Laurie Cordek (you know, Henny Johnsen's daughter) probably sat at the table at Sidetrack
where I'm now typing, looked at this same lake, and wrote me a letter from, as she said, "your future cabin."
(The letter ended with a "PS" letting me know that we would need garbage bags and dish soap next time we came here.)
I read the letter, underlined the book recommendation, and put it into the Reading
cubbyhole in my desk. There it sat until a couple weeks ago as I was about to write about
a thoroughly delightful and educational book. I had overlooked the letter in August when
I was putting together the last issue (how fortuitous). When I pulled out Laurie's almost-
forgotten letter, guess what she had recommended.
She wrote:
"I still enjoy philosophizing about what we and life are all about. I just don't take much
time for it. Was Sophie's World mentioned in Reading? Sue, one of my
stepdaughters, and her boyfriend are reading it aloud, discussing their thoughts and
reactions. I knew I'd heard of it and thought that Reading might be the place. It looks
like a very good book to get a brief overview of the history of philosophy and see how
the various ideas interact with each other."
And that's not all.
Laurie's mention may have been in my unconscious, but I thought the first time I came across Sophie's World was in the Daedalus catalog. Last year, Dan Conrad and I shared a closet-sized office. One day, as I thumbed through the catalog, I showed him the description of the book, "A novel about the history of philosophy." A novel about the history of philosophy?
Dan, the philosophy teacher, was intrigued enough to order it. He read it and recommended it as "all you really need to know about philosophy if you're not going to be a philosopher." (Well, he said something like that, but I suppose I shouldn't quote him so directly. Then again, he can write and make a correction next time.) Last spring, a couple students in his philosophy class read Sophie's World and liked it.
Last summer Nancy found the book in Amery when we signed up for our library cards.
(We go right by the library on our way to and from Sidetrack, so stopping to check out or
return books is really convenient.) She saw the "novel about the history of philosophy"
subtitle and was intrigued enough to abandon mysteries and science fiction for awhile.
Well! That was enough to get me started on it. But philosophy?
I've never been drawn to the introspective nature of it, but I've
appreciated the intellectual/structural aspects. Once I started,
it was hard to put the book down.
One day at Sidetrack, Henny and Bob Johnsen stopped by to say hello.
She saw me reading it and asked if it was good, because someone had recommended it to
her (her daughter, perhaps?).
We returned the Amery library copy and I checked another out from the Northfield library.
I was entranced with the charming story, with the summaries of profound ideas, and with the
interaction between those two aspects of the book. I became much a much less empirical absolutist
after reading the book. (You'll have to read Jostein Gaarder's wonderful section on Democritus
if you want to know why. Well, either that or pay attention to Einstein's descriptions of how he figured
out that time is relative. PBS' Nova series did a wonderful job of that.) I also got new impressions
about Descartes and Kierkegaard as I learned a bit more about them. (I also try to remember that
a little knowledge can be dangerous, so I'm not going to pretend I know anything about either of them.)
The plot of this novel is a little thin, but just about the time I was ready to give up on it and just read the essays (little lectures really) on the philosophers, Gaarder made his characters begin to wonder whether they were real or just figments of some author's imagination. Of course, this little plot twist coincided with the description of Enlightenment (and later) philosophy that asked questions about the nature of existence. Neat touch.
David (ten years old) had seen Nancy and me reading Sophie's World
and asked one evening at bedtime asked what it was about. Like the "instructor"
in the book, I told him it was about the big questions people had been asking for
the last 3,000 years. Then we went through most of the book and picked out the
questions chapter by chapter. He thought the questions were good ones; things
he'd like to think about. This all fit in quite nicely with the bit of home schooling
we're doing: home Sunday schooling. David and I are reading and discussing
How Do You Spell God? We're getting through about a chapter every Sunday
morning. (I'll let you know later how it all comes out.)
Shortly after I finished Sophie's World, we had dinner with some friends.
Liz and her fourteen-year-old daughter Sarah were reading the book. (See Rick's question below)
Sarah liked the book and found it to be at least tolerable educational summer reading. Her mother--also enjoying the book--wondered (as does Rick) who is the best audience for the book.
When I asked Sarah a few weeks later if she'd finished the book, she shrugged and said no. I gather she lost interest/ran out of summer not long after reading about Descartes.
Then, as I worked my way though the Hunters' "rants and raves," I found the following from Rick:
"I rarely read 'mass market' paperbacks, and hardly ever buy a book based solely on the cover blurb. Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World is a welcome exception. The plot of this novel--and there's not much of one--involves a young girl's encounter with a mysterious philosophy teacher. In the form a novel, the book is in fact a clever overview of the history of philosophy from the pre-Socratics to the present. As a former classics major from Carleton, I am somewhat embarrassed that I actually read this book, and even more embarrassed that I learned so much. One question I have: Gaarder, a teacher, wrote this book for his own teenage daughter to interest her in philosophy. I would think a smart, inquisitive high-schooler would love this book (I would have), but my kids are much too young to test this theory. Do other Reading readers have any experience in this regard?"
Well, I think Sophie's World is a marvelous book.
Like Liz and Rick, I wonder if those of us who know a little intellectual history might be a better audience than kids. But at least one of the high school seniors in Dan's philosophy class really liked it.
I'd like to hear more people's reactions to the book--especially younger readers.
Sarah, would you like to tell us what you thought rather than relying on me to interpret your reactions? This is a perfect chance to write and tell a little bit of the world what you think.
Since I wrote this, Larry Small and Pam Stern have written that they were less enthusiastic about Sophie's World than I was. And Larry said that his daughter enjoyed it, but it wasn't a favorite. With this kind of divided response, there's no crowd to follow. So make up your own mind and then tell us what you think. I'm not trying to take a poll, but more opinions are welcome.
Sophie's World Online
Sophie's World Discussion Project
