Recently Mentioned Books

Also new and notable is Andrew Lo, Adaptive Markets: Financial Evolution at the Speed of Thought .

Ilde Rizzo and Ruth Towse, editors, The Artful Economist: A New Look at Cultural Economics .

Zoe Fraade-Blanar and Aaron M. Glazer, Superfandom: How Our Obsessions are Changing What We Buy and Who We Are .

Gary Saul Morson, Cents and Sensibility: What Economics Can Learn From the Humanities , and

That is from her 2003 book The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle Class Parents Are (Still) Going Broke , with Amelia Warren Tyagi.  Here is the WSJ link to the full passage , Friedmanesque throughout.  The more general underlying point is that the “rent is too damn high crowd” ought to be somewhat more sympathetic to vouchers than is often currently the case.

And I have been enjoying my ongoing browse of Robert E. Lerner, Ernst Kantorowicz: A Life .

Andrzej Franaszek, Milosz: A Biography . Long, thorough, but readable treatment, focusing on more on his poetry than the political writings.

7. Giorgio Bassani, The Garden of the Finzi-Continis .  This beautiful short novel (also a movie) is especially good on anti-Semitism in Italy, how youth process political collapse in their countries, and how events can outrace your expectations and leave you in a haze.

6. I’ve also been reading plenty of Benedetto Croce , including his history of Naples and History, its Theory and Practice .  He is oddly boring and non-concrete, but was a consistent opponent of the Italian fascist regime, except for the first two years of Mussolini’s rule (he later claimed that was for tactical reasons).  In any case, the reader learns that the opposing side doesn’t always have a good ability to articulate why bad events are happening.  I can recommend Fabio Fernando Rizi’s ve...

6. I’ve also been reading plenty of Benedetto Croce , including his history of Naples and History, its Theory and Practice .  He is oddly boring and non-concrete, but was a consistent opponent of the Italian fascist regime, except for the first two years of Mussolini’s rule (he later claimed that was for tactical reasons).  In any case, the reader learns that the opposing side doesn’t always have a good ability to articulate why bad events are happening.  I can recommend Fabio Fernando Rizi’s ve...

5. Alexander de Grand, Italian Fascism: Its Origin and Development .  Highly focused and to the point, also has an A+ quality annotated bibliography.  It considers regions of Italy, demographic issues, looks at the arts, and for such a short book gives the reader a remarkably broad and multi-faceted perspective.  Overall this book emphasizes how deeply rooted fascism was in so many other Italian institutions and ways of life.

4. R.J.B. Bosworth, Mussolini’s Italy: Life Under the Dictatorship .  I’ve only read parts of this one, but it seems to be the best detailed historical account of a non-Nazi fascist regime.  If you wish to know, for instance, how and why the Italian fascists reformed Italian public holidays, this is your go-to source.

3. Robert O. Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism .  Along with Payne, one of the core books to read, stronger on analysis while Payne has more historical detail.  He is especially clear on how the fascists built up and refined their political coalitions over time, and the conflicting roles of party and nation in the history of fascism.

2. Stanley G. Payne, A History of Fascism 1914-1945 .  One of the classics, readable and comprehensive and one of the best places to start.  One thing I learned from this pile of books is how hard some of those leaders worked to have the mid-level bureaucracy on their side.  The centralization often occurred at higher levels, for instance Mussolini had 72 cabinet meetings in 1933, but only 4 in 1936.  The Italian Fascist party, by the way, was disproportionately Jewish, at least pre-1938.

1. Lucy Hughes-Hallett, The Pike: Gabriele d’Annunzio Poet, Seducer and Preacher of War .  A vivid and entertaining look at a major European fascist who remains neglected by Americans (I don’t even think this book has a U.S. edition).  I was surprised how readable this book was, given its length and subject matter.  The words “rollicking” and “psychopath” come to mind.  He was nonetheless one of the most influential European writers of his time.

They have a new book out, namely Governing Global Health: Who Runs the World and Why? It is to the point, clear, uses economic reasoning very well, and serves up the information you actually want to learn.  It is a look at some major public health organizations, specifically the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, the Gavi Alliance, the WHO, and the World Bank, and how they operate, from a public choice point of view.  It’s hard to think of many books I’ve looked at over the last year or ...

Gray, a renowned cultural and historical pessimist, also offers a critique of those thinkers who promote mass feline genocide, so at this point you may be wondering why he titled his book Straw Dogs .  Here is the review .  Here is Abigail Tucker’s very good cat book, The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World .

Gray, a renowned cultural and historical pessimist, also offers a critique of those thinkers who promote mass feline genocide, so at this point you may be wondering why he titled his book Straw Dogs .  Here is the review .  Here is Abigail Tucker’s very good cat book, The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World .

The author is Joshua Kurlantzick and the subtitle is America in Laos and the Birth of a Military CIA , here is one excerpt from a book I read through to the end:

Authored by John Curtis Perry , this is a good one-volume introduction to the history of Singapore, with the most interesting section being the one on the Japanese wartime occupation.  Here is one excerpt:

Recommended, pre-order it here .

You can order the book here , here is the Rosa Brooks WSJ review .

That is the new and truly excellent biography of Paul Samuelson , by Roger E. Backhouse, volume I alone, which covers only up to 1948, is over 700 pp.  So far I find it gripping, here is one bit:

The authors are Dalton Conley and Jason Fletcher, and the subtitle is What the Social Genomics Revolution Reveals About Ourselves, Our History and the Future .

By Vlad Tarko, order your copy here .  Here are two excerpts: