Sophie's world : a novel about the history of philosophy

Book Review Assignment Sophie’s World by Jostien Gaarder Sophie’s World is a novel about the history of western philosophy. In this book written in 1991 by Jostein Gaarder we see introduced Gaarders’ heroine, Sophie Amundsen. Sophie is a fourteen year old girl living in Norway. Her father works on a ship and is at sea most of the time, while her mother is a stay at home mom who is hinted to have fidelity issues. Sophie’s life is characterized by school and homework the author implying a ho hum existence. This continues until one day while checking the mail she receives a mysterious letter asking, “Who are you?” and “Where does the world come from?” So begins the core of the book around which Sophie is merely a periphery, a journey down the rabbit hole of western philosophy. A mysterious philosopher by the name of Alberto Knox begins writing Sophie every day, educating her in western philosophy and the origins of our western political thought. Alberto Knox has plenty to tell Sophie about philosophy when he begins writing her. Knox starts with Democritus and works his way chronologically up to the theory’s surrounding the Big Bang. Gaarder covers a huge span of time with a few pages devoted to each of the philosophers featured in his book, but some of these sections stand out. Gaarders interpretation of some of the philosophers is quite good. For example, Gaarders interpretation of Hegel was one of the easiest and best explanations that I have ever read, while Kierkegaard and Plato are also well reasoned out. However I must agree with John Vernon of the New York Times when he says, “On Spinoza and Hume he is superb, but when he gets to Romanticism we see the supermarket encyclopedias lying open before his hidden God, Mr. Gaarder.” (Vernon, pg BR42) For his failure with Romanticism, Gaarder makes up for it with his chapter on Hegel, a great critic of Schelling and the Romantic Philosophers. Using his character Alberto Knox who at this point in the story is using Socratic dialogues to teach Sophie philosophy, Gaarder writes of Hegels’ philosophy, “So to Hegel, history was like a running river. Every tiny movement in the water at a given spot in the river is determined by the falls and eddies in the water higher upstream. But these movements are determined, too, by the rocks and bends in the river at the point where you are observing it...and the history of thought-or of reason-is like this river. The thoughts that are washed along with the current of past tradition, as well as the material conditions prevailing at the time, help to determine how you think. You can therefore never claim that any particular thought is correct for ever and ever. But the thought can be correct from where you stand..” (Gaarder, pg. 363) This simple explanation for Hegelian philosophy is typical for Gaarder in Sophie’s World. A ridiculously difficult concept brought down to a level where anyone can understand it, at least if they can read of course. Gaarders’ uniqueness is also displayed through his linkage of the ‘stories’ he uses to tell the history of philosophical thought. He links each and every philosopher to the one or ones who preceded him, giving the reader a level of continuity sometimes not found in traditional philosophy textbooks. To use Gaarders’ chapter on Hegel as an example again, Gaarder uses Schelling from the previous chapter on Romanticism to help explain why and where Hegel was going. Gaarder says, “Schelling as well as other Romantics had said that the deepest meaning of life lay in what they called the ‘world spirit’. Hegel also uses the term ‘world spirit,’ but in a new sense. When Hegel talks of ‘world spirit’ or ‘world reason,’ he means the sum of human utterances, because only man has a ‘spirit.’” (Gaarder, pg.361) Thus the reader can see where the past philosophy stands in relation to the new direction that each philosopher is taking his thoughts and writings, something that most philosophy textbooks fail to accomplish due to their length and depth of detail. The reader does not become lost in Gaarder’s writings, they are straightforward and do not loose coherency by diving to deeply into that dreaded detail while still adequately describing each philosophers philosophy. This book is quite well written. The authors thoughts flow without a hitch, but that could be because his characters have all the depth of a mud puddle in the Sahara Desert. Gaarder being a high school philosophy teacher most definitively accomplishes the goal of his thesis, which is to teach the reader the history of Wester Philosophy. The humble beginnings of Democritus and his Atom lead us into Karl Marx/Timothy Sommer and his socialism all the way to the Big Bang with nary hiccup. However, to be entirely honest his characterization of Berkeley was a little over the top. Once this philosopher is mentioned, the book loses some of its up to this point wonderful coherency, and the reader is distracted from the philosophy by a meaningless plot twist that distracts the reader into t a realm of thought that is in all practicality worthless to the overall goal of the book. Gaarder does a good job with objectivity by and large, straying at only a few points. The man must be applauded, for it is difficult work to present philosophy from a relatively unbiased perspective, especially when discussing the likes of Jesus and Marx. One of those few points that Gaarder strays from can be found in his main character Sophie. She constantly can be found using feminist thoughts and terminology, which is understandable consider the book is entirely about dead white men and how they thought, but it is still an annoyance better left out as it detracts from the historicity of what the reader is attempting to ingest. This book makes an excellent contribution to history, especially history for young adults and high school students. I received this book as a gift from Bill Freeman, Coordinator of Curriculum for our Graduate Degree Program. He used Sophie’s World in his philosophy class which he wrote from scratch and then taught for the past decade or so. In Europe this book has also been used routinely in that capacity due to its ease of use as a teaching tool, and for its readability among the high school student population. As for my personal knowledge, this book was an immense aid in organizing philosophy into some coherent time line in my mind. Where before I read Gaarders’ work I had a working knowledge of almost everyone he writes about in this book thanks to Dr. Vanheemst, I now have a much better grasp and understanding of how closely each and every philosopher truly is. Philosophy builds on itself, and while most people teach philosophy by showing one philosophy’s diametrically opposed opposite, (For example Locke v. Marx) Gaarder shows how they are all related. In conclusion, I would recommend this book to anyone interested in western philosophy who wishes for a better understanding of the continuities to be found in western philosophy. If you are looking for an interesting story about a 14 year old girl, I would suggest looking else where.