Philosophy Books (1 Viewer)

[absolution*]

Does anyone else find Nietzsche in particular really difficult to read?

 

[loquasagacious]

The first book of his I read was Beyond Good and Evil - and it was a pig to get through the first part but I adjusted quickly to his style/got into philosophical thinking mode and then it was alright and a pretty good read ultimately.

The key is wide reading, get an overview eg The Philosophers read it and then select some works by philosophers you like the sound of - read them. Then select some from thsoe youd dont like - read them as well.

If you're doing this for uni you might want to keep a log for each philosopher to write good quotes from them an outline of their ideas and your reactions to them. If nothing else it could be interesting reading in ten-twenty years to see how you've changed.

 

[Kierkegaard]

Nietzsche is easy, but I suppose it's all relative. Try reading Hegel and then move to Nietzsche. Never again will you find Nietzsche difficult.

Good luck with the Nietzsche reading, but I do advise that you never tell a lecturer about your Nietzsche reading. Teenagers reading Nietzsche just pisses them off--'Thus spake Zarathustra' is the intellectual equivalent to 'Like a Virgin'.

 

[absolution*]

That said, we all have to start somewhere.

 

[Kierkegaard]

Start at Descartes--he wrote comedy. :uhhuh: Well, at least I find his meditations funny.

When I say that it's the intellectual equivalent to 'Like a Virgin', that's not my personal opinion.

 

[phatic]

Yeah, same, once I got into Nietzsche I found it a lot easier... It was hard at first though. Especially since the first book of his I read was The Birth of Tragedy...

From what I've heard of Zarathustra, it's like a philosophical work posing as a novel... And I'd imagine it doesn't have all the characteristics of a quality novel, hence being poor intellectual material...? I should probably just read it.

 

[Xeno]

Nietzsche

Kierkegaard - whose opinion is it (reading Zarathustra is equivalent to like a Virgin) ?

Perhaps Hegel is so hard that it makes Nietzsche easy by comparison - I haven't read Hegel so I wouldn't know...

but is there not another issue surfacing here? at what level do we try and read these books? I mean, do you assume that every little thing in Thus Spoke Zarathustra means something - as opposed to something like Sophie's World; I suspect that if you read between the lines in Sophie's World you would not end up with a meaning that could be described as genuinely esoteric. Of course, I think if you read Zarathustra critically enough and for long enough you would find an esoteric meaning...

Nietzsche said (preface to Daybreak I'm told):

"A book like this, a problem like this, is in no hurry; we both, I just as much as my book, are friends of lento. It is not for nothing that I have been a philologist, perhaps I am a philologist still, that is to say, A TEACHER OF SLOW READING:- in the end I also write slowly. Nowadays it is not only my habit, it is also to my taste - a malicious taste, perhaps? - no longer to write anything which does not reduce to despair every sort of man who is 'in a hurry'.... "

 

[Cyan_phoeniX]

go to maq uni and buy the phil131 textbook. it has a collection of works from philosophers. They are all interesting and if you like one in particular then you can find the full text.

 

[bLu3_gRaSS]

Understanding the Present, Bryan Appleyard... very good book. Also to an extent:

1984, George Orwell

The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood

very simple language and ur looking more @ Dune.

I read The Handmaid's Tale a while ago but i don't really understand why Fred treats Ofred the way he does.