt to realise one’s ideal in a woman, instead of the woman herself, is a necessary destruction of the empirical personality of the woman. And so the attempt is cruel to the woman; it is the egoism of love that disregards the woman, and cares nothing for her real inner life. [Sex & Character, 1903, (Heinemann edition., 1906, par. 678).]

In the next paragraph, he announces: “Love is murder”. (Of course, she does not see love this way. Except in so far as she is swept away by the passion of being a victim. But that experience only highlights the difference.)

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