[MagnumOpus]

She is teaching courses that involve reading books. In her words: “I’m teaching Existentialism this semester. It is entirely primary texts—Dostoevsky, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Camus, Sartre”. Five or more books plus a textbook might cost $100. (And yes of course all of these are on Gutenberg and Libgen, but the point is that the kids don’t read them either way.)

[TimorousBestie]

Setting aside Libgen (never used it, don’t know anything about it), it’s unlikely that any of those authors is available on Gutenberg in a modern, critical translation. Reading primary texts in their publication language was dead or dying even when I was a philosophy major, but still it’s impossible to do close textual analysis without a scholarly translation.

I know some of the early translations of e.g. Nietzche sometimes end up saying the opposite of what might have been intended, which is a downer.

[psychoslave]

I guess that anyone which, on top of being an English native, can read both French and German, and are confident that they can grasp anything from some of their most sybilin hermeneuticians, is really far from the average student, whatever their nationality.

The linked text is clearly announcing it's focused on the average student, not the top of bottom tiers.

I'm not sure about the opinion that the author implies about Harry Potter, but I'm confident the series is an easier read and still give you plenty of opportunity to discuss about philosophical and literacy topics.

Anyway, that's definitely an interesting reading, I forwarded it to my wife who teach as a physician, something I rarely feel like relevant to do with HN posts.