You don’t need a dusty syllabus with 500 years of unreadable nonsense. You need philosophy books that hit hard, open your brain, and don’t make you want to yeet yourself into a Socratic dialogue. Here’s a 15-book starter pack - a mix of classic, mode...
Sections
2
The Classic Core
The Modern Shakers
The Classic Core
Where the heavyweights live
Stoicism distilled: timeless, punchy, and written like a personal journal, not a lecture. You’ll quote it more than you want to admit!
Meditations, Marcus Aurelius
This is the big one — justice, the ideal state, the famous cave metaphor. Spoiler: it’s dense, but the dialogues format keeps it lively.
The Republic, Plato
Want to understand virtue ethics? Here’s your map. Less airy than Plato, and more practical.
Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle
Forget “evil mastermind” memes, this is a sharp, cynical manual on power. It’s as relevant today as it was for Renaissance backstabbers.
The Prince, Machiavelli
“I think, therefore I am” - yes, that came from here. A foundational modern work, accessible but sneaky in how deep it cuts.
Discourse on the Method, Descartes
The Modern Shakers
Ideas that reshaped the world
Brash, provocative, often misunderstood.
Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche
A powerful defense of individual freedom and free speech. Feels incredibly fresh in a world obsessed with control.
On Liberty, John Stuart Mill
The blueprint for modern political thought: freedom, collective will, and the tension between society and the individual.
Social Contract, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Warning: brain melter. Kant rewired philosophy, but start with this if you don’t want to feel like you’ve walked into theoretical quicksand.
Critique of Pure Reason, Kant
Not beginner-friendly, but no list is honest without him. I would start with secondary guides or summaries if you value your sanity.
