Hegel [Paperback]

Charles Taylor (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521291992 | ISBN-13: 978-0521291996 | Publication Date: May 27, 1977

This is a major and comprehensive study of the philosophy of Hegel, his place in the history of ideas, and his continuing relevance and importance. Professor Taylor relates Hegel to the earlier history of philosophy and, more particularly, to the central intellectual and spiritual issues of his own time. He engages with Hegel sympathetically, on Hegel's own terms and, as the subject demands, in detail. This important book is now reissued with a fresh new cover.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Professor Taylor is a stimulating and lucid guide....His book is to be strongly recommended to anyone who wants to understand the origins and style and content of modern ideologies." The Economist

"...the most important book on Hegel ever to appear in English." Journal of European Studies

Book Description

A major and comprehensive study of the philosophy of Hegel, his place in the history of ideas, and his continuing relevance and importance. Professor Taylor relates Hegel to the earlier history of philosophy and, more particularly, to the central intellectual and spiritual issues of his own time. He engages with Hegel sympathetically, on Hegel's own terms and, as the the subject demands, in detail. We are made to grasp the interconnections of the system without being overwhelmed or overawed by its technicality. We are shown its importance and its limitations, and are enabled to stand back from it.

Product Details

• Paperback: 596 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (May 27, 1977)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521291992
• ISBN-13: 978-0521291996
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #487,691 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Commentary, October 13, 2008

By 

Reader From Aurora - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hegel (Paperback)

A sweeping, insightful and erudite survey of Hegel's work, originally published in 1975 Taylor text has become a modern classic in the field of Hegelian studies. The following comments are offered for potential purchasers.

First, a few minor criticisms. From a physical perspective the text (paperback) is less than ideal; the font is small and at nearly 600 pages the book is a bit too bulky. Stylistically, Taylor has his eccentricities, occasionally mixing top flight academic prose with awkward colloquialisms and ill-fitting literary devices, e.g. an unnatural interspersing of untranslated French terms where English or German terminology would seem more appropriate.

These few drawbacks aside the text has much strength. Hegel is a notoriously difficult read for the uninitiated. In this regard Taylor is particularly effective in using an appropriate combination of technical Hegel-speak and non-Hegelian terminology to both maintain the author's meaning and make it more accessible. Perhaps the greatest value, of Taylor's work, however, is the corrective it offers to much modern Hegelian scholarship. Often scholars are guilty of reading their worldviews back into the thought of earlier thinkers. While to a degree this is unavoidable, when overdone it can be quite misleading. An example of this is the tendency of twentieth century thinkers to read their atheistic/materialistic assumptions into early-modern thinkers such as Hobbes, Descartes, Kant and Hegel, often dismissing the clearly theistic views/comments of these early thinkers as nothing more than the idiom of the day and, in the process often recasting them as radical atheists. This is particularly distorting with regard to Hegel. Divorced from his pantheistic teleological view of embodied spirit much of his subsequent thought becomes incoherent nonsense. Finally, the concluding chapter on the contemporary relevance of Hegelian thought is helpful in situating Hegel in the modern Western tradition- although recent developments (i.e. the demise of communism), have likely made it of lesser interest to the broader public.

Overall the text is highly recommended for students of German idealism - an excellent if rather dense tomb. A solid background in modern philosophy, however, is likely a prerequisite to enjoying this work.

44 of 61 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Making the case for Hegel, April 16, 2004

By 

A. Lowry (Madison, MS United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hegel (Paperback)

Since I'm not half through, I wouldn't be reviewing this if anyone else had stepped up. I'm enjoying the book. Hegel's been a sore spot ever since the seminar on the "Phenomenology of Spirit" where I felt like a complete illiterate trying to read him (in translation no less).

Since Hegel's practically the definition of "pseudo-philosophy" in the English-speaking world, it's fascinating to read this treatment by a sensible English (?) philosopher. Taylor does a great job in the 1st chapter setting up Hegel's problematic, with a survey of German romanticism and its issues. Those issues are in large part still with us today, so that Hegel's working on problems that should be of interest to us.

But are those problems solvable? Can we take seriously someone who argues that "the rational is real, and the real is rational"? Taylor's carefully developing and qualifying Hegel's claims of universal rationality and trying to see his case for them.

Even if you hate Hegel, or think you do, the great anti-Hegelian Bertrand Russell said that the 1st step to evaluating a philosophy is to engage with it as sympathetically as possible (in a bit of a Hegelian moment himself as I recall: sympathy-antipathy-evaluation). This book may be your best shot in English.

Nietzsche argued that (1) the world is meaningless and "irrational," and that (2) humans cannot accept (1). If he's right, then something like Hegel's system may be the necessary consequence.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Quite a difficult book in itself, December 22, 2010

By 

T. Carlsson - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hegel (Paperback)

This is obviously a fine commentary work on a classic philosopher, but it's also a very difficult book. As Taylor says in the introduction, one can not simplify Hegel's ideas too much without distorting them. Avoiding distortion has clearly been an important goal for him and I imagine that this is a very useful book for professional interpreters of Hegel. But students and laymen will find the majority of this book very difficult to understand, almost on a par with the original works. Be prepared for some torturous elaborations on the self-realizing Spirit.

However, there's one major exception. Taylor's discussion of Hegel's political philosophy, a fairly brief segment of just over 50 pages, is in my opinion magnificent and quite easy to understand. He raises some very interesting questions which I intend to explore further by reading Hegel's Philosophy of Right to start. Taylor's own philosophical acumen is particularly evident in this section and I found his application of Hegel's political philosophy to contemporary society most interesting. Of course these applications are mere examples, as Taylor's intention is not to present his own view of political philosophy in this book. But the examples were so interesting that they immediately kindled my interest for this aspect of Hegel's philosophy.

So in conclusion, I bought this book because I thought that Taylor would be a more manageable route to Hegel than the translated original works, but that was not really the case. I can't say I really understand more about Hegel's spiritual philosophy after reading this book than I did before. Taylor's presentation is difficult and I did not have sufficient interest to follow him through every twist and turn of Hegel's obscure system. For laymen interested in this system, I think an easier introductory book will be more helpful than this one. But as I indicated above, anyone interested in Hegel's political philosophy must read what Taylor has to say about it. I doubt that you'll find a more useful guide to that aspect in any other book.

And finally, I haven't read Taylor's other book, Hegel and Modern Society, but it seems like it may contain much the same material that I have praised here.