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The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant Review: A Landmark Survey of Western Thought
Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy, first published in 1926 and revised in 1933, remains one of the most enduring popular introductions to Western philosophy, profiling thinkers from Plato and Aristotle through Nietzsche, Bergson, Russell, and Dewey — tracing not just their ideas but the lives and historical conditions that shaped them. The edition under review (ASIN B0CLL5XDCR) is a Kindle release published by Grapevine in October 2023, co-credited to the Original Thinkers Institute. Critical coverage called the work "a delight," and its place as a foundational text of accessible philosophy writing is well established — though its exclusive focus on Western, predominantly European and American thinkers is a documented limitation Durant himself acknowledged.
LuvemBooks Verdict
Best for
General readers who want a single-volume, narrative introduction to the Western philosophical tradition — covering Plato through Dewey — before tackling primary texts, or anyone drawn to intellectual biography that shows how each thinker's ideas grew from those before them.
Worth it if
You want an accessible, story-driven orientation to Western philosophy that has earned nearly a century of continuous readership and is widely considered the go-to starting point for non-specialists.
Skip if
You're looking for a genuinely global survey of philosophy — Durant himself acknowledged in his 1933 second edition that the absence of Confucius, Buddha, and Adi Shankara is a real gap — or you need treatment of philosophy beyond the early twentieth century.
What readers & critics say
Simon & Schuster's catalogue, echoed by books.google.com, records that the book was called "a delight" and "one of the most important books of our time," a reception standing it has maintained across generations. The tosinadeoti.com review notes that Durant renders philosophers as vivid, vulnerable human beings rather than marble monuments, bringing both the danger of Socrates' questioning and the stubborn hope of Plato's Academy to life on the page.
Sources: Simon & Schuster, books.google.com, tosinadeoti.com4.2from 107 Amazon ratings— reader ratings, not a LuvemBooks score
In This Review
- What Works & What Doesn't
- What the Book Is and What It Covers
- Significance and Publishing History
- Durant's Central Design: Ideas in Interconnection
- A Notable Gap: The Absence of Non-Western Philosophy
- Cultural Footprint and Who It Is For
What Works & What Doesn't
What Works
- Structured to show the intellectual connections between philosophers across centuries, not merely list them in isolation
- Covers an exceptionally broad roster — from Plato and Aristotle through Nietzsche and on to early twentieth-century figures including Russell, James, and Dewey — in a single volume
- Written in an accessible, narrative style designed for general readers rather than academic specialists
- A text with nearly a century of continuous readership, described by critical coverage as 'a delight'
- Available as a Kindle edition with enhanced typesetting and screen-reader support, making it accessible across devices
What Doesn't
- Covers only the Western philosophical tradition; Durant himself acknowledged in the 1933 second edition that the exclusion of Confucius, Buddha, and Adi Shankara was a real gap
- The core text dates to 1926 (revised 1933), meaning its treatment of early twentieth-century philosophers represents the cutting edge of that era, not of contemporary philosophy
A century after its debut, Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy endures as one of the most widely read introductions to the Western philosophical tradition — a work critical coverage called "a delight" — available here in a Kindle edition published by Grapevine in October 2023.
What the Book Is and What It Covers
The Story of Philosophy: Lives, Ideas and Impact of History’s Greatest Philosophers (Grapevine Edition) by Will Durant, Original Thinkers Institute front cover
The Story of Philosophy is a work of popular non-fiction that profiles the lives and ideas of major Western philosophers from ancient Greece through the early twentieth century. As Wikipedia's entry on the work documents, there are nine chapters each devoted to a single philosopher, followed by two further chapters offering briefer profiles of early twentieth-century figures. The full roster moves from Plato (with a section on Socrates) through Aristotle, Francis Bacon, Baruch Spinoza (with a section on Descartes), Voltaire (with a section on Rousseau), Immanuel Kant (with a section on Hegel), Arthur Schopenhauer, Herbert Spencer, and Friedrich Nietzsche. The tenth chapter covers Henri Bergson, Benedetto Croce, and Bertrand Russell; the eleventh turns to American philosophers George Santayana, William James, and John Dewey. The Simon & Schuster synopsis describes Durant's approach as chronicling not only the ideas of each thinker but also "the economic and intellectual environments which influenced them, and the personal traits and adventures out of which each philosophy grew."
“the economic and intellectual environments which influenced them, and the personal traits and adventures out of which each philosophy grew.”
Significance and Publishing History
The book's origins are unusual and worth understanding. As Wikipedia records, it grew out of a series of pamphlets in the Little Blue Books series — inexpensive worker-education materials — that proved popular enough to be assembled and published in hardcover by Simon & Schuster in 1926. A revised second edition followed in 1933. The work has since appeared in numerous editions, including a 1962 Time Reading Program special edition, a 1967 Touchstone paperback, and various later reprints. The Kindle edition under review is published by Grapevine (October 23, 2023) and carries a co-authorship credit for the Original Thinkers Institute alongside Durant's name. Prospective buyers should be aware this is a modern reissue of a text originating in 1926, not a new work. Simon & Schuster's own catalogue describes it as "one of the most important books of our time," a reception standing the work has maintained across generations.
Durant's Central Design: Ideas in Interconnection
What sets The Story of Philosophy apart from a mere biographical dictionary is Durant's explicit organizing ambition: as Wikipedia's account of the text notes, he attempts to show the interconnection of the philosophers' ideas — how each thinker's work informed the next. Rather than treating Aristotle, Spinoza, and Kant as isolated monuments, Durant threads them into a continuous intellectual conversation across centuries. This design intent makes the book useful not just as a reference but as a narrative of how Western thought evolved. The Simon & Schuster synopsis reinforces this, noting that Durant traces "every school of social thought" back to its roots in the ancient Greek tradition. One passage quoted there captures the texture of his prose: "He had lost a little of the hot enthusiasms of youth, but he had gained a perspective of thought in which every extreme was seen as a half-truth, and the many aspects of every problem blended into a distributive justice to every face."
A Notable Gap: The Absence of Non-Western Philosophy
The most substantive and well-documented limitation of The Story of Philosophy is its exclusive focus on the Western tradition. This is not an incidental omission — it is structural. As Wikipedia records, Durant himself addressed it directly in the foreword to the 1933 second edition, acknowledging criticism that the book does not include philosophers from the Asian continent, most notably Confucius, Buddha, and Adi Shankara. That acknowledgment, offered nearly a century ago, remains the clearest way to frame what the book is not: it is an account of Western philosophy, and readers seeking a genuinely global survey of philosophical traditions will need to look elsewhere. For the audience it targets — those wanting an accessible entry point into the European and American canon — the scope is coherent, but it should be stated plainly.
Cultural Footprint and Who It Is For
The Story of Philosophy carries an unusual footnote in popular culture: it is the verified origin of one of the most widely circulated misattributions in the philosophical world. As Wikipedia's entry documents, the oft-quoted line "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit" is not Aristotle's — it was written by Durant while discussing Aristotle's ideas, and has been misattributed to Aristotle ever since. This small detail speaks to the book's broader influence: Durant's synthesis was compelling enough to be mistaken for the source itself. The work is designed for general readers approaching philosophy without specialist training, and the Simon & Schuster catalogue frames it precisely that way — as a book for anyone who wishes to survey the history and development of philosophical ideas in the Western world. Readers who enjoy intellectual biography alongside the history of ideas, or who want a single-volume orientation before tackling primary texts, will find this the text most frequently recommended for that purpose.
Frequently Asked Questions
is The Story of Philosophy: Lives, Ideas by Will Durant, Original Thinkers Institute worth reading in 2024
Yes, for the right reader — critical coverage called it "a delight," and it remains the text most frequently recommended for anyone wanting a single-volume orientation to Western philosophy before tackling primary texts. That said, it is a work rooted in 1926 and covers only the Western, predominantly European and American tradition, a limitation Durant himself acknowledged in his 1933 foreword.
What philosophers are actually covered in this book
The book devotes nine full chapters to Plato (with a section on Socrates), Aristotle, Francis Bacon, Baruch Spinoza (with a section on Descartes), Voltaire (with a section on Rousseau), Immanuel Kant (with a section on Hegel), Arthur Schopenhauer, Herbert Spencer, and Friedrich Nietzsche. Two further chapters offer briefer profiles of early twentieth-century figures including Henri Bergson, Benedetto Croce, Bertrand Russell, George Santayana, William James, and John Dewey.
Does this book cover eastern or non-western philosophy
No — this is one of its most clearly documented limitations. Durant himself addressed the omission directly in the foreword to the 1933 second edition, acknowledging criticism that the book excludes philosophers from the Asian continent, most notably Confucius, Buddha, and Adi Shankara. Readers seeking a genuinely global survey of philosophical traditions will need to look elsewhere.
Is this book good for beginners with no philosophy background
It was specifically designed for that audience — the book grew out of inexpensive worker-education pamphlets in the Little Blue Books series before being assembled into a hardcover, and the Simon & Schuster catalogue frames it as a book for anyone who wishes to survey Western philosophical ideas without specialist training. Durant's approach focuses on the lives and historical conditions behind each thinker's ideas, which makes the material more approachable than reading primary texts directly.
Is the famous aristotle habits quote actually in this book
In a way — this book is actually the verified origin of that misattribution. The oft-quoted line "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit" was written by Durant while discussing Aristotle's ideas, not by Aristotle himself, and has been misattributed to Aristotle ever since. It's a detail the reviewer highlights as evidence of just how compelling Durant's synthesis was.
What makes this book different from just a philosophy textbook
Durant's explicit ambition is to show how each thinker's work informed the next — threading Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza, Kant, and the rest into a continuous intellectual conversation across centuries rather than treating them as isolated monuments. The Simon & Schuster synopsis also emphasizes that he traces each philosophy back to the economic and intellectual environments that shaped it, plus the personal traits and adventures out of each philosopher's life.
Is the kindle edition of this book a new or updated version
No — the Kindle edition published by Grapevine in October 2023 is a modern reissue of a text that originated in 1926 and was last revised in 1933, not a new or updated work. Prospective buyers should also be aware it carries a co-authorship credit for the Original Thinkers Institute alongside Durant's name, which the reviewer flags as worth noting.
Sources & Further Reading
The key facts and claims in this review are grounded in the retrieved, verified sources listed below.
- 1
en.wikipedia.org
- 2
- 3
- 4
newbookrecommendation.com
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- 6
books.google.com
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