Philosophical Fiction Book Club

This event is supported by The Royal Institute of Philosophy’s Local Partners Programme.

N.B.: this meeting will be held online via Google Meet. There is also an in-person session being held on Wednesday in the Prince of Wales pub near Covent Garden.

For the culmination of our 'Crisis of Values' year, we return to Russian nihilist philosophy and its consequences in the eyes of Dostoevsky. We join poverty-stricken protagonist Rodion Raskolnikov as he schemes to commit a 'justified' murder, and the moral and spiritual crisis that haunts him afterwards.

The meeting starts at 7pm with drink breaks at 8 and 9. The discussion will end around 10pm but leave whenever you need to.

Here's the blurb from GoodReads:

Raskolnikov, a destitute and desperate former student, wanders through the slums of St Petersburg and commits a random murder without remorse or regret. He imagines himself to be a great man, a Napoleon: acting for a higher purpose beyond conventional moral law. But as he embarks on a dangerous game of cat and mouse with a suspicious police investigator, Raskolnikov is pursued by the growing voice of his conscience and finds the noose of his own guilt tightening around his neck. Only Sonya, a downtrodden sex worker, can offer the chance of redemption.

This event is supported by The Royal Institute of Philosophy’s Local Partners Programme.

N.B. this meeting will be held in person in the Prince of Wales pub near Covent Garden. There is also an online session held on Thursday if you are not in London or are not able to attend in person for any other reason.

Moving on from 2025's theme of 'Crisis', our theme for 2026 will be 'Quest'. The year will take us through Homer's Odyssey and culminate with Moby-Dick, but we will kick off the journey with Ursula K. LeGuin's A Wizard of Earthsea.

Published in 1968, this is not your average children's book. Drawing deeply from both Western and Eastern ideas of the myth, quest and philosophy, the story follows Ged as he experiences both the joy and awful weight of magic on his journey to become the Wizard, Sparrowhawk.

The meeting starts at 7pm with drink breaks at 8 and 9. The discussion will end around 10pm but leave whenever you need to.

Here's the blurb from GoodReads:

Ged was the greatest wizard in Earthsea, but in his youth he was the reckless Sparrowhawk. In his hunger for power and knowledge, he tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world. This is the tumultuous tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death's threshold to restore the balance.

This event is supported by The Royal Institute of Philosophy’s Local Partners Programme.

N.B.: this meeting will be held online via Google Meet. There is also an in-person session being held on Wednesday in the Prince of Wales pub near Covent Garden.

Moving on from 2025's theme of 'Crisis', our theme for 2026 will be 'Quest'. The year will take us through Homer's Odyssey and culminate with Moby-Dick, but we will kick off the journey with Ursula K. LeGuin's A Wizard of Earthsea.

Published in 1968, this is not your average children's book. Drawing deeply from both Western and Eastern ideas of the myth, quest and philosophy, the story follows Ged as he experiences both the joy and awful weight of magic on his journey to become the Wizard, Sparrowhawk.

The meeting starts at 7pm with drink breaks at 8 and 9. The discussion will end around 10pm but leave whenever you need to.

Here's the blurb from GoodReads:

Ged was the greatest wizard in Earthsea, but in his youth he was the reckless Sparrowhawk. In his hunger for power and knowledge, he tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world. This is the tumultuous tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death's threshold to restore the balance.