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matthewwester's review
2.0
I usually enjoy the Introducing series with its cartoon accessibility and brief overview of a topic. When I was younger the series gave me a scaffolding for figures like Hegel and Kierkegaard. I could read longer works and flesh out the basic scaffolding.
This entry in the series, however, spends too much time listing individuals/variants and giving a list of new vocabulary to go with these variants. Turn four pages and you're reading something that has nothing to do with four pages ago...
I wonder what could have made this book more effective for a reader like me? Perhaps a little extra info about how each new movement was a response to the previous movements? Perhaps a few less "this word is difficult to translate" and more examples of sayings/wisdoms from those individuals?
It's not a good sign when the reader has studied some of these topics and still gets lost in the listing of ambiguously defined terms.
This entry in the series, however, spends too much time listing individuals/variants and giving a list of new vocabulary to go with these variants. Turn four pages and you're reading something that has nothing to do with four pages ago...
I wonder what could have made this book more effective for a reader like me? Perhaps a little extra info about how each new movement was a response to the previous movements? Perhaps a few less "this word is difficult to translate" and more examples of sayings/wisdoms from those individuals?
It's not a good sign when the reader has studied some of these topics and still gets lost in the listing of ambiguously defined terms.
tamzinlittle's review
4.0
If you expect some crazy in depth overview of eastern philosophy from this you will obviously be disappointed, but if you need a quick refresher that you can read in a day or just a place to start (since it seems obvious where to start with western philosophy but not so much with eastern philosophy if you have never been exposed to it), then this is a good place to start.
Honestly- the intellectual snobbery in this review section. Forget making things more accessible to the average person, eh.
heli_mads's review
2.0
Very fast reading. Didn't like it much, so I just read the parts I liked. So many pages about history of philosophy and almost nothing about the philosophy, and not much catchy.
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