Moreover, the author's being alive harms him, if he is a distinguished man and many things are discovered about him: for everyone is obliged to exchange the author for his work. What the book actually contains in itself - wisdom, sweetness and gilded brilliance - can only develop with the passing of years, with the care of a reverence that grows, ages and finally fades. Many hours must be spent on it, many spiders must weave their webs over it. Good readers make a book better and better, while good opponents make it famous.
Every good book is written for a certain reader and his type, and for this very reason it is considered weak by the rest of the readers, the vast majority: for whom its fame rests on a limited basis and can only be built up slowly. The mediocre and bad book is such precisely because it seeks to please, and even pleases, the majority.
Nietzsche set out these ten rules in a series of letters, between August 8 and 24, 1882, sent to Lou Andreas-Salomé:
1-As a first necessity of life, an author's style must be lively;
2-The style must suit the type of person to whom the work is addressed;
3-Writing is pure imitation: before putting anything out there, the writer must be very clear about what he wants to communicate and how he wants to present it;
5-The wealth hidden in the details is the key: the writer must learn to capture and perceive everything: from long and redundant phrases to punctuation, the choice of certain words, pauses, and sequences of arguments;
6-Be careful with excessively long periods: only those who can hold their breath for a long time can endure them. Most people need dry and short phrases;
8-The more abstract a truth you want to convey, the more you will need to convince your listeners to perceive the meaning of your idea;
10-It is polite and thoughtful behavior to allow the reader to make observations and develop his own judgment regarding what has been written by the author; it is always better to leave the reader the opportunity to discover what the quintessence of human wisdom consists of. /konica.al