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/lit/ - Literature

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15520663 No.15520663 [Reply] [Original]

When you study a philosopher or philosophical school, how much background reading do you do first?

A deep knowledge of every major work of western philosophy is obviously impossible to attain, but jumping into certain texts without adequate preparation, i.e. reading Kant's first critique without reading Hume, is obviously a bad idea. How do you find the balance?

>> No.15520669

>>15520663
plato.stanford.edu is your friend :)

>> No.15520673

>>15520663
I should add that I particularly struggle with this when it comes to 20th-21st century continental philosophy. The tree of references and interlocutors has grown so large.

>> No.15520675
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15520675

>>15520663
Fuck that, I just jump right into it

>> No.15520698

>>15520673
Continental philosophy is trash.

>> No.15520799

> i.e. reading Kant's first critique without reading Hume, is obviously a bad idea. How do you find the balance?

By reading Hume first.

>> No.15520808

None, background reading is a cope for people who dont actually like reading philosophy, but do so because they think it makes them a well rounded person. It's the oldest excuse in existence to put down books without finishing them.

>> No.15520821

>>15520808
You must be retarded if you don't find value in background sources. Any kind of knowledge is useful when we try to analyze the concepts of our judgement, whetever it be philosophy or anything else which requires some sort of back up information for better understanding.

>> No.15520840

anything you read will require the background of and be the background for something else, stop being a faggot

>> No.15520852

>>15520663
CoPR was the first work of philosophy I've ever read and it wasn't particularly hard. Maybe if you need to read the entire canon and half a dozen supplementary works before you tackle something like CoPR you should consider that being an office drone or a floor scrubber is more your speed than philosophy is. Just saying.