Nietzsche published this book in 1882, still relatively healthy, still capable of joy, and it shows. This is the book where God is dead, where the eternal return is first announced, where Nietzsche finds reasons for laughter in the midst of his terrible diagnoses. The aphoristic style is at its most playful, the range of topics inexhaustible. It is the most accessible of his major works, the one that best captures his ability to think against himself, to dance on the edge of the abyss he had discovered.