/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.7232132]

Which is better Durant or Magee's story of philosophy?

[Anonymous No.7232853]

Reps for Repin!

[Anonymous No.7232876]

>>7232132
/lit/ sure is a bit more shit than normal tonight.

[Anonymous No.7232881]

>>7232876
answer my question

[Anonymous No.7232894]

>>7232876
All the good posters either left or are READING.

Read some samples and some reviews, OP.

[Anonymous No.7232898]

>>7232132
Haven't read Magee, but Durant had a witty style without being overbearing or tedious, and his sections were fairly well apportioned, in that each major philosopher got about the same degree of attention (60-65 pages).

Obviously only cursory investigations into only the main works of these guys, but the biographical and contextual social/political backdrops were helpful and interesting, although Durant may have been a bit too keen on letting those affect his presentation of the works in question (e.g., questioning all of Schopenhauer's cynicism because he never experienced love).

It's definitely a story of philosophy (as the name suggests) rather than a survey of it; people are included/left on based not on how interesting/insightful their philosophies were, but on their contribution as a stepping stone to philosophy as a whole, e.g., ~60 pages on Francis Bacon largely because he called for a more rigorous approach to philosophy (while not really getting around to trying to accomplish it, himself), but no mention of Kierkegaard, and Stirner is mentioned in literally one sentence.

Would recommend just to get the general vibe for western philosophy, and to spark further interest in it, but obviously not to really investigate any of the philosophers in question. It's a cool introduction to a lot of big names, and is very fun if you don't know anything about them already; I never really knew anything about Voltaire until this book, and ended up crying when reading about his death.

[Anonymous No.7232929]

>>7232132
Not familiar with Magee, but I've read Durant's book. Very well written, fun to read, and absolute shit in the analysis of the philosophers. He pretty much gets every single one of them wrong, and in only a few cases is it really a matter of quibbling. His worst, as I recall, were his takes on Plato, Spinoza, Hegel, and Nietzsche, where he fundamentally fails to even approach understanding any of them (though he adores Spinoza).

Pretty much everything is determined from a social democrat's point of view, which is fine, but it's terrible if you ever want to grasp the philosophers.

If you're not using it to learn about philosophy, it's very fun, but that's really it.

[Anonymous No.7232963]

>>7232929
>>7232898
Do either of you know of any better alternatives? If you do i would very much appreciate it if you shared.

[Anonymous No.7232999]

>>7232963
Honestly I don't think there are any "good" options out there. Every historian will have his own bias, and apparently Russell's "history of western philosophy" is even more tendentious than Durant's text.

I would recommend Durant as a biographical intro, and then the Basic Writings series for whichever philosophers you care about. You're not going to get a pure account of philosophical texts unless you read the texts themselves. Although obviously the ideal would be to read everything by a philosopher you care about, it's still a great start to read 1-2 major works in full instead of just reading outlines. You won't get the full picture, but you'll at least be able to form your own conclusions about a general theme in the philosopher's work (Plato's Republic, Aristote's Nicomachean Ethics, Spinoza's Ethics, Kant's Critique, Schopenhauer's Will).

[Anonymous No.7233008]

>>7232963
As I said above, I'm not familiar with Magee, so I'd have to defer to anyone who is as to his quality; that said, I do like Copleston's multi-volume History of Western Philosophy very much. It provides historical context and some biographical details when necessary, but what's better is that Copleston actually bothers to try to understand the philosophers he's going over, even when he disagrees with them. He tries to cover the essentials of each philosopher without simplifying them, and yet he doesn't settle for just letting hard thinkers remain obscure.