Recently Mentioned Books

Here is the full Bloomberg column .  And here is Adrian’s new book on liberalism , self-recommending.

2. David Hockney embraced tech (NYT).  And do not forget his writings , not to mention his persona and also his role in gay history and liberation.  He was truly one of the great Englishmen, as he had been doing first-rate work since what, 1954 ?

That is from Lem’s Imaginary Magnitude , an extraordinary book in parts, most of all see his Golem IV section on how n AGI (our term, not his) is likely to behave.

I very much enjoyed Katja’s recent book Weimar: Life on the Edge of Catastrophe .

1. New edition of Copernicus on money .

This was published in English (and Polish) in 1986 under the title One Human Minute :

The author is Martha C. Nussbaum, and the subtitle is Opera & Political Freedom .  Martha decided she did not wish to do a podcast after all, so since I put some real prep time in I thought I would offer some thoughts on the book directly, in part because it is not receiving substantive reviews elsewhere .  I suspect the number of people qualified to review the book, on the musical and philosophical and historical fronts, is pretty small.

Recommended, informative and interesting throughout.  And I am very happy to recommend all of Toby’s books, including his latest The Last Dynasty: Ancient Egypt from Alexander the Great to Cleopatra .

Yes, I will be doing a Conversation with him.  Richard does have a new book coming out, Kakistocracy: Why Populism Ends in Disaster .  While I liked the book (and blurbed it), I do not feel our conversation about the book would be that interesting — too much beating up on the stupidities of other people, which is an activity not in short supply.  So we agreed to (mostly) discuss Joseph Conrad’s Nostromo instead.  Given that, what should I ask Richard?

That is the new Soumaya Keynes book , out today.  I was happy to have blurbed this book, and here is an essay , on export restrictions, based on the book.

5. Suzy Hansen, From Life Itself: Turkey, Istanbul, and a Neighborhood in the Age of Erdoğan . An insightful look into Erdoğan, Turkish Islamism, parts of Istanbul, and most of all how Turkey slid into autocracy.  One of the best case studies I know of on how a fragile democracy can go away.

4. Frank Callanan, James Joyce: A Political Life .  An excellent, lengthy study, I now see Joyce as intensely political whereas I did not before.  “His fiercely Parnellian critique of Ireland and Irish nationalism is only politically intelligible as written from within Irish nationalism.  It is an argument addressed to Irish nationalists.  The paradox of Joyce’s nationalism is that it is in his critique of nationalism that his nationalism is most evident.”  As Italo Svevo once stated: “Joyce is ...

3. Malachi Haim Hacohen, Karl Popper: The Formative Years 1902-1945 .  Such an excellent and high-level work.  And the author is not afraid to accuse Popper of making everything about himself, and also writing on topics (Plato, Hegel, Marx) where he was less than well-informed.  I had not known that Popper hated Toulmin’s Wittgenstein’s Vienna book, feeling that the actual Viennese environment at the time was far more positive and forward-looking than most intellectual historians were inclined t...

2. Robert C. Austin and Artan R. Hoxha, Enver Hoxha: Twentieth-Century Tyrant .  How did this strange story end up happening?  This book offers the best set of explanations I have seen.  But Hoxha himself remains a psychological cipher at the end of it all?  It turns out he never thought Mao was much of an ideologue, being too influenced by Chinese culture and thought.  Also I had not previously realize how much Albania’s growing youth population — with the most natalist demographics in Europe a...

1. Paul Mendes-Flohr, Martin Buber: A Life of Faith and Dissent .  A beautifully written, first-rate intellectual biography of Buber.  It is hard to imagine finding a better book on him.

The subtitle is The Politics of Feasible Liberalism , and the author is Deirdre Nansen McCloskey.  The author wishes to argue for liberalism as opposed to statism , a very good book.  And unlike many authors, Deirdre also tells you what she thinks of everyone else’s views.  Due out in November.

The subtitle is Artificial Intelligence and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning , due out June 23.

Yes I will be doing a Conversation with him.  Chase and Charles Koch have a new book out, namely Becoming a Principle-Driven Leader: 41 Principles to Build an Enduring Business .  And for background here is Wikipedia on Chase Koch .  So what should I ask him?

That is from Frank Fukuyama’s forthcoming memoir , recommended of course.

3. Thomas Mann, Doctor Faustus , a new translation by Ritchie Robertson.  An imperfect, problematic work, too caught up with its own Germanness, and lacking dramatic tension.  Still, an important work and this new translation is much better than the old one.

2. Siri Hustvedt. Ghost Stories: A Memoir .  About her history with her now-deceased husband Paul Auster, and how she dealt with his death.  Moving and insightful, recommended.

1. Mikhail Fishman, The Successor: Boris Nemtsov, Vladimir Putin, and the Decline of Modern Russia .  One of the best books to read on how Russia moved from “had some democratic elements in place” to autocracy, on a step-by-step basis.  The story is told using the career of Boris Nemtsov, who was assassinated in 2014, as a lens.  The author has biases of his own, but they do not detract from what is valuable here.

Bob was excellent throughout, and I very much enjoyed his new biography of the Rolling Stones .

6. I am enjoying the new Elizabeth Strout novel The Things We Never Say .  It is arguably “too American” for me, and also “too New England,” still it is quite good.

2. Steven Nadler, Spinoza, Atheist .  A good and very readable introduction to the Dutch philosopher.