A Hegel reading list

Primary texts

There are four English translations of The Phenomenology of Spirit.
J. B. Baillie 1910/1931 (very antiquated and in many ways inaccurate, but helpful thanks to its more attractive literary qualities)
A. V. Miller 1977
Michael Inwood 2018 (effectively a revision of Miller)
Terry Pinkard 2018


There are three English translations of The Science of Logic. None is ideal, but each has its uses. Johnston and Struthers; A. V. Miller; George di Giovanni.

There are two English translations of Encyclopaedia I: Science of Logic. Wallace; Geraets/Suchting/Harris.

There are two English translations of Encyclopaedia II: Philosophy of Nature. Miller; Petry.

There is one English translation of Encyclopaedia III: Philosophy of Spirit. Wallace rev. Inwood. There is an additional English translation of III: Philosophy of Subjective Spirit. Petry.

There are two English translations of Philosophy of Right. Knox; Nisbet. Nisbet is to be preferred.

Lectures on Philosophy of History; Lectures on History of Philosophy; Lectures on Philosophy of Religion; Lectures on Aesthetics; etc.

Recommended secondary readings: introductory

G. R. G. Mure, The Philosophy of Hegel 1965.

Charles Taylor, Hegel 1975.

Charles Taylor, Hegel and Modern Society 1979.

Michael Inwood, Hegel 1983.

Recommended secondary readings: advanced

Michael B. Foster, Die Geschichte als Schicksal des Geistes in der Hegelschen Philosophie 1929.

G. R. G. Mure, An Introduction to Hegel 1940.

Dieter Henrich, Hegel im Kontext 1971/1988/2010. (Collection of essays)

Michael Theunissen, Sein und Schein: die kritische Funktion der hegelschen Logik 1978.

See also the discussion proceeding from Sein und Schein in Hans Friedrich Fulda, Rolf-Peter Horstmann and Michael Theunissen, Kritische Darstellung der Metaphysik 1980.

Karen Ng, Hegel’s Concept of Life 2020.

Recommended secondary readings: Phenomenology of Spirit

Jean Hyppolite, Genesis and Structure of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. Samuel Cherniak and John Heckman 1974 (French original: Genèse et structure de la Phénoménologie de l’esprit de Hegel 1946).

Hans Friedrich Fulda, Das Problem einer Einleitung in Hegels Wissenschaft der Logik 1965/1975.

Robert Stern, Routledge Guidebook to Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit 2001/2013.

Ludwig Siep, Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. Daniel Smyth 2014 (German original: Der Weg der Phänomenologie des Geistes: Ein einführender Kommentar zu Hegels ‘Differenzschrift’ und ‘Phänomenologie des Geistes’ 2000.

H. S. Harris, Hegel: Phenomenology and System 1995.

Recommended secondary readings: logic

G. R. G. Mure, A Study of Hegel’s Logic 1950.

Georg Sans, Die Realisierung des Begriffs 2004.

Recommended secondary readings: political philosophy

Franz Rosenzweig, Hegel und der Staat 1920 (Suhrkamp edn 2010).

M. B. Foster, The Political Philosophies of Plato and Hegel 1935.

Recommended secondary readings: legacy

John Edward Toews, Hegelianism: The Path Toward Dialectical Humanism, 1805–1841 1980.