Sofies Welt. Roman über die Geschichte der Philosophie

My partner picked up a copy of Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder in The Children's Society charity shop in Garstang last year (Great book selection there!). We both knew of its hype, but hadn't previously read it so were interested to see how good we thought the book really was. Sadly he gave up about a quarter of the way through so, discouraged, I let it languish on the shelf.

Having finished reading, I now have mixed views on Sophie's World hence the three star rating. On one hand I was fascinated by the potted history of philosophy, most of which I didn't know anything about, and am hoping that at least some of what I read has lodged itself in my brain. There are a lot of names and dates to take in so I would probably need to re-read in short sections - like a textbook - in order to really start learning. However the history is written in such an accessible way that this is something I may well do over the next few months.

The fiction elements of Sophie's World were very disappointing though. I think I understand what Gaarder was trying to achieve with the inclusion of his fictional characters, but I just didn't find their conversations convincing. We are repeated told that Sophie is a fourteen year old girl, but she doesn't speak or act like one and I don't think Norwegian teenagers are so very different from British ones! Everyone appeared more like a plot device than a real person and I frequently found that irritating and distracting. For me, the fictional interludes were a respite from the increasingly intense philosophy, but I would have preferred Gaarder to have written a similarly accessible history of philosophy instead. Then again, without the fictional hook Sophie's World probably wouldn't have hit the bestseller lists!

An unknown person starts writing letters to fourteen years old about philosophy, intrigued by the letters and subject the main character, Sophie gets on to the track to know about western philosophy.

The book is a starting point to know about western philosophy and not any substitute for the history of western philosophy by Bertrand Rusell.

At times, the writing style poses a serious question, is it a fictional or non-fictional work.

The author/translator gets a few facts wrong about India and it's language.

In page 126, ”In Sanskrit, the ancient classical language of India, the gods are called asura and in Persian Ahura.”

Asura may mean God, in most of the time it's used to denote demon or evil.

Author/translator may be unaware of Tamil which also a classical language in India. Rather writing it as ”Sanskrit, one of the classical languages of India ” write it as ”classical language of India”, as of no other language in India has a similar status. You can read more about Tamil’s status of classical language in southasia.berkeley.edu/tamil-classes by George L Hart.

Sophie’s World is written as a novel but really dives into the history of Philosophy. The book is about a teenage girl, Sophie who keeps getting letters on philosophy in the mail. These letters spark Sophie’s curiosity and provide questions and answers to questions on life. Jostein Gaarder intended the book to be both a novel and a basic guide to philosophy, which made the book very easy to read.

Sophie started her studies with the natural philosophers, before moving onto the popular Greeks (Socrates, Plato and Aristotle) all the way up to Darwin, Freud, and Sartre. Though covering most of the major philosophers Gaarder didn’t shy away from the lesser known or even the controversial ones (Marx). He did a good job of showing the positive and negative points of each philosopher, while trying not to tell the reader which ones are better than others.

The novel aspect of this book is bizarre and intriguing, with little examples of philosophical theories along the way. It did a great job of breaking up the history lesson to bring the reader back to the feeling of reading a novel. I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading it again. Next time I plan to read it slower and spend time exploring these philosophers in greater detail. Well worth the read and a good introductory point into the world of philosophy.