The REAL Monolith

In Nietzsche sprech a Monolith is a "block of rock" that serves to INSPIRE one to see a PATH [as in Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven] that ENABLES the viewer to "Morph" to a higher level of understanding of [to use Col Kurtz's words] "seeing clearly what has to be done, without judgment but using primordial instincts".

Nietzsche uses a character called Zarathustra [from Persian times] to take such a journey [and do a spot of spreching], BUT to get the ball rolling Nietzsche himself needed to be inspired, and that happened in 1880s on a holiday in Switzerland where he looked up from Lake Silvaplana to a pyramid shaped rock and got his inspiration on the spot.

He wrote his book about Zarathustra's journey of discovery at that time and 10 years later Strauss [or one of them] "put it to music".

In 1968 this movie used the Monolith concept to inspire, inter alia, Apes to "improve their lot" - by violence if need be, and also used the "sunrise" movement of the music to make it all "dramatic and mysterious" [and as esoteric as possible so the movie would be considered "gay" - but not the meaning pronked in 1980 to launder the word faggot, rather the Gay Science meaning of the 1800s].

OK, I have gone back to these roots ["rowts" in American, as root means sex and Americans are not allowed to think of sex, as Zarathustra might do - I will return to that!] and combined the original Monolith with the music - please ENJOY.

This video and GoogleEarth photo below are taken from 12,000 feet, whereas Nietzsche was in the lower right of the photo in Surlej, so was looking up at the Monolith some 4,000 feet above, meaning it would have been far more "inspiring".