Great Books of the Western World--Vol 14--Plutarch

by Mortimer J. Adler and Jonathan Swift

Book Overview

From the ancient classics to the recent masterpieces, the Great Books of the Western World is the ultimate introduction to the ideas, stories, and discoveries that have shaped modern civilization.... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: B001D54XXG
• Release Date: January 1
• Publisher: Encyclopaedia Britannica
• Weight: 2.04 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.5" x 9.4"

Customer Reviews

An investment for future generations

My in-laws bought this set for the family, but they never really got past Plato. The books sat on the shelf holding up an ideal. Recently, my mother-in-law decided to pass them on to us. I've begun studying them, and I found the set accessible and intriguing. The first book, The Great Conversation, encourages the late bloomer. I am determined that my children will make good use of grandma and grandpa's old books, sometimes good ideas just need time and good faith.

An excellent investment for the past, present and future

Well, how does one start with an introduction to what the title already says - 'The Great Books of the Western World?' The 'GBBWW' (as they are called) more or less form what Mortimer Adler and his editorial team believed were the core of Western learning and culture, and I pretty much agree. Virtually every book in this collection is required reading in the Liberal Arts, and the ideas and issues discussed by these authors still dominates and influences debate today. Here we see the finest works of Art, Science, Philosophy, Poetry, Prose and History from the time of the Greeks until the early 20th century. I have noticed other collections of great books often include mediocre and more obscure works which, while important in their historical context, are not part of what Adler described as the 'timeless conversation of ideas' that undergirds Western civilisation. Other collections of 'great books' more often reflect the compiler's or editor's cultural prejudices (though I know the same could be said for Adler, a 'Dead White Male') and frankly, a lot of chaff is in with the wheat. In one list for example, over 50% of the books were novels from the 20th century. The good thing about the 'Great Books' in this collection is that they are 'battle-tested' - Adler went to experts in the respective fields and asked them which works had survived the test of time, and which had not, and those that had 'made the grade.' The other excellent thing is Adler's 'syntopicon of Great Ideas' and his extensive Bibliography at the end. The syntopicon and Bibliography together are almost a liberal education in themselves. The key ideas that have shaped western thought since its inception are cited and then Adler writes a 5,000 or so word essay explaining how they are discussed by the authors in the series, from Plato to Freud. Works that are highly relevant but not included in the collection but which also discuss these issues are included, such as Cicero, Schopenhauer, Lombard, Paine, Voltaire, etc. In my view the collection is excellently priced. Considering a university education even in the liberal arts these days costs somewhere between $30,000 and $100,000, a book set costing only 1/30th or 1/100th of that but providing the core for a 'liberal education' as Adler puts it, is in my view a 'no-brainer.' Many people at my university have degrees in Law or the Arts but have not read a single book from this collection, and do not have any sense of where ideas like postmodernism have their actual origin; few have actually read the works of Plato or Plotinus (who Derrida refers back to a great deal in his most important works), Marx (many 'Marxists' have not actually read Marx's works aside from the 'Communist Manifesto') or Freud. Schopenhauer once said 'We need to read the primary texts (of an author of genius), for they will be far more enlightening than the mediocre mind who tries to fit him within his three pounds of grey matter.' Although Sch

good start...

I used this set of books to cure myself of various dimensions of my own illiteracy. Suffering from a lack, perhaps, of desirable introductions featured in other editions of the same works, the consistency of printed style makes it slightly more accessible for a serious reader. The overall aesthetics of the set may add to speed and comprehension. Some of this set will seem, for many, a review of good high school studies. I would not necessarily read every word : page thru, and see what catches your eye ... then go back and study more thoroughly what needs to be. Yet there are others I would have included, though Adler had his reasons. There's Robert Burton's 'Anatomy of Melancholy,' Vico's 'New Science,' Kant's *complete* ' Critique of Pure Reason' and 'Prolegomena,' Spengler's 'Decline of the West(start with the abridged,)' and read different sections of Lyell's Geologies online every so often, to get a backround for your Darwin reading. And why not Arthur Conan Doyle, complete ? Werner Jaeger's 'Padeia' (3 vol)may be expensive, even in paperback, yet it's a great addition and keepsake/reference on the classical world. These additions will enrich your shelf for you, I trust. They broaden the view, flesh out the understanding, enhance and enrich the overall perspective from every angle. The grey type on so many pages turns into a huge historical/philosophical/literary map with these additions. With the GBWesternWorld, these additions help form a great broad overview to gently range the mind over, til 'this matter of culture' begins to fall into place. yet dont try to read everything all at once, in a great and rapid hurry. Reading shld be more of a ballet than a racing competition, than it so often is. Organize yourself with grace, wisdom, strength. Lane has a great music history book, a thousand pp., from the 1940s thats a great addition to anyone's personal library. Grove has a highly recommended opera volume, (tho I do not yet personally own it.) Siegfried Kracauer's 'Theory of Film' may be hard to get into right away, yet is such a staple in my library, I have yet to find a substitute for it, large or small: let it be the axle whereby you come to know the 'art form of the twentieth century,' through other film books, older or newer, greater or lesser in size or seeming usefulness. ... and start to familiarize yourself with such readings as Joyce's ULYSSES, FINNEGAN'S WAKE, Prousts' REMEMBRANCE, and Musil's MAN WITHOUT QUALITIES, Mann's MAGIC MOUNTAIN, and the works of Hermann Brock. Great Books lists abound. . . ...of course, one ought not to stop there . . . supplement your "great books" with the "missing features" included in Dr.Eliots' earlier five foot shelf of Harvard Classics. Eliot includes more eastern writings than Adler finally did. Also, do not neglect Eliot's later addition to his five foot shelf, the Shelf of fiction in twenty volumes. It is essential. I have derived much of value from goiong thro