Sakhnevich S.V. Language as Illness and Therapy: Nietzsche and Wittgenstein Through the Lens of the Paratext
DOI: https://doi.org/10.15688/lp.jvolsu.2026.1.7
Sergey V. Sakhnevich
Candidate of Sciences (Philology), Associate Professor, Department of Linguistics, Institute of Business Career
Nizhegorodskaya St, 32, Bld. 4, 109029 Moscow, Russian Federation
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https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2068-9250
Abstract. A comparative analysis of the philosophical systems of Friedrich Nietzsche and Ludwig Wittgenstein at the level of their canonical, “system-forming” texts reveals an apparently unbridgeable gap: the irrationalist, aphoristic pathos of the former is radically opposed to the analytical rigor and logical purism of the latter. However, this study, drawing on Gérard Genette’s theory of the paratext, demonstrates that behind this obvious doctrinal opposition lies a profound unity of their fundamental philosophical intentions. Shifting the research focus from the central textual core to the paratextual periphery – prefaces, drafts, diary entries, epistolary heritage, and the very aphoristic forms – makes it possible to reconstruct a common existential and methodological stance shared by both thinkers. The analysis shows that, despite the radical difference in methodological paths (Nietzsche’s concept of language as the “breath of the body” and an affective discharge of the “will to power” is contrasted with Wittgenstein’s theory of “language games” and meaning as use), their projects converge in a paradoxical yet fundamental conclusion: language is not a representation of objective reality but an instrument of practice, rooted in pre-linguistic, lived experience. The paratexts of both philosophers reveal a striking similarity in lexico-metaphorical complexes, uncovering a shared philosophical ethos: an understanding of philosophy as a therapeutic activity aimed at healing thinking from illusions generated by the grammar of language itself; intellectual asceticism and a conscious refusal of “the help of the rabble” in favor of an elitist, highly personalized practice of inquiry; and an intuitive preference for fragmentary, non-systemic, provocative forms of expression over totalizing metaphysical constructs. Thus, paratextual analysis serves as an effective methodological key for reconstructing the hidden but substantial kinship between the projects of Nietzsche and Wittgenstein, who ultimately appear not as antagonists but as creators of two different yet similarly directed modes of language criticism, united by a single ultimate goal: its clarification, the “untying of knots”, and therapeutic overcoming.
Key words: main text, paratext as a methodological key, paratextual periphery, priority of fragmentation, resistance to trivialization.
Citation. Sakhnevich S.V. Language as Illness and Therapy: Nietzsche and Wittgenstein Through the Lens of the Paratext. Logos et Praxis, 2026, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 70-83. (in Russian). DOI: https://doi.org/10.15688/lp.jvolsu.2026.1.7
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