DD 106-110.999 (Tony) The History of Philosophy by Martyn Oliver (109 Oli)

At last-a philosophy book which focuses more on the philosophers than on the doctrines they espoused! This book is a godsend for a reader like me who enjoys the cold, hard facts and has trouble understanding the abstract thoughts. "The History of Philosophy" offers 190 pages of entries and pictures about nearly every major philosopher from the Greek era to the pop culture era.

That does not mean that this book devalues the other difficult books I've read prior to this entry in the Dewey Decimal system project. In fact, it has helped me appreciate many of the philosophies discussed in my earlier readings byt giving me a better understandng of what many philosophers' lives and cultures were like that caused them to create the ideas on life they thought up. Oliver's biggest problem is that his chronology becomes skewed once he begins to cover the era of the enlightenment, at which point, he begins going backwards, forwards, and sometimes, nowhere, apparently trying to cover every philosopher that ever lived. While his entries on Karl Marx and major Nazi Germany philosophers are fasicnating, they do not belong in the chapter that cover the American and French revolutions.

"The History of Philosophy " is designed to be a coffee table book, and I admit, I didn't read 190 pages of text with this choice, because of the numerous pictures, but I just couldn't sit through another work about things that might be, if we just live a certain person's way. That's why I took philosophy in college-and ended up hating it. There are, however, many books at the Chapel Hill branch library that are manifestos of many great philosophers, like Sartre, and for those inspired to explore the Dewey Decimal system, feel free to challenge yourself. I, on the other hand, felt that I had already challenged myself with two prior exhaustive works of philosophy, and thus decided to use a lifeline.

Believe me, I really needed to do that!