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Who really said it

If we have our own why in life, we shall get along with almost any how

Written by Friedrich Nietzsche 1844–1900 · German philosopher & philologist
Verified In copyright

From Twilight of the Idols (Götzen-Dämmerung, 1889), “Maxims and Arrows,” aphorism 12: “Hat man sein warum? des Lebens, so verträgt man sich fast mit jedem wie?” The familiar English wording is Walter Kaufmann’s translation in The Portable Nietzsche — which actually reads “why of life”; the widely shared form swaps in “why in life.”

Last verified 10 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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“If we have our own why in life, we shall get along with almost any how” Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols (1889), "Maxims and Arrows," 12; trans. Walter Kaufmann.

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Still under copyright (rights held by Walter Kaufmann translation — Viking Press / Penguin Random House). A short, credited quote is generally fine for talks, teaching, and internal decks; for commercial, published, or large-scale reuse, get permission.

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Provenance

The source

Work
Twilight of the Idols (Götzen-Dämmerung)
Section
“Maxims and Arrows,” aphorism 12
First published
1889 (written 1888), in German
Translation
English wording follows Walter Kaufmann, The Portable Nietzsche (1954)

Hat man sein warum? des Lebens, so verträgt man sich fast mit jedem wie? — Der Mensch strebt nicht nach Glück; nur der Engländer thut das.

The German original, from “Sprüche und Pfeile” (Maxims and Arrows), 12. Kaufmann renders the first sentence “If we have our own why of life, we shall get along with almost any how.”

Quote Investigator: the ‘why’ and ‘how’ investigation

How we traced it

In copyright

Nietzsche’s German original (1889) is long in the public domain. But the exact English wording shown here traces to Walter Kaufmann’s translation in The Portable Nietzsche (first published 1954), which remains in copyright. The public-domain Victorian translations (Thomas Common, 1896; Anthony Ludovici, 1911) use markedly different phrasing, so the modern “why … almost any how” form is not itself public domain.

Fact-check

The mix-ups

This one is correctly credited to Nietzsche — the usual confusion is over who made it famous and exactly how it’s worded.

Viktor Frankl popularizer, not author

Frankl quoted the line twice in Man’s Search for Meaning (1946) and it became inseparable from his work, so many now cite it as “Frankl’s.” But Frankl named Nietzsche as the source ↗ both times.

“in life” vs. “of life” drifted variant

The most-shared form says “our own why in life,” but Kaufmann’s published translation reads “our own why of life.” Both render the same German line from Maxims and Arrows, 12 ↗.

The thought and the source are genuinely Nietzsche’s — Twilight of the Idols, 1889 — and the polished English wording is Walter Kaufmann’s translation ↗.

Context

Why it resonates

Nietzsche buried the line in a rapid-fire list of maxims, but it carries one of his most portable ideas: that meaning (“why”) makes suffering and circumstance (“how”) bearable. Half a century later, Viktor Frankl — a psychiatrist who survived the Nazi camps — made it the emotional spine of Man’s Search for Meaning, which is why the two names are now so often linked.

He who has a why can bear almost any how.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Purpose

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Quote Investigator: ‘Why’ and ‘How’quoteinvestigator.com

The authoritative investigation: German original, four English translators, and Frankl’s role.
Twilight of the Idols — Wikiquoteen.wikiquote.org

Sourced quotations from the work, including the German and English of “Maxims and Arrows,” 12.
Twilight of the Idols — Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org

Background on the 1889 work and its “Maxims and Arrows” opening section.
Twilight of the Idols (full text)theanarchistlibrary.org

Complete English text of the work for reading the aphorism in context.
Friedrich Nietzsche — Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org

Biography of the author and overview of his works.

The author

About Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche

1844–1900 · German philosopher & philologist

Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher whose work on morality, nihilism, and the will to power reshaped modern thought. Twilight of the Idols, written in 1888 and published in 1889, was one of his last works before his mental collapse; its opening “Maxims and Arrows” is a string of aphorisms, including the one about the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ of life.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source — Chicago

Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols (1889), “Maxims and Arrows,” 12; trans. Walter Kaufmann, The Portable Nietzsche (New York: Viking, 1954).

MLA (9th ed.)

Nietzsche, Friedrich. Twilight of the Idols. Translated by Walter Kaufmann, The Portable Nietzsche, Viking, 1954, “Maxims and Arrows,” no. 12.

APA (7th ed.)

Nietzsche, F. (1954). The portable Nietzsche (W. Kaufmann, Trans.). Viking. (Original work published 1889)

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