Science of Logic - Brief History of The Book

Brief History of The Book

Hegel wrote 'The Science of Logic' after he had completed his Phenomenology of Spirit and while he was in Nuremberg working at a secondary school and courting his fiancé. It was published in a number of volumes. The first, ‘The Objective Logic’, has two parts (the Doctrines of Being and Essence) and each part was published in 1812 and 1813 respectively. The second volume, ‘The Subjective Logic’ was published in 1816 the same year he became a professor of philosophy at Heidelberg. The Science of Logic is too advanced for undergraduate students so Hegel wrote an Encyclopaedic version of the logic which was published in 1817.

In 1826 the book went out of stock. Instead of reprinting, as requested, Hegel undertook some revisions. By 1831 Hegel completed a greatly revised and expanded version of the ‘Doctrine of Being’, but had no time to revise the rest of the book. The Preface to the second edition is dated 7 November 1831, just before his death on 14 November 1831. This edition appeared in 1832, and again in 1834–5 in the posthumous Works. Only the second edition of Science of Logic is translated into English.