Product Description

Philosophy is a subject that influences many aspects of our lives and our understanding of our experiences yet it can seem dauntingly inaccessible. Unrivalled in its clarity and insight The Story of Philosophy guides us expertly through the history of ideas and thinking. History of Western philosophyProfessor Bryan Magee traces over 2 500 years of Western philosophy from the Ancient Greeks to modern thinkers. His deep appreciation of the subject and grasp of its complexities have enabled him to produce a book accessible to the general reader yet substantial enough for the more experienced student. What is philosophy? Philosophers have questioned the fundamental principles underlying all knowledge and existence. Among the important philosophical issues that The Story of Philosophy addresses are questions such as "What is being?" and "Can the existence of God be proved?" Covering every major philosopher from Plato to Popper via Saint Augustine Locke and Nietzsche Bryan Magee opens up the world of ideas in a way that is easily understood by everyone. Additional background information puts the philosophers in historical context with the influences that shaped their lives and work.Comprehensive highly visual and filled with penetrating observations The Story of Philosophy is the essential guide to this fascinating subject.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #115296 in Books
• Published on: 2001-07-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 240 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
As a populariser of philosophy, Bryan Macgee is arguably the best in the business; his latest offering The Story of Philosophy is further testament to that. Macgee has been a Member of Parliament, a music and theatre critic, broadcaster and university lecturer as well as being the author of many books including Modern British Philosophy, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer, Popper, Confessions of a Philosopher and more recently the excellent Wagner and Philosophy. He has presented two popular BBC television series, Men of Ideas, and The Great Philosophers, which in turn became successful books. The difference between The Story of Philosophy and The Great Philosophers is that the latter involved Macgee asking questions and leading an in-depth authoritative discussion with other professional philosophers about particular philosophical greats. The former is a much more basic introduction to, and history of, philosophy, which very briefly summarises the key points in the thought of the great philosophers. It is broken up into nine general sections--"The Greeks and Their World", "Christianity and Philosophy", "The Beginnings of Modern Science", "The Great Rationalists", "The Great Empiricists", "Revolutionary French Thinkers", "A Golden Century of German Philosophy", "Democracy and Philosophy" and "20th-Century Philosophy"--but manages to range more widely.

What makes this book noteworthy is the fact that Macgee's expertise and characteristically lucid prose is enormously enhanced by the layout of the book itself. The main figures and the leading ideas are illustrated with drawings, photographs, paintings and sculpture along with judiciously placed enlarged quotations, useful historical information set off from the main text and a handy glossary of philosophical terms at the end. This is a fine reference book and if a basic introduction to the history of philosophy is what you're looking for, you won't find better.--Larry Brown

Amazon.co.uk Review
As a bright adolescent, Magee discovered--see his Confessions of a philosopher --that the kind of thinking he liked to do was called "philosophy". The great disappointment of his life was the realisation that, incapable of great original thoughts, he was condemned to be a populariser all his life. His loss is our gain, and this admirable illustrated book is his very partial account of philosophy for other adolescents and adults who need a handy crib. This is Whiggish history, in which everything leads to a selective group of 20th-century Greats--Wittgenstein, Russell and Popper--two of whom were Magee's personal friends; contemporary French thinkers like Foucault and Derrida are relegated to the sidelines and linguistic analysis treated as a slightly irrelevant game. It is also Eurocentric history in which we leap from Stoics and Epicureans to Thomas Aquinas taking in only Saint Augustine on the way--Muslim thinkers are no more than mentioned and the Buddha is only here as an influence on Schopenhauer. Illustrations and sidebars give a useful cultural context; Magee writes well about his intellectual heroes and this is a personal enough book to be both more and less than a mere introduction. --Roz Kaveney

About the Author
A distinguished Oxford academic and critic, Bryan Magee has also written a regular column for The Times, authored a variety of successful books on philosophy and presented two popular TV series, for which he was awarded the Silver Medal of the Royal Television Society * Bryan Magee's published titles include: Modern British Philosophy, Papper, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer, Confessions of a Philosopher and Wagner and Philosophy.

Customer Reviews

Superb overview
Magee has produced an entertaining and enlightening introduction to the history of philosophy. It looks like a coffee-table book and has much of the agreableness of reading one. It is popularisation at its best. Magee's theism is not intrusive so the atheist can happily read it without irritation.

The perfect introduction
Great book. Introduces the key ideas through history in a clear and interesting way. He refrains from passing judgement and lets the various arguments speak for themselves.

Having read the book, I am loath to say that the book is objective, but it certainly feels that way from my subjective point of view!

Has certainly inspired me to look at philosophy in more depth, and even to start to try and clarify my own beliefs.

A life-saver for A Level students ??
This book is fantastic. Philosophy can struggle in gaining A Level age interest, and can be skated over in RE as well. This book is great, it doesn't provide massive debates, but it lets you know they are there. The most important thing this book does is introduce - very clearly - some key Philosophy figures and give you a clear way of 'catergorising' what you will hopefully go on to read. A level students should read it, Philosophy teachers should read it and RE students should look at it to re awaken some idea of Cosmology etc

Also its really glossy !! No more endless texts that don't give your imagination chance to kick in, after all the aim is to promote thinking !