Phenomenology of Mind is really brilliant - I still haven't read it in full, but I find myself returning to it, again and again. I think there's a case to be made that Hegel was lightyears ahead of his contemporaries. But "important" can mean a billion different things, so this is a really hard question to answer!

You can choose your favorite work.

I have to admit that I find the question a bit too presumptuous to answer. "classical" already selects among many works, and it would seem to me that classical would already include "important" -- and how does one select between important texts?

I mean, I am appreciative of the conversation starters that you are posting -- but the question is just so big.

I changed the question.

Ah ok. my bad.

THEN -- I have grown to really enjoy the Republic. But I admit that the Phenomenology of Mind was a very close second. The only reason I pick the Republic over the latter is the appeal which Plato holds to other people -- which I value in a text regardless of how I may personally feel about it.

I initially disliked the Republic, but have grown to appreciate it with re-readings over time. I don't agree with it, of course, but I can find a basis of sympathy with it.

The World as Will and Presentation (Schopenhauer)

It's an almost unacceptable omission from such a poll I think. I voted Wittgenstein.

No Philosophical Investigations?

Tractatus is better - pick it! Philosophical Investigations is merely a continuation of the same mission started in the Tractatus. The genius was the Tractatus.

I started it but couldn't bring myself to finish it. I find it very different to the PI.

I started it but couldn't bring myself to finish it. I find it very different to the PI. — Michael

But it's much easier to read, and a lot more concise. You can also ponder it for much longer. Tractatus is just dealing with the language of logic. PI attempts to deal with all language, not only in its logical function. The reason why Tractatus deals with the language of logic is because the logical atomists tried to reduce all language to the language of logic - they thought all its functions could be captured by logic. So Wittgenstein was correct - if all language could be reduced to logic, then the Tractatus was the end of philosophy and matters would have been settled. That's why Wittgenstein differentiated language by "meaning is use" in PI - there is a way language is used when folks engage in formal logic, which, for example, is different than the way language is used when they pray - and the latter can't be reduced to the former.

What I find much stranger is why the work Nietzsche is listed with is "Will to Power"? Shouldn't it be "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" or "Beyond Good and Evil"?

Yeah, one of those two. The Will to Power is probably the least appropriate one to offer.

Tractatus is better — Agustino

Personally I think the Tractatus sucks. I don't care for Wittgenstein in general, but the way the Tractatus is written is garbage in my opinion. Philosophical Investigations is at least well-written.

The Antichrist is pretty great, too. BG&E is great, but some of it wanders perhaps from contemporary relevance (a little too topical). TSZ comes off a little awkward, insufficiently "prosy."