The Greatest Books of All Time on Philosophy

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This list represents a comprehensive and trusted collection of the greatest books. Developed through a specialized algorithm, it brings together 759 'best of' book lists to form a definitive guide to the world's most acclaimed books. For those interested in how these books are chosen, additional details can be found on the rankings page.

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Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
15898 Gadādhara's Śaktivāda Gadādharabhaṭṭācārya 1650 Unknown Sanskrit
15898 Idealism And The Endgame Of Theory F. W. J. Schelling 1800 German German
15898 Treatise Of Zera Yacob Zera Yacob 1667 Ethiopian Ge'ez
15898 Advancement Of Learning Francis Bacon 1605 British English
15898 The Works Of Sir Thomas Browne Sir Thomas Browne 1686 British English
15898 The Journal Of A Disappointed Man W. N. P. Barbellion 1919 British English
15898 The Selected Letters Of William James William James 1920 American English
15898 Holmes Laski Letters Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. 1953 American English
15898 Zibaldone Giacomo Leopardi 1898 Zibaldone Italian
15898 The Living Thoughts Of Kierkegaard Soren Kierkegaard 1938 Danish English
15898 On The Shoulders Of Giants Robert K. Merton 1965 American English
15898 The Origins Of European Thought R. B. Onians 1951 British English
15898 Chu Yuan Guo Moruo 1942 Chinese Chinese
15898 The Greeks And The Irrational E. R. Dodds 1951 British English
15896 The Retreat To Commitment William Warren Bartley 1962 American English
15886 Winds Of Doctrine George Santayana 1913 American English
15898 Light On Yoga B. K. S. Iyengar 1966 Indian English
15889 At The Mind's Limits Jean Améry 1966 German German
16501 Science Of Logic G. W. F. Hegel 1812 German German
15898 Journal Of A Tour To The Hebrides James Boswell 1785 Scottish English
15898 The Colossus Of Maroussi Henry Miller 1941 American English
15898 Amiel's Journal Henri-Frédéric Amiel 1883 Swiss French
16493 An Apprenticeship Or The Book Of Pleasures Clarice Lispector 1969 Brazilian Portuguese
15898 Citizen Tom Paine Howard Fast 1943 American English
15898 Childhood, Youth And Exile Alexander Herzen 1852 Russian Russian
16484 The Ages Of The World F. W. J. Schelling 1815 German German
16563 Tous Les Hommes Sont Mortels Simone de Beauvoir 1946 French French
16570 The Wisdom Of Life And Counsels And Maxims Arthur Schopenhauer 1851 German German
16576 Schopenhauer As Educator Friedrich Nietzsche 1874 German German
16579 Storia Dei Greci Indro Montanelli 1959 Italian Italian
16560 The Critique Of Aesthetic Judgement Immanuel Kant 1790 German German
16614 Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff 1950 Armenian Russian
16650 The Seven Who Were Hanged Leonid Andreyev 1908 Russian Russian
16707 Diary Of A Seducer Soren Kierkegaard 1843 Danish Danish
16613 Summerfolk Maxim Gorky 1904 Russian Russian
16648 Values, Objectivity, And The Social Sciences Gresham Riley 1974 American English
16614 Asana Pranayama Mudra Bandha Satyananda Saraswati 1969 Indian English
16665 O Sztuce Miłości Erich Fromm 1956 German Polish
16600 La Femme Rompue / L'âge De Discrétion / Monologue Simone de Beauvoir 1967 French French
16729 Concluding Unscientific Postscript To Philosophical Fragments, Volume 1 Soren Kierkegaard 1846 Danish Danish
16609 Borges On Writing Jorge Luis Borges 1973 Argentinian Spanish
16736 Twilight Of The Idols, Or How To Philosophize With A Hammer Friedrich Nietzsche 1889 German German
16644 The Pilgrim's Regress C. S. Lewis 1933 British English
16642 Kleine Weltgeschichte Der Philosophie Hans Joachim Störig 1950 German German
16734 Manalive G. K. Chesterton 1912 British English
16641 Personal Knowledge Michael Polanyi 1958 British English
17120 Walter Lippmann and the American Century Ronald Steel 1980 American English
17120 Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph L. Rusk 1949 American English
17120 The Measure of Man Joseph Wood Krutch 1954 American English
17120 Mistress to an Age J. Christopher Herold 1958 American English
17120 The Nature of Life C. H. Waddington 1961 British English
17120 Physics and Philosophy Werner Heisenberg 1958 German German
17120 Discussion with Einstein on Epistemology Niels Bohr 1949 Danish Unknown
17120 Reflections from Captivity Ho Chi Minn 1965 Vietnamese Vietnamese
17120 Fatal Purity Ruth Scurr 2006 British English
17120 Hopeful Monsters Nicholas Mosley 1990 British English
17120 The Life of the Mind in America Perry Miller 1965 American English
17120 The Heavens and the Earth Walter A. McDougall 1985 American English
17120 Enthusiasms Bernard Levin 1983 British English
17120 Self-Consciousness John Updike 1989 American English
17120 Theophrastus William Wall Fortenbaugh, Dimitri Gutas 1992 Greek English
17120 Metaphor and Memory Cynthia Ozick 1989 American English
17120 The Root And The Flower L. H. Myers 1935 British English
17120 Doctor Copernicus John Banville 1976 Irish English
17120 You And I Padgett Powell 2011 American English
17120 In The Light Of What We Know Zia Haider Rahman 2014 British English
17120 The Palace Of Eternity Bob Shaw 1969 British English
17120 The Walking Shadow Brian Stableford 1979 British English
17120 The Nice And The Good Iris Murdoch 1968 British English
17120 Vagabond Volume 1 Takehiko Inoue 1998 Japanese Japanese
17120 Other Minds Peter Godfrey-Smith 2016 Australian English
17120 Gorgias/Gorgias Coleen P. Zoller, Jurgen R. Gatt, S. Montgomery Ewegen 2023 Unknown Unknown
17120 The Darkness That Comes Before R. Scott Bakker 2003 Canadian English
17120 Mr Isaacs F. Marion Crawford 1882 British English
17120 Robert Elsmere Mary Augusta Ward 1888 British English
17120 The Mind Body Problem Rebecca Goldstein 1983 American English
17120 Universal Consciousness alexis karpouzos 2016 Greek Unknown
17120 The Cult Of Emptiness The Western Discovery Of Buddhist Thought And The Invention Of Oriental Philosophy Urs App 2012 Swiss English
17120 From Dawn To Decadence Jacques Barzun 2000 American English
17120 The Fate Of Reason Frederick C. Beiser 1987 American English
17120 Paradigms Regained John L. Casti 2000 American English
17120 The Extraterrestrial Life Debate, 1750 1900 Michael J. Crowe 1986 American English
17120 The Fabric Of Reality David Deutsch 1997 British English
17120 The Science Of The Mind Owen J. Flanagan 1984 American English
17120 Fire In The Mind George Johnson 1995 American English
17120 Evil In Modern Thought Susan Neiman 2002 American English
17120 The Dreams Of Reason Heinz R. Pagels 1988 American English
17120 The Inescapable Self Timothy Chappell 2006 British English
17120 Defenders Of The Truth Ullica Segerstrale 1986 American English
17120 Common Sense, Science, And Scepticism Alan Musgrave 1993 New Zealand English
17120 What Does It All Mean? Thomas Nagel 1987 American English
17120 Brother Astronomer Guy Consolmagno 2000 American English
17120 Dignaga's Investigation Of The Percept Douglas Duckworth 2016 Unknown English
17120 Japanese Philosophy John C. Maraldo, Thomas P. Kasulis, James W. Heisig 2011 American English
17120 The Philosophical Works Of Al Kindi Peter Adamson, Peter E. Pormann 2012 Unknown English
17120 Sage Philosophy Henry Odera Oruka 1990 Kenyan English
17120 Against Method Paul Feyerabend 1975 German English
17120 The Routledge Handbook Of Panpsychism William Seager 2020 Canadian English
17120 Spurs Jacques Derrida 1976 French French
17120 If You're An Egalitarian, How Come You're So Rich? G. A. Cohen 2000 British English
17120 Individuals P. F. Strawson 1959 British English
17120 Beast And Man Mary Midgley 1979 British English
17120 Sense And Sensibilia J. L. Austin 1962 British English
17120 The Object Of Morality G. J. Warnock 1971 British English
17120 The Work Of The Dead Thomas W. Laqueur 2015 American English
17120 How Proust Can Change Your Life Alain de Botton 1997 British English
17120 Great Books David Denby 1996 American English
17120 Conversations With Glenn Gould Jonathan Cott 1983 Canadian English
17120 Independent Spirit Hubert Butler 1990 Irish English
17120 Darwin Among The Machines George B. Dyson 1997 American English
17120 The World As I Found It Bruce Duffy 1987 American English
17120 Time And The Art Of Living Robert Grudin 1982 American English
17120 Adam's Task Vicki Hearne 1986 American English
17120 Forests Robert Pogue Harrison 1992 American English
17120 There Is A World Elsewhere F. Gonzalez-Crussi 1998 American Unknown
17120 The Oldest Dead White European Males Bernard Knox 1993 American English
17120 The Undertaking Thomas Lynch 1997 American English
17120 Confessions Of A Philosopher Bryan Magee 1997 British English
17120 Medieval In La Jim Paul 1996 American English
17120 List Of Books Frederic Raphael 1981 British Unknown