Nietzsche Archive
The Nietzsche-Archiv, also known as the Nietzsche Archive, was the first organization that dedicated itself to archive and document the life and work of the philosopher Frederich Nietzsche.
The Nietzsche Archive was founded in 1894 in Naumburg, Germany, and found a permanent location at Weimar. Its history links to the middle of the 20th century with its foundress and chief for many years, Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, who was the philosopher's sister. Although from the beginning it has been exposed to partially violent critiscism, the archives, to the end of the Second World War, could hold themselves as a central place of the Nietzsche Reception in Germany. In the GDR it was affiliated with the Nationale Forschungs- und Gedenkstätten der klassischen deutschen literatur in Weimar (national research and memorial place of the classical German literature in Weimar), and formally dissolved in 1956. Its holdings were made accessible for western researchers, most notably Mazzino Montinari, who replaced the dubious old Archiv's Nietzsche editions with new ones. In the GDR, however, Nietzsche was still a forbidden author, with all of his works being banned.
Since German reunification, the archive's holdings are in possession of the Stiftung Weimarer Klassik, now called Klassik Stiftung Weimar. The archive's domicile, the Villa Silberblick, is now a museum.
History
The Archive's Objectives
Elisabeth Förster planned the establishment of a Nietzsche Archive after returning to Germany from Paraguay in the Fall of 1893. The purpose of the archive was to collect resources to keep them from being scattered and to secure a monopoly over their value—not unusual at that time.
From the beginning of the 1890s, the reception of Nietzsche's works in the German-speaking world grew enourmously. The Nietzche Archive attempted to attain the legal rights of interpretation of Friedrich Nietzche and his philosophies in public discussions. Not only did Elisabith Förster-Nietzsche's biographies serve these discussions, but also a multitude of journals and newspaper articles which came from the archive and the surrounding areas. Förster-Nietzsche had already collected documents from her admired brother since her youth and then began to buy up all of his mail correspondences for a substantial sum. These letters were therefore also published directly and indirectly by the archive alongside Nietzsche's works. Another reason for the publishing frenzy from the archive and its monopolization of Nietzsche's work might also have been to earn large profits from them.