PLEASE NOTE this is a sample reading list for the 2015-16 academic year
– precise seminar content may change from year to year.
Primary Texts
Spinoza
Benedict de Spinoza, A Spinoza Reader. The Ethics and Other Works, ed. E. Curley
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), or
Benedict de Spinoza, Ethics, ed, E. Curley (London: Penguin, 1996) [this includes Curley’s
translation of the Ethics in the Princeton edition above, but contains no other texts by
Spinoza], or
Baruch Spinoza, The Ethics and Selected Letters, trans. S. Shirley (Indianapolis: Hackett,
1982).
Also helpful will be: B. Spinoza, The Letters, trans. S. Shirley (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1995).
Leibniz
G.W. Leibniz, Philosophical Texts, eds. R.S. Woolhouse and R. Francks (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1998) [contains Discourse on Metaphysics, a selection from the
Correspondence with Arnauld, Monadology and other texts], or
G.W. Leibniz, Philosophical Essays, trans. R. Ariew and D. Garber (Indianapolis: Hackett,
1989) [also contains Discourse on Metaphysics, Monadology and other texts, but includes a
shorter selection from the Correspondence with Arnauld than the OUP collection]
Secondary Texts
General
A Companion to Early Modern Philosophy, ed. S. Nadler (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002, 2008).
The Blackwell Guide to the Modem Philosophers: From Descartes to Nietzsche, ed. S.
Emmanuel (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001).
A.W. Moore, The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics: Making Sense of Things (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2012).
P. Phemister, The Rationalists: Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz (Cambridge: Polity Press,
2006).
R.S. Woolhouse, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz: The Concept of Substance in SeventeenthCentury Metaphysics (London: Routledge, 1993).
On Spinoza
The Cambridge Companion to Spinoza, ed. D. Garrett (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1996) .
H. Allison, Benedict de Spinoza: An Introduction, revised edition (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1987).
H. Allison, article on Spinoza in The Routledge Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, vol. 9, pp. 91107.
J. Bennett, A Study of Spinoza's Ethics (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1984).
J. T. Cook, Spinoza’s Ethics. A Reader’s Guide (London: Continuum, 2007).
E. Curley, Behind the Geometrical Method. A Reading of Spinoza’s Ethics (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1988).
G. Deleuze, Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza, trans. M. Joughin (New York: Zone
Books, 1992).
G. Deleuze, Spinoza: Practical Philosophy, trans. R. Hurley (San Francisco: City Light
Books, 1988).
M. Della Rocca, Spinoza (London: Routledge, 2008).
S. Hampshire, Spinoza and Spinozism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2005).
E.E. Harris, Spinoza's Philosophy: An Outline (New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1992).
G. Lloyd, Spinoza and the Ethics (London: Routledge, 1996).
B. Lord, Spinoza’s Ethics (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010).
R. Mason, The God of Spinoza. A Philosophical Study (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1997).
Y.Y. Melamed, Spinoza’s Metaphysics: Substance and Thought (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 2013).
S. Nadler, Spinoza. A Life (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
S. Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2006).
R. Scruton, Spinoza (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986).
On Leibniz
The Bloomsbury Companion to Leibniz, ed. B. Look (London: Bloomsbury, 2014).
The Cambridge Companion to Leibniz, ed. N. Jolley (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1995).
Leibniz. Nature and Freedom, eds. D. Rutherford and J.A. Cover (Oxford: Oxford Univerity
Press, 2005).
S. Brown, Leibniz (Brighton: Harvester, 1984).
D. Garber, Leibniz: Body, Substance, Monad (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009).
N. Jolley, Leibniz (London: Routledge, 2005).
G. MacDonald Ross, Leibniz (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984).
C. Mercer, Leibniz’s Metaphysics: Its Origin and Development (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2001).
G.H.R.Parkinson, Logic and Reality in Leibniz’s Metaphysics (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1965).
G. Rodriguez-Pereyra, Leibniz’s Principle of Identity of Indiscernibles (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2014).
A. Savile, Leibniz and the Monadology (London: Routledge, 2000).
***
M. Stewart, The Courtier and the Heretic. Leibniz, Spinoza, and the Fate of God in the
Modern World (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005).