The purpose of this paper is not just to record my opinion but to elaborate on one of Danto’s most compelling points. Before I pursue that end, I would like to briefly frame the context of Arthur Danto’s work and his interpretive relationship with Nietzsche’s philosophical output. Danto’s reading of Nietzsche was not casual. It was detailed, incisive, and deeply rooted in a respect for the complexity of Nietzsche’s thought. Yet, it also sought to render Nietzsche accessible—structured even—within the framework of analytic philosophy.
In Nietzsche as Philosopher, Danto presents a systematic vision of Nietzsche’s project, arguing against the popular portrayal of Nietzsche as an aphoristic writer of literary fragments with no coherent system. Instead, Danto traces patterns, principles, and even philosophical architecture beneath Nietzsche’s poetic chaos. One of the most profound contributions Danto makes in this regard is his interpretation of the will to power—not merely as a psychological or political principle, but as a metaphysical substrate for Nietzsche’s vision of existence.
It is this point I wish to elaborate on.
The Will to Power as a Metaphysical Principle
Danto insists that the will to power operates as a unifying principle across Nietzsche’s corpus, one that binds his moral critique, his epistemology, and even his aesthetic theory. Unlike some interpreters who reduce it to a base assertion of domination or self-interest, Danto reads will to power as a dynamic process that defines becoming itself. All entities, all actions, all interpretations—are not driven by a desire to exist, but a desire to assert, expand, and impose form.
This interpretation gives us a richer framework through which to engage Nietzsche’s broader philosophical method. Rather than isolating will to power to Nietzsche’s later notebooks or reading it through a purely posthumous lens (as the editors of The Will to Power volume did), Danto traces it through earlier works like Beyond Good and Evil and The Gay Science. He reveals a continuity in Nietzsche’s concern with force, structure, resistance, and transformation.
Elaboration: Will to Power as an Epistemological Force
Where I wish to press further is in Danto’s subtle but undeveloped suggestion: that the will to power can also be read as an epistemological force—one that does not simply motivate human knowledge-seeking but shapes the very categories of what can be known.
Nietzsche repeatedly challenges the idea of neutral knowledge or pure objectivity. In On the Genealogy of Morals, he warns us that truths are illusions “which we have forgotten are illusions.” This is not a declaration of relativism for its own sake but a demand that we recognize the active role of interpretation—the power dynamics involved in how categories are constructed and sustained.
Danto acknowledges this in part, noting Nietzsche’s perspectivism, but does not fully explore how will to power might underwrite this process. What if our very perception of “truth” is itself a product of competing wills to power? What if scientific method, logic, and language are merely structures that have successfully imposed their interpretation of reality by overpowering alternative modalities?
This opens an avenue for merging Nietzsche’s work with post-structuralist thought, but more importantly, it preserves Nietzsche’s originality by grounding it in a metaphysical drive rather than mere historical contingency. If all knowledge is interpretation, and all interpretation is a form of power, then the act of knowing is an act of willing powerfully—of attempting to shape the world by naming it.
The Ethical Implication
Danto approaches Nietzsche’s ethics with caution, wary of distorting the philosopher’s rejection of traditional moral values. But reading will to power as epistemological has ethical consequences. It places responsibility not just on what we value, but how we construct the frameworks through which values emerge. It suggests that domination does not only occur in acts of war or oppression, but also in the quiet arrangement of syllogisms and the structure of academic discourse.
Nietzsche’s critique of morality is not a call for chaos, but a call for accountability. If we are creators of value—if all knowledge and moral systems are forms we have projected onto chaos—then we are responsible for the outcomes of our interpretations. This includes the systems we uphold, the truths we defend, and the exclusions we accept.
Closing Thoughts
Danto’s contribution to Nietzsche scholarship is immeasurable. He rescued Nietzsche from misreadings that cast him as a brilliant but fragmented thinker. In offering Nietzsche as a philosopher in the truest sense—a rigorous thinker with systemic ambitions—Danto reshaped the academic conversation.
But some of Danto’s suggestions, like the one regarding will to power as a metaphysical or epistemological force, deserve deeper reflection. In pushing further down this path, we discover a Nietzsche who is not just critiquing systems but exposing the power moves behind their construction. This reading not only preserves Nietzsche’s brilliance but amplifies it—showing us a thinker who wasn’t merely ahead of his time, but possibly outside of it altogether.