Part 1
To Korean readers
Celebrating the 20th anniversary of the publication of "Sophie's World"

Garden of Eden
Magician's Hat
myth
natural philosophers
Democritus
fate
Socrates
Athens
Platon
Major's Cabin
Aristotle
Hellenism
postcard
Two cultures

Part 2
Middle Ages
Renaissance
Baroque
Descartes
Spinoza
lock
Hume
Berkeley
Bierkelly
Enlightenment

Part 3
Kant
Romanticism
Hegel
Kierkegaard
Marx
Darwin
Freud
Our times
Garden party
counterpoint
Big Bang

Translator's Note
Reviewer's Note
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A novel that beautifully embodies philosophy

"Sophie's World" presents philosophy in a different way than before.
Although it is a novel about philosophy, it is not simply an educational novel or a novel for the purpose of introducing philosophy.
It is not a book that simply explains difficult philosophy in an easy way.
"Sophie's World" allows us to understand the philosophical roots of modern intellectual civilization through a fantastic story structure.


Gaarder successfully embodies philosophical speculation through the most popular literary form, the novel.
In other words, in this novel, philosophical seriousness and rigor are beautifully embodied in the clothes of captivating beauty.
The author vividly demonstrates that the path of philosophical contemplation, although demanding of painful mental labor and patience, contains a beauty and joy that cannot be found anywhere else, thereby awakening in the reader a natural yearning for a philosophical life and attitude.
This is the decisive feature that distinguishes it from other philosophy books.

Why did Gaarder write "Sophie's World"?

Film critic Lee Dong-jin said, “Philosophy gives a strange coolness.
“It’s not as easy to read as a novel, so it can be painful in some ways, but philosophy is fundamentally a discipline that thinks through language, and because it uses language strictly, there is a joy that comes from that,” he said, expressing the appeal of philosophy.

Gaarder, who was a philosophy teacher, also always thought that children needed philosophy.
For him, philosophy is democratic, a discipline that affects all humanity because it addresses questions that concern everyone, such as "What is the good life?"
“Philosophy asks questions of a global scope that could be called eternal,” says Gaarder.
And above all, the reason philosophy is important is because it piques our curiosity.
“It certainly makes our lives more intense,” he emphasized, adding, “Philosophy is very important for a society where young people develop their own critical and analytical skills.
“A society that creates a generation that blindly rebels is very dangerous,” he says, speaking of the significance of philosophy today.
Through this, we are revealing why we need to know about philosophy in this age of philosophy absence.


A philosophical puzzle that readers ask and answer for themselves.

"Sophie's World" unfolds the thoughts of the great philosophers who left their mark on the vast 3,000-year history of Western philosophy, from ancient Greek philosophy to modern existentialism, one by one, according to the flow of time, while allowing readers to immerse themselves deeply in the author's unique novelistic devices.
This book doesn't simply teach philosophy by rote, but rather, through numerous examples and problems, readers are encouraged to ask and answer philosophical questions they might not have thought of before, and it progresses like a puzzle game where they fill in the blanks.
Therefore, it allows teenagers, college students, and even adults who had to memorize logic to experience the joy of philosophy, and helps them develop the joy of thinking and the ability to think logically.

The best-selling "Sophie's World" craze spread from Europe to the world.

After the translated version was published in Germany in August 1993, it rose to the number one spot on the bestseller lists of five major current affairs weekly magazines, including Der Spiegel, and became a bestseller not only in Germany but also in France, the United States, Japan, and other countries around the world.
The New York Times Book Review even wrote, "Originally written for teenagers, it was adults who made this book a bestseller."
As of 2011, it has been translated into over 60 languages ​​and sold over 40 million copies worldwide, including in France, Germany, the United States, and Japan.

Imagine a guide for beginners to philosophy and a modern fantasy novel like Alice Through the Looking Glass.
What do you get when you blend these two completely different genres? It's an exquisite masterpiece, a rare international bestseller.
― Time

This book will be an excellent introduction for those who have never taken an introductory philosophy course, and it will be a fascinating refresher for those who have taken it or have forgotten most of it.
― Newsweek

What's remarkable about this novel is that it treats philosophy lectures without being pedantic at all.
He conveys Western philosophy as clearly as a glass bead in a plain and skillful style.
― The Washington Post

This work borrows the basic format of a detective novel and creates a philosophical exploration into a novel.
Although the book was originally written for teenagers, it was adults who made it a bestseller.
― New York Times Book Review

plot

Sophie, a fourteen-year-old girl living in the small Norwegian town of Kløverveen, receives a mysterious letter one day.
“Who are you?” The sender of the letter introduces himself as a “philosopher” and immediately begins lecturing Sophie on the history of philosophy.
This exciting and mysterious philosophy class continues despite Sophie's mother's suspicions about Sophie's over-concern with the mailbox and her outlandish comments.
Next, philosophy teacher Alberto Knox, who revealed his identity, explains the historical background and the flow of their theories, from natural philosophers, ancient philosophers such as Socrates and Plato, to modern philosophers such as Hume, Kierkegaard and Freud, in an easy-to-understand manner.
In the middle of this process, Major Albert Knag and a character named Hilde appear, and the novel unfolds shrouded in mystery, entering the world of medieval philosophy.

The story confuses readers when it is revealed that 'Sophie's World', which was depicted as a vivid reality in the beginning, is actually a metafictional fiction written by Major Albert Knag, a Norwegian UN peacekeeper stationed in Lebanon, as a birthday present for his daughter Hilde.
Sophie and her teacher, Alberto Knox, begin to realize that they are merely the protagonists of a novel, and they rebel against their creator, Major Knag, and devise a plan to escape from the novel, "Sophie's World."

Reviewer's Note (Professor Kim Sang-bong, Department of Philosophy, Chonnam National University)

Are we, the readers of "Sophie's World," any better than the beings in this novel? Are my existence and the world I belong to self-evident and solid, unlike Sophie's world? The author inevitably forces us, the readers, into this question.
- p.743

One of the most fundamental achievements of philosophy is to awaken consciousness, lost in the everyday, and to experience what seemed most familiar and self-evident to us—ourselves and the world around us—as infinitely strange and mysterious.
In that sense, "Sophie's World" is not merely an educational novel for introducing philosophy, but is already a meaningful philosophical achievement in itself.
- p.743~744