This essay René Girard: The Last Nietzschean brings tears to my eyes while reading, not so much for the content, but because of a private hypothesis I developed while independently thinking about René Girard and Nietzsche. This essay explores that relationship in enough detail to confirm the theory.
Rene Girard spent a lot of time, an enormous amount of time, thinking and writing about Nietzsche. And he did it because Nietzsche came so close to the truth which Girard eventually discovered (scapegoat theory). His relationship with Neitzsche on the surface looks like complete polarized opposition. But it is not. Girard is like a son who loves his father even though his father is a criminal who has been a bad model for him, giving him a wretched inheritance which must be overcome, not enjoyed. Nevertheless, the son still loves his father, and in his mind salvages his father from his own weaknesses.
In short, what I see, as a Christian, is this: Rene Girard had the spirit of Christ operating within him, seeking to alleviate Nietzsche's pain. He knows that Nietzsche got nearly everything right, except the way he interpreted the victim=victor aspect of Christianity. He boldly states that the cognitive dissonance from a negative interpretation of that specific aspect is what drove Nietzsche insane. But he means this with compassion, not rejection, as most people do when they say someone else is insane. Girard's positive interpretation of that same aspect (victim=victor) replaces Nietzsche's negative opinion. This ironically reveals the victory of Christ right where Nietzsche tried to suppress him. Because it's such a deep point about the nature of Christianity, this interpretation also enables Girard to love Nietzsche and spend years seeking to exonerate him from his own prison of insanity. If you believe in an afterlife, where Nietzsche has learned the full truth of everything and is yearning to be free from the constraints he placed upon himself while in this life, you can see Neitzsche cheering for Girard's interpretation.
The tenderness and diligence with which Girard approaches this labor brings tears to my eyes. The essay is also well written. Note that I am not alone in seeing this side of Girard. Linked here: Saved from salvation : Friedrich Nietzsche in the work of René Girard is another essay that goes into this intellectual relationship along these lines. But I am pleased that at least I realized it independently, before finding it in other's works.