I’m writing a book.
It’s a little unusual. I take a few of the great philosophers and reduce their work to a few pages. Then I translate them into plain English. Glyn Hughes did the first part before me, and his book is better than this one.
Let me be very clear: my work is not very good. You should read the philosophers, not me. Read them in the original if you can. If you can’t, read a full, beautiful, skillfully-written translation. You should savour the words, and read slowly, giving these masters, these very great geniuses, your full attention.
You should do this. But you probably won’t.
I figure a little philosophy is better than none at all. What you have here is a little philosophy. But please, be forewarned: I cut stuff I find boring. You might have loved something I cut out. I write their English into my English; I might be wrong. And, of course, in the introductory passages, I’m making dumb, ill-informed, hasty history that would make proper scholars twitch.
And let me be clear about something else: if you show this book to a real philosophy teacher (or, god forbid, a real philosopher), she will laugh at you until you cry. Don’t even think about citing this book in an essay. Didn’t you see that I published it myself? This is not a good book.
No, seriously. It’s not. This book is for people who want a reasonable shortcut to the great philosophers. Nothing more. It is not for people who want to be sure they know what they are talking about. It is certainly not for research.
Press on, then: