Hello Veeky Forums, /a/ here. I've been interested in studying philosophy by myself for a long time...

Read modern(ish) books on Greek history and culture, particularly mythology (Hamilton is always good). Then dip into the Iliad and Odyssey, then Herodotus, then get into drama with Aeschylus and Sophocles, then read Thucydides. After that you'll have three choices. Follow the history with Xenophon, follow drama with Euripides and Aristophanes, or start your travel into philosophy with Plato. If you're looking to do the Entire Western Canon, I would go with the playwrights.

how to a greeks:
vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/4chanlit/images/3/3f/Start_with_the_greeks.jpg

What the hell, isn't that like 10000 pages worth of books? How much does it take just to get to the starling line?

Start with Thales of Miletus. Then skip the rest of that shit and read books that seem interesting to you for enjoyment.

You want to study this stuff, right?

It's the bare minimum, it's not like you were going to use your time in anything better since you're an /a/ poster. Better start reading, user.

You weak little faggot, this is your precipice. You either dedicate yourself or you go back to your pathetic little chinese cartoons. There are no shortcuts.

Wtf this is the meanest board

see pleb

The "start with the Greeks" meme (in its modern form) originated with European aristocrats who had been forced to read that shit by their governesses growing up. They were at the "starting point" they set because mommy and daddy paid an older woman (probably from a down-on-their-luck noble family) to teach and discipline their kids from an early age. You don't really have to start with the Greeks. If you want to be "classically educated," then you have to play catch-up with the Renaissance equivalent of prep-school trust fund kids.

>Comes from /a/
>Claims Veeky Forums is the meanest board
So /a/ really did fall from grace, huh

Okay but like I go /sp/ and ask about the rules they show enthuasum and joy to teach newcomers so why when I want to join Veeky Forums and fun with philosophy it’s all hostility?

Yeah it's probably too hard better keep watching anime, a medium whose worthwhile works I could count on a small group of hands.
Did you hear the one about the guy, who on his deathbed said: "I wish I spent more time watching juvenile cartoons from a land I'll never visit?" Quite the joke you might turn out to be.

youtube.com/watch?v=J5zbgD1NhMk

I can't balance medical school with 10000 pages of Greek philosophy. Please help me out selecting only the absolutely necessary books.
That's not a nice thing to say.

haha i miss /sp/

This board is mostly pseudo-intellectual wannabe "literary men" who get their rocks off pretending to be cool like Hemingway and Hunter S. Thompson. Don't mind them. You don't have to start with the Greeks. Read what interests you. See
I personally read a lot of eastern religious stuff, fiction, and history. If you're into anime and Japan, you'd probably really enjoy reading 20th century Japanese authors like Junichiro Tanizaki, Yukio Mishima, Osamu Dazai, and Yasunari Kawabata. Mishima's "The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea" and Kawabata's "Snow Country" are my two favorite books ever. I highly recommend them. You might also enjoy reading Japanese and Chinese history. I'd start with a book called "A History of Japan" by two guys named Mason and Caiger.

If you're in medical school you should probably just read the books that interest you immediately, without starting with the Greeks. If you come across an idea in Nietzsche that you don't understand, just look it up to get a cursory idea and continue reading. Most academic editions of philosophy books will have copious footnotes to explain the context to everything.

This is a good chart. For Philosophy just go:
Mythology
Iliad
Odyssey
First Philosophers
Plato
Aristotle

For Plato your minimum dialogues should be:
Euythphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Meno, Phaedrus, Symposium, Theaetetus, Sophist, Parmenides, Protagoras, Gorgias, Republic, Laws
For Aristotle your minimum should be:
Nicomanchean Ethics, Politics, The Organon, Physics, Metaphysics.
Then you will have started with the Greeks.

The fuck user, why would you make him read the organon and the physics.

But you do have time to waste reading Kant and cheechee? I don't understand

they all must suffer

That's not me (OP) you're replying to, but thanks for the advice. I have written down the name of those two books, thanks.
So is it really not necessary? I once tried to read that famous Kant book but gave up after 50 pages because I felt I wasn't understanding anything.
Are you trolling me?

>who get their rocks off pretending to be cool like Hemingway and Hunter S. Thompson.
>when you dont even know the board or literature well enough to make an accurate insult

No, all love is suffering. If you really, truly want to learn, you must suffer.

I forgot the pseuds who get their rocks off pretending to be too cool for the things other pseuds think are cool. Cool like Pinecone?

cute animu girl-- stop stressing and just read
plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato/
And myth/culture
Plato is an easy intro to pretty much all philosophical inquiry, but the Start with the Greeks meme is really meant to read the Greeks for the Greeks.
I don't know how to say this but you probably don't even know what you want to read because studying Kant is a lot more difficult than the Greeks.
Nietzsche is a writer before a philosopher and relies on historical critique, he was a massive fan of ancient greece and references them often

I'm not, but if you really want to shave it down you could go:
Iliad
Odyssey
Plato
Aristotle
And for Plato read: Euythphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Meno, Symposium, Theaetetus, Parmenides, Gorgias, Republic
And for Aristotle read: Nicomanchean Ethics, Politics, The Categories, Metaphysics + some secondary sources on the metaphysics
That's the lowest i'm willing to go

Second reply answered your question. Read Plato's Republic plus "Plato:Five Dialogues" (Hackett Classics). If you don't already know, Plato's works are all about Socrates.
Then, read some Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics and Politics are essential. Sample others if you wish, but stick with those two at minimum.
Now you have a ton of philosophers that come before Nietzsche. I would suggest maybe skimming a history of philosophy, such as the one by Kenny, or the Russell one, to see if there's anything else you want to educate yourself on before diving into Nietzsche. Also read articles that sum up the philosophy of the major figures before Nietzsche.
Once you've done all that feel free to dive into Nietzsche.
You don't need to read Greek literature and history extensively to understand Plato and Aristotle, but some basic background on the era will help. Maybe a "Classical Civilization" book or something.

>the Start with the Greeks meme is really meant to read the Greeks for the Greeks.
Darn.
> you probably don't even know what you want to read because studying Kant is a lot more difficult than the Greeks.
You're most likely right. But I did enjoy the few things I somewhat understood, like the concepts of a priori (time, space) and a posteriori (empirical data).

I still feel like you're subtly trolling me.

Thanks user. I will incorporate your advice into my plan.

This is the most legit reply if you want to go easy mode.

Most of the posts here are aping the suggestions from this chart. It's solid for someone who wants to have some semblance of the classical training that used to be prevalent in Western education until fairly recent times. The biggest take-away from completing it is getting much more out of more contemporary works that rely heavily on references to classical mythology and history, which is a large chunk of Western literature and poetry up through the 20th century.

Ok OP, I'll let you in on a secret
you can read other books by academics that essentially summarise the works of the people you want to read. For example instead of reading all of Plato's works you can find a book that concisely explains his ideas for you, meaning you're more likely to get the right ideas in less time.
This is an easy way of powering through the western canon to eventually reach the ideas you want, and you can fully understand them since you know the entier background and how they emerged.
NEVER skip the greeks though

Just read Plato senpai

His list is good.
Imagine it as reading the conversation of a few wise grandpas(that's what it literally is desu)

You're all such a bunch of pretentious faggots its fucking disgusting

>/a/

welcome to Veeky Forums

Is this pic from a Veeky Forums meet-up?

The dialogues in this book stand on their own well. You can understand them fine without having read any Greek poetry or drama. Honestly, I think this is a decent ground zero. You'll pick up most of his predecessors retroactively.

Also, I can't speak for Nietzsche or Kant in particular, but you'll miss something from almost all philosophers (even these Greeks are often responding to earlier figures whose works are only known by a few scraps), so it can be a fool's errand to try to be read on everything before approaching a philosopher. Sometimes it can help you most to find the philosopher you want and work backwards whenever you run into a snag or something unfamiliar. As one weeb to another, I tried to understand Wittgenstein very thoroughly after playing Subarashiki Hibi and was able to follow along alright by using lectures on YouTube even if I didn't have a lot of background in Russell or Frege, for example.

Listing off a bunch of dialogues may make it look like a lot of work but most of Plato's stuff is very short and pretty easy reading. When you want to move onto modern stuff Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy is the place to start then just move on to guys like Hume, Berkeley and Leibniz. Plato and Aristotle really are essential though.