Philosophers: Their Lives and Works

by D.K. Publishing

From Confucius and Plato to Karl Marx and Noam Chomsky, this book brings together more than 100 illustrated biographies of the world's great philosophers.Introduced with a stunning portrait of each featured philosopher, the biographies trace the ideas, friendships, loves, and rivalries that inspired the great thinkers and influenced their work, providing revealing insights into what drove them to question the meaning of life and come up with new ways of understanding the world and the history of ideas.Lavishly illustrated with photographs and paintings of philosophers, their homes, friends, studies, and their personal belongings, together with pages from original manuscripts, first editions, and correspondence, this book introduces the key ideas, themes, and working methods of each featured individual, setting their ideas within a wider historical and cultural context. Charting the development of ideas across the centuries in both the East and West, from ancient Chinese philosophy to the work of contemporary thinkers, Philosophers provides a compelling glimpse into the personal lives, loves, and influences of the great philosophers as they probed into life's big ideas.

Genres: Philosophy

1113 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 30, 2022

About the author

Dorling Kindersley (DK) is a British multinational publishing company specializing in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 62 languages. It is part of Penguin Random House, a consumer publishing company jointly owned by Bertelsmann SE & Co. KGaA and Pearson PLC. Bertelsmann owns 53% of the company and Pearson owns 47%.

Established in 1974, DK publishes a range of titles in genres including travel (including Eyewitness Travel Guides), arts and crafts, business, history, cooking, gaming, gardening, health and fitness, natural history, parenting, science and reference. They also publish books for children, toddlers and babies, covering such topics as history, the human body, animals and activities, as well as licensed properties such as LEGO, Disney and DeLiSo, licensor of the toy Sophie la Girafe. DK has offices in New York, London, Munich, New Delhi, Toronto and Melbourne.

Source: Wikipedia.

Reviews

[Igor · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very short summary. Still useful. At least for me.

[Chris · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I first picked this up I was impressed that the publishers Dorling Kindersley had applied their skills to put together a very attractively illustrated volume on Philosophers. Each entry is from one to six pages, and the pictures are often of portrait paintings. I thought I would be able to recommend this to people who were new to philosophy, and that they would become interested in a few of the philosophers and want to explore further. Once I started reading my illusions were smashed. What is distinctive about philosophers is their ideas, yet there is hardly any discussion of these in the articles. The articles are written by a number of contributors whose backgrounds are described at the front of the book, and sadly these indicate the majority of them have no backround in philosophy. Simon Blackburn did not write the book, her merely provided the Foreword.

[Ray A. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good reference work. Its strength lies in the conciseness of its entries and the attractiveness of its illustrations. Its weakness lies primarily in its political correctness. People who hardly qualify as philosophers are included for reasons that have to do not so much with philosophy as with ideology. However, we can ignore those and enjoy the rest of the book.

[Ned Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very thorough work of famous philosophers. Well read. Something to think about