The overman will be a free spirit. What does Nietzsche mean by "free
spirit"? It's not what we might call "free-thinkers" or "bohemians." The notion is more substantive than this. In order to see what the free spirit is, we should ask what the free spirit is free of. The free spirit is free of convention and tradition. He will not consent to
anything simply because "this is how it's been done." He will think ""differently from what, on the basis of his origin, environment, his class and profession, or on the basis of the dominant views of the age, would been have expected of him." (Human, All Too Human, 225) The "fettered spirit," on the other hand, will do things because of habit or tradition. (HH 226) Consider some of the street-level characters in The Wire. Why do they
enter and stay in the drug business? Avon, for example, has been in the game for most of his life. His father was a well-known and hardened criminal figure of Baltimore. His sister, Brianna, is involved in the drug trade. His nephew, D'Angelo, is one of his lieutenants early on. The family business is crime. Avon is in the game because this is what was expected of him. Reputation too is a key element of Avon's chosen way of life. This explains why Stringer, who makes several investments that make Avon and himself wealthy enough to leave the game, isn't able to lure Avon away. "This ain't about your business class," he tells Stringer. "The street is the street … always." ("Port in a Storm," Season 2) He likes the warlike nature of owning corners, and it's clear that he's been taught to like it by those who raised him. He's doing what is "expected of him." Contrast Avon's being in the drug business with Marlo's. We get very
little background information about Marlo, but we can ultimately see that he is in the game not because it's what is expected of him, but because he chooses this life. When he learns that he must retire, after he receives the stet (an inactivation of the charges against him, which would disappear after a year), he pretends that he's ready to do this. He sells his connect to the Greek and is prepared to invest his money. Yet, as he rubs elbows with movers and shakers at a party, he eventually ducks out, finding his way to a corner where he provokes one of the dealers into a fight. He gets knifed in the altercation—a cut on his forearm—and as he touches and tastes the blood, smiling, we can see the thrill being in the game gives him. This is why he lives. Most people are fettered spirits. Marlo is only relatively freer than Avon,
but not a free spirit. Fettered spirits will take up positions or roles based on what their parents and friends do, while the free spirit will be a "contradiction to his today" (Beyond Good and Evil, 212). He will seem out of place, distant, and he will feel this distance—experiencing what Nietzsche calls "pathos of distance"—and embrace it. Thus, he will be free of the almost universal need to belong.The free spirit will observe the world from a height, as if he is not really a
part of it. More than anything, he will not be invested in what happens to him. This is why Marlo isn't a free spirit. The free spirit will learn to love fate and necessity—amor fati—and eventually come to assent to every single thing that happens in his life—good and bad. Even more than assenting, he will eventually affirm life to such an extent that if he had the power, he would will that every event in his life should occur—and re-occur—eternally. The free spirit will be in, but not of, the world. This will ensure that he
won't remain "stuck" to any particular person, a country, pity or compassion, science, or even one's own detachment or virtues. This freedom is almost absolute—freedom from excessive attachment to other persons, events, and even oneself.
Is Omar a free spirit? When Omar leaves Baltimore in order to let things cool down with Avon,
McNulty tells him at the bus station, "Go easy, Omar. … Stay free." ("The Cost," Season 1) McNulty is probably referring to Omar's freedom from arrest, but we can also ask whether he is free in Nietzsche's sense. He is certainly freer than most of the other characters of the show. For example, we are struck by his apparent rootlessness. When asked under oath where he lives, he responds, "No place in particular." When he is further pressed as to whether this means that he is homeless, he says, "In the wind, so to speak." ("All Prologue," Season 2) We never see any permanent abode for Omar, only temporary hideouts. Even his apartment in Puerto Rico, after he has gone into retirement, is more like a resting place, good for the time being, but not permanent. He displays no strong attachment to money or material goods. Having
amassed a tidy sum as a result of robbing dealers for years, he could live more comfortably. Wealth is only secondary, however, to the imposition of his own will on the players of the street. Sometimes we see just how much power he wields.
On a Honey Nut Cheerios run, clad only in silken pajamas, and not
packing a gun, he pauses on the way back and leans against a building to smoke a Newport. From out of nowhere a bag falls beside him with a thud. Those hiding inside the building know that Omar is outside and assume he is about come in, shotgun blazing, and have dropped their stash in the hopes that he won't.
When he gets back, he throws the bag on the kitchen table and tells
Renaldo, his partner, that he doesn't even want the loot. "It ain't what you taking," he says, "it's who you taking it from, you feel me?" Renaldo shakes his head. Omar thinks a moment, then says, "How you expect to run with wolves come night when you spend the day sporting with puppies?" ("Home Rooms," Season 4) Omar does have sexual attachments, but these can be relatively
superficial. He has three boyfriends within the time period of the show: Brandon, Dante, and Renaldo. It can't be denied, however, that he is more than sexually attached to Brandon. For example, when he views Brandon's body in the morgue, after
Brandon had been tortured and killed, his scream fills the halls. The depth of feeling in that scream is unmistakable—he loved Brandon. His attachment was deeper than mere sexual attraction. He spends a lot of time avenging Brandon's death—not just Brandon's being killed, but how he was killed. At the same time, however, he also seems to have learned a lesson about attachment, for later he has no problem in dropping Dante after learning that Dante had given him up to Brother Mouzone. And he seems interested in little more than Renaldo's physical beauty.
Omar seems to be in a process of transformation, an evolution from being
someone "stuck to" certain things in life to being a free spirit. As such processes go, however, it consists of progression and regression, advance and backslide. When one of his partners in crime, Tosha, dies, he is clearly upset. But there is a moment, when he presses a lit cigarette into his palm, when he seems to be saying, "No more. I can't feel like this anymore." From that point on, accomplices are accomplices only. Of course, Omar's detachment is stretched to its limit when Butchie is
murdered by Chris and Snoop. When Omar hears about it, his eyes well up. He loved Butchie, the blind father-figure. Ultimately, his love for Butchie seals Omar's fate. Omar ends up being fettered, but only after a period in which he was a free spirit. Had he lived, he would have likely freed himself again.