American Philosophy
A Love Story
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American Philosophy
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Narrated by:
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Josh Bloomberg
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Written by:
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John Kaag
About this listen
The epic wisdom contained in a lost library helps the author turn his life around.
In American Philosophy, John Kaag - a disillusioned philosopher at sea in his marriage and career - stumbles upon a treasure trove of rare books on an old estate in the hinterlands of New Hampshire that once belonged to the Harvard philosopher William Ernest Hocking. The library includes notes from Whitman, inscriptions from Frost, and first editions of Hobbes, Descartes, and Kant. As he begins to catalog and preserve these priceless books, Kaag rediscovers the very tenets of American philosophy - self-reliance, pragmatism, the transcendent - and sees them in a 21st-century context.
Hocking was one of the last true giants of American philosophy. After studying under Harvard's philosophical four - William James, George Santayana, Josiah Royce, and George Herbert Palmer - he held the most prestigious chair at the university for the first three decades of the 20th century. And when his teachers eventually died, he collected the great books from their libraries (filled with marginalia) and combined them with his own rare volumes at his family's estate. And there they remained for nearly 80 years, a time capsule of American thought.
Part intellectual history, part memoir, American Philosophy is an invigorating investigation of American pragmatism and the wisdom that underlies a meaningful life.
©2016 John Kaag (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc.What listeners say about American Philosophy
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Tee
- 2017-12-02
Over my head
How should I put it.
I’m not formally schooled in the humanities, and have not been introduced to philosophy before.
It might be a bit like going to a buffet in an international food fest. Only the best dishes are represented. You get a morsel of this, a bite of that, a little here, and a little there. They have exquisite names, and each dish its own history. Some are bizarre, others delectable, yet others forgettable. And you know there’s so much more that have not been represented in the buffer. So... one comes out senses awakened but vaguely dissatisfied - wondering what the heck happened in there.
I like the novel for showing me that philosophers are human beings. They lead normal lives, have friends whom they correspond with, could be accomplished in many fields and not just in lecturing philosophy (Hocking was a master carpenter and studied military engineering), and have interesting life stories (Hocking’s friendship with Pearl S. Buck for instance).
John Kaag does a decent job introducing morsels of the lives / ideas of the great American philosophers (whom I’ve not heard of prior to this book). He had interwoven his own life journey with some epiphanies, showing that philosophy pervades a person’s life beyond the classrooms. His language is energetic, and his stories empowering in certain ways.
Unfortunately for me, many of the subtleties are lost on me.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Dana
- 2019-02-19
wonderful introduction
a wonderful introduction to American philosophy - truly captivating from start to finish. No prior knowledge necessary, only interest
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