December 1888 - Januar 1889 25 [1-21]
25 [4]
petits faits vrai
Fromentin [Eugène Fromentin (1820-1876): French painter and writer. The "petits faits vrai" (small true facts) are the basis of Stendhal's dictum for accurate fiction. For a similar notion in Fromentin, see Nietzsche's copy of Les maitres d'autrefois: Belgique-Hollande. Paris: Plon, 1882, 197: "C'est toujours le cours régulier des choses que rien ne dérange, et le fond permanent des petits faits journaliers avec lesquels on a tant de plaisir a composer de bons tableaux." (It is always the regular course of things that nothing deranges, and a permanent foundation of small daily facts with which they take so much delight in composing their excellent pictures.) See "New Sources of Nietzsche's Reading: Eugène Fromentin." In: Nietzsche's Library.]
De Vogüé [Eugène-Melchior de Vogüé (1848-1910): French diplomat, writer and author of Le roman russe. Paris: Plon, 1886. Vogüé served in the French diplomatic corps, stationed at the French embassy in St. Petersburg, where he met Fyodor Dostoevsky. His book served to introduce Dostoevsky's works to the world, calling him (267) a "psychologue incomparable" (incomparable psychologist). In his chapter on Gogol, Vogüé also refers (114f.) to the "petits faits vrai" mentioned in Gogol's Letters on Dead Souls. See "New Sources of Nietzsche's Reading: Eugène-Melchior de Vogüé." In: Nietzsche's Library.]