Sundar Sarukkai on how philosophy can be a living tradition in our lives today

Will Durant did not expect his path-breaking book The Story of Philosophy to be so popular, both in his time and for decades after. The book, first published in 1926, can still be found in bookshops as well as in the many pavement booksellers around India. Durant, in the Preface to the Second Edition of his book, justifiably notes the great surprise at the popularity of his book. He wrote, “All in all it was such a success as no author who has known it once can ever hope to know again.”

Durant’s book did something for philosophy that few books after have done. It converted philosophy’s abstract respectability into a concrete text. It made philosophy a little more accessible. One element that contributed to this readability was the rewriting of philosophy in a popular form. Writing a story of philosophy in this manner had its own pitfalls. Durant felt that he had to defend his book. He pointed out that Plato wrote two types of texts, one for the professionals and the other – popular dialogues – for the ordinary reader. We should remember that Durant’s book was published before popular writing in science, philosophy and arts became a flourishing industry.

The chapters in the book...

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