Reviews

The Consolations of Philosophy by Alain de Botton

ahmed92kira's review against another edition

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5.0

تمنيته ما يخلص

ann3_l3's review against another edition

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informative inspiring reflective slow-paced

3.5

sam_bizar_wilcox's review against another edition

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2.0

The Marie Kondo of philosophy. Alain de Botton takes a similar space in the cultural sphere as Malcolm Gladwell: a public intellectual who makes sort of specious claims or explains relatively obvious phenomena. De Botton is a far more eloquent writer than Gladwell, of course. But that's not to excuse the relative lack of substance that The Consolations offer.

rohan_42's review against another edition

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informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.5

kmdraijer's review against another edition

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informative fast-paced

2.5

A neat summary of various philosophical schools that is part "self-help" book. I missed some more critical analysis in the first few chapters, but I suppose that would be too much to ask for a book that is more a summary than anything else.
However, the choice of Schopenhauer for "A Consolation for a Broken Heart" baffled me . All the presented work in the chapter reeks of misogyny.
Overall, glad I read it as a starting point to guide me to other books and essays to read.

lewreviews's review against another edition

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4.0

I’m just starting to get into Philosophy and heard that this was a great starting point. It certainly was. Nothing groundbreaking (or original, to be honest) but that is the point; it’s essentially a summary of the major philosophical ideas over the past thousands of a year. And for this purpose, it is excellent.

Super easy to read and jam-packed with solid information; I feel as if I have a great basis for diving into more complex works by the authors mentioned throughout the book.

hieronymusbotched's review against another edition

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3.0

Huh. You know, as much loved as this book is, I don’t know that there’s all that much here, or even whether the author believes all the “consolations” are actually worth taking seriously, especially Schopenhauer, who is almost immediately cast into the gutter by Nietzsche in the final chapter.

The book equivalent of carpooling with an erudite stranger. Good for passing the time, but I don’t know that we’d exchange numbers at the end of the ride.

mzoli's review against another edition

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3.0

کتاب در مورد نحوه مواجهه فیلسوفان با مشکلات است. شما دلایل فلسفی نخواهید دید و می‌شود گفت عنوان کتاب از این نظر کاملا غلط انداز است.
به نوعی یک کتاب
self-help
با نگاه به زندگی فیلسوفان داریم.
با کنار گذاشتن انتظاری که عنوان ایجاد می‌کند باید بگم که کتاب خوبی بود بخصوص فصل مونتی برای من که اصلا با وی آشنایی نداشتم خیلی جذابیت داشت.
به قول یکی از اساتید ایرانی خیلی وقت‌ها ما با مسئله روبرو نیستیم با مسئله‌نما مواجهیم. در این کتاب نیز عموما فیلسوفان اصلا مشکل را برسمیت نمی‌شناختند. مثلا در فصل مواجهه با عدم محبوبیت سقراط لزوما محبوبیت را به عنوان یک اتفاق ارزشمند نمی‌شناخت و در نتیجه برای او اصلا مسئله محسوب نمی‌شد در بقیه فصل‌ها و فیلسوفان هم این نگاه وجود داشت

sarah_ayed's review against another edition

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5.0

من أجمل ما قرأت هذا الصيف
أفكار بسيطة ولكن لها أثر عميق لو طبقت في حياتنا
أسلوب آلان دو بوتون سلس جذاب

melligans's review against another edition

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challenging inspiring

5.0