There Are No Facts Only Interpretations

From Nietzsche's unpublished notebooks, written in spring 1887 (Nachlass fragment NL 7[60], Kritische Studienausgabe Vol. 12, p. 315). The full passage begins: "Against positivism, which halts at phenomena — 'There are only facts' — I would say: No, facts is precisely what there is not, only interpretations." It became widely known through its inclusion as §481 in The Will to Power, a posthumous anthology assembled by his sister Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, which is not considered an authoritative text. The fragment expresses Nietzsche's doctrine of perspectivism: all knowledge is conditioned by the knower's perspective, not a neutral record of objective facts.