Is Aristotle really that difficult?

On face value it won't seem too difficult. But there's a lot lying there beneath the surface. When you start reading the later scholars and commentators you'll really begin to appreciate the difficulty and the subtlety of the work that is being done by these people. It really is awe-inspiring.

And of course you should read the whole fucking book. Do you really want to say some day "I only read books II and VI of NE" instead of "Yeah, I've read those"?

>>9961072
Hes probably in the top 10 of most difficult philosophers in the Western Tradition.

his "book" is a chaotic cluster of lecture notes

>>9961072
1. Organon and Ethics are mostly readable, Metaphysics is very difficult. Read Plato first: Aristotle's philosophy is partly criticism of Plato.
2. For the Metaphysics, if you do not care about reading whole books, read Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta and Lambda. Make sure you read Delta, Aristotle defines several key concepts there. Zeta is very hard, you could glance over that or read a secondary source on it.
3. Definitely worth it. You will encounter Aristotle a lot in Medieval and Arabic philosophy, but also in modern philosophers like Kant and Hegel, and postmodern authors like Heidegger. If you are interested in politics, consider reading Politics as well.
Good luck.

>>9961072
It's difficult but not impossible. Read slowly, take notes, read the entire thing. He's a very important philosopher

quick someone give me the quick rundown on poetics

>>9962605
things that you already know because western literature has internalized what aristotle taught

>>9961072
>1. Are they very difficult?
Yes but not impossible. They take work and a vastly different approach from reading Plato, but they're readable and valuable. Your method will have to be different; you have to read commentaries basically immediately after you read an Aristotelian treatise. Read Telford's commentary on the categories/de int. immediately after reading those texts. It'll help you figure out what they're about, and also ground you in terms of the overall organon.
>2. Are only some chapters/books worth reading and the rest skipping?
Maybe, but even then only in retrospect. You'll look back on certain sections and think "that was a fucking waste of time because apparently modern scholars don't even know what the fuck he was talking about," but those sections are rare enough and so embedded in the main works that you should just read everything and then bitch about the shittier parts later.
>3. Are they worth reading? Like, will I need knowledge of Aristotle for Kant?
Don't know about Kant, but I've personally had a lot of fun struggling through the organon and some of Aristotle's earlier physical treatises. Haven't read any ethics or the metaphysics, but once you get over the fact that you won't be getting literature like with Plato, it's interesting, informative, and just by virtue of its difficulty is educational simply in terms of making you more accustomed to grappling with tough, dry nonfiction (esp. philosophical) texts. Definitely recommend at least categories/de int/both analytics, physics, and de anima, in addition to the ethics and metaphysics you're already interested in.

PS Keep an eye out for Aquinas' commentaries on various Aristotelian treatises, as they are some of the most lucid, comprehensive, and highly regarded of all time.