Riding the Tiger: Ethics of Resistance in Evola and Nietzsche

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

Introduction

In times of dissolution, when the structures that sustain life crumble, the question of how to act resurfaces with force. Julius Evola, in Ride the Tiger, proposes a figure drawn from Eastern tradition: to ride the tiger—neither to dominate it nor to flee from it, but to remain steady on its back. This image, rich in philosophical connotations, contains a paradoxical ethic: to pass through collapse without being carried away by it.

This article proposes to read that figure as a starting point for exploring two modes of resistance to collapse: Evola’s, anchored in a traditional and cyclical vision of time, and Nietzsche’s, which confronts modernity through a tragic affirmation of meaninglessness. By examining their diagnoses, images, and conceptions of time, we will see how both thinkers conceive an ethics without guarantees—one that can sustain itself in the open air of desolation.

In what follows, we will first examine the symbol of the tiger as a metaphor for chaos and the fall of structures. We will then turn to two figures: Evola’s “watchman of the night” and Nietzsche’s Zarathustra, as ways of traversing the void without hope. Finally, we will compare their conceptions of time: the traditional cycle of decline versus the eternal return without redemption. The goal is not to reconcile them, but to think with them what it means to resist when no firm ground remains.

The Symbol of the Tiger and the Dissolution of Structures

The metaphor that gives Ride the Tiger its title embodies a paradoxical strategy of resistance. “When a cycle of civilization comes to an end,” writes Evola, “it is difficult to achieve any result by resisting or directly opposing the forces in motion. The current is too strong, and one risks being swept away by it.”¹ Against this uncontrollable current, the response is not frontal struggle but inner firmness: not to yield, not to fall, not to dissolve with one’s surroundings.

Nietzsche diagnoses an analogous phenomenon. The death of God leaves humanity without an ultimate reference point. Every value appears relativized. “Are we not straying as through an infinite nothing?” asks the madman in The Gay Science.² What vanishes is not merely a belief but the entire structure that once gave meaning to the world. Both Evola and Nietzsche recognize this loss, yet they diverge sharply in how they face it.

Waiting Without Hope: The Watchman of the Night

This ethic without promise crystallizes in another powerful image: the watchman of the night. Evola takes up a motif from Hugo von Hofmannsthal—those who “have known how to keep watch through the long night,” awaiting a dawn that may never come. In this figure is condensed an ethic of resistance without illusion. It is not about expecting the return of the light, but about remaining awake while all others sleep—without comforting oneself with the idea of a new cycle.

Nietzsche offers a kindred figure in his Zarathustra, who withdraws to the mountains after proclaiming the twilight of the idols. The sage does not preach salvation; his task is to endure the void, to create without guarantees, to make of the abyss a dance. “One must still have chaos in oneself to give birth to a dancing star.”³ Here, the tiger is not only the outer world but also the inner turbulence one must cross to become a creator.

Cyclical Time and Modern Rupture

Evola structures his historical vision upon the doctrine of the four ages: from the Golden Age to the Kali Yuga, the present dark age. The current moment, for him, marks the terminal phase of this descent, where all that is sacred has disappeared. Kali—the goddess of time and destruction—has awakened, unleashing forces that were once restrained by traditional order.⁴

Nietzsche too conceives time from within collapse, but his notion of the eternal return does not imply a restorative cycle; it is a repetition without redemption. The return does not save—it compels one to affirm the instant in its unbearable character. Where Evola sees the possibility of renewal, Nietzsche demands a tragic decision: to love one’s fate (amor fati), even if nothing remains but ruins.

Conclusion

The image of “riding the tiger” can be read, beyond its traditionalist context, as a metaphor of radical resistance in times of collapse. It is about standing firm without nostalgia, without expecting restitution, without yielding to the fall. The tiger is not conquered, but neither are we defeated if we can remain on its back without letting go.

Nietzsche offered an exit without hope: to affirm the world in its absurdity. Evola proposed an inner strategy for traversing the Kali Yuga. Both, in their own ways, invite us to inhabit collapse lucidly—to make of it an ethical site from which to rethink existence. Not to restore what has been lost, but to endure exposure without turning to stone or ashes.

Notes

1. Julius Evola, Ride the Tiger, Ch. 2, “The End of a Cycle.”
2. Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, §125.
3. Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Prologue §5.
4. Julius Evola, Ride the Tiger, ibid.

Bibliography

• Evola, Julius. Ride the Tiger. Trans. Joscelyn Godwin and Constance Fontana. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions, 2003.
• Nietzsche, Friedrich. The Gay Science. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Vintage, 1974.
• Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Trans. Walter Kaufmann. New York: Penguin Classics, 1978.
• Hofmannsthal, Hugo von. The Book of Friends. Trans. Ronald Taylor. London: Pushkin Press, 2016. (Cited by Evola.)