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Books

The Shorter Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Mark Cyzyk looks up a compact philosophy encyclopedia.

Reading the blurbs on the web for its more robust and portly grandfather, The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (REP), I found Roger Scruton noting there that “The REP surpasses in range all previous attempts,” Galen Strawson quips, “My travels in 6 million words were studious and happy,” and Peter Strawson pronounces it “A unique achievement and a great one.” I ran down to our college reference collection to browse through the full Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy and I must concur: it’s magnificent. In ten volumes it provides over 2,000 entries written by 1,300 current (ie, last decade of the last century), experts in the field. It clearly required a major effort to compile (seven years, to be more exact), and after browsing through I can confirm that it provides a useful and comprehensive update to Paul Edwards’ equally-magnificent 1967 Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Paul Edwards’ encyclopedia was later published in a compact edition.

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