Rereid of the Darkness that Comes Before Part 0

Rereid of Prince of Nothing Trilogy

Book 1: The Darkness that Comes Before

by R. Scott Bakker

A few years back, I was in the Borders at the SeaTac airport killing time before my flight. While browsing the fantasy section the Darkness that Comes Before caught my eye. I read the description on the back with talk of apocalyptic past and a gathering crusade. Of a mysterious traveler named Anasûrimbor Kellhus. I was hooked. I bought the book on the spot and devoured it on my trip. The Prince of Nothing Trilogy and its sequel the Aspect Emperor Trilogy. Together these two series plus a third as yet written series form the greater Second Apocalypse series.

With the third book of the Aspect Emperor Trilogy, the Unholy Consult, release approaching I felt the need to reread the series in preparation. I don't know how often I will post these rereads but my goal is one post a week.

So without further ado, let's dive into the Darkness that Comes Before.

Bakker opens the book with a quote. Not a fictitious quote from his own setting, but a Quote of the German philosopher Nietzsche.

“I shall never tire of underlining a concise little fact which those superstitious people are loath to admit—namely, that a though comes when 'it' wants, not when 'I' want...”

—Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

My Thoughts

Philosophy is a large part of the Second Apocalypse and Bakker starting the series with a quote of Nietzsche informs us of some the themes he explores in the series. Nietzsche was an atheist that promoted the philosophy that without God there is no moral authority upon man. Nietzsche believed that ideas like “self-consciousness,” “knowledge,” “truth,” and “free will” were inventions of moral consciousness. Nietzsche believed the “will to power” explains all human behavior.

According to Nietzsche, the will to power explains human ambition, the drive to succeed, and reaching the highest position in life. In Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche writes, "Even the body within which individuals treat each other as equals ... will have to be an incarnate will to power, it will strive to grow, spread, seize, become predominant — not from any morality or immorality but because it is living and because life simply is will to power."

The quote that Bakker states that we human have no control over the origin of our thoughts. This idea is directly related to the title of the book and one of the overarching themes of the series: the Illusion of Free Will.