Penguin Books Australia

THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER THAT TAKES YOU ON A JOURNEY THROUGH YOUR MIND AND GIVES YOU THE ANSWERS TO THE BIG PHILOSOPHICAL QUESTIONS

There are many books about philosophy, but Who Am I? And If So How Many? is different from the rest. Never before has anyone introduced readers so expertly and, at the same time, so light-heartedly and elegantly to the big philosophical questions.

SOCRATES is hailed as one of the greatest thinkers of all time and is oftern called the father of philosophy.  Yet he left no writing of his own, so what we know of his life and ideas we know from the works of his student Plato and other contemporaries.  And what these accounts tell us is as important today as it was then.  Socrates taught-and indeed strove to embody-his credo that how...

The foundations of capitalism are being battered by a flood of altruism, which is the cause of the modern world's collapse. This is the view of Ayn Rand, a view so radically opposed to prevailing attitudes that it constitutes a major philosophic revolution. In this series of essays, she presents her stand on the persecution of big business, the causes of war, the default of conservatism, and the evils...

'No one is born complete; perfect yourself and your activities day by day until you become a truly consummate being, your talents and your qualities all perfected'

Nausea is both the story of the troubled life of a young writer, Antoine Roquentin, and an exposition of one of the most influential and significant philosophical attitudes of modern times – existentialism. The book chronicles his struggle with the realization that he is an entirely free agent in a world devoid of meaning; a world in which he must find his own purpose and then take total responsibility...

Why do so many of us love or hate our work?
How has it come to dominate our lives?
And what should we do about it?

Work makes us. Without it we are at a loss; in work we hope to have a measure of control over our lives. Yet for many of us, work is a straitjacket from which we cannot free ourselves.

We all worry about what others think of us. We all long to succeed and fear failure. We all suffer – to a greater or lesser degree, usually privately and with embarrassment – from status anxiety.

For the first time, Alain de Botton gives a name to his universal condition...

Bestselling author Alain de Botton has written about love, travel, status and how philosophy can console us. Now he turns his attention to one of our most intense but often hidden love affairs: with our houses and their furnishings. He asks: What makes a house truly beautiful?Why are many new houses so ugly?Why do we argue so bitterly about sofas and pictures – and can differences of taste ever...

Euthyphro/Apology/Crito/Phaedro

'Consider just this, and give your minds to this alone: whether or not what I say is just'

'I have seen the armies of wind clash
uprooting plump grain left and right from deepest roots'

'They might as well take the sun from the heavens when they take friendship from life!  The immortal gods have given us nothing better or more enjoyable than friendship'

Although none of their original writings have come down to us complete, patient...