A better way to read books
To download the latest version to run locally on Obsidian, click here
In 1952, after nearly 400,000 hours of reading, Mortimer Adler published The Syntopicon. It was meant to be a reference book that indexed the world's great ideas.
"The aim of this "syntopical reading" was to discover the unity and continuity of Western thought in the discussion of common themes and problems from one end of the tradition to the other. All the works in the Great Books are significantly related to one another and, taken together, they adequately present the ideas and issues, the terms and topics, that have made the Western tradition what it is. More than a collection of books, then, the Great Books are a certain kind of whole that can and should be read as such." - Mortimer Adler
Our literary heritage is, in an essence, a "Great Conversation" -- the ongoing process of writers and thinkers referencing, building on, and refining the work of their predecessors. Since the time of Homer, authors have wrestled with the same fundamental, existential ideas, themes and questions. The Syntopicon aims to trace that. It traces the conversations that have defined our civilization, connecting and troubling people in every age. And it gives us an opportunity to read these conversations and then participate in and contribute to them.
This project does something similar to the original Syntopicon. It takes the great books and then puts their most influential ideas in backlinks. Each idea is a node in the graph, and also has an index of every single instance where the idea has been mentioned. In this way, you can see how different ideas are connected together and how they develop and evolve overtime. It combines the power and flexibility of knowledge graphs with our best ideas to create a better reading experience for you, so that you can satisfy your curiosity and explore the ideas that have shaped us civilization in a fast and seamless manner.
Here is the graph you will be able to explore and play with. Each idea is a node in the graph, and the lines in between the nodes show how the different ideas are connected to each other.
Suppose you are reading "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" and are really fascinated by the idea of hope. You can click on the word and see a list of all other mentions of hope to explore how other authors examine the idea.
You can do so for any of the ideas in backlinks. Here, suppose you wanted to explore the influence of Homer in Western literature. Clicking on his name generates a list of every instance he is mentioned
If you want to explore a reference further, you can simply click on it and you will be taken to that instance, as shown here.
Note: If you just want to read, the books are hosted on this website. Unfortunately, the graph and linked mentions cannot be supported online yet. To access those, you will have to run Obsidian locally.
- Download the Obsidian App
- Download the folder linked here
- Open the Obsidian vault on the downloaded folder
- You're done!! Happy exploring
Note: To optimise the graph, you can decrease node size and line thickness in the graph settings
- The project is open source and you can explore the repository here
- To request a book, you can great a Github issue or fill out this form
- If you are fascinated by a particular idea and want to introduction for an idea, please open a Github pull request or contact [email protected].
- One problem is that all the books are currently in lowercase. If you want to improve punctuation or the structure of any of the books, please open a Github pull request or contact [email protected].
- Another potential improvement would be to group synonyms or similar themes together. If you want to do so, please open a Github pull request or contact [email protected].
This is a passion project I made in my spare time. If you have any feedback or want to learn more or contribute or work together, I would be more than happy to hear from you at [email protected] or using this Feedback form.
A big thank you to Project Gutenberg and The Internet Classics Archive for making these books available online for free. If you are able, please consider donating to Project Gutenberg to support their mission of making knowledge available online for free.