Books

5 minute read

“I’ve developed a great reputation for wisdom by ordering more books than I ever had time to read, and reading more books, by far, than I learned anything useful from, except, of course, that some very tedious gentlemen have written books. This is not a new insight, but the truth of it is something you have to experience to fully grasp.”

- Gilead

Top recommendation

Lee Kuan Yew’s memoirs, The Singapore Story and From Third World to First. The “Zero to One” of building a first world nation.

Biographies and auto-biographies

Personal History by Katharine Graham (1917-2001), former leader of the Washington Post. Born into a traditional wealthy East coast family, Graham’s father initially bought the Washington Post in a bankruptcy auction, and when he moved on it seemed natural to Graham that the editorship would pass to her husband Philip rather than herself. But in 1963 Philip died by suicide and Graham became the leader of the Post. Despite her lack of experience, she sourced a string of strong collaborators and advisors and expanded her circle of competence over time in a recognisably feminine way, eventually becoming a little less traditional:

“In Washington and elsewhere where large, social dinners were given, men and women automatically separated after eating, the men usually remaining at the dining-room table discussing serious matters over brandy and cigars while the women retreated to the living room or the hostess’s bedroom to powder their noses and gossip, mostly about children and houses—“women’s” interests, as they were then considered. I remember hearing a story that once Cissy Patterson, on being herded off with the other women after dinner, said to her hostess, “Let’s hurry through this. I have no household problems and my daughter is grown.” But she, too, accepted this ancient custom, as did I. Long after I had gone to work and was engaged in discussing political, business, or world affairs with many of these same men by day, at night, after dinner, I would mindlessly take myself off with the rest of the women, even in my own house. Finally, one night at Joe Alsop’s, something snapped. I realized that I had worked all day, participated in an editorial-issue lunch, and was not only deeply involved in but was actually interested in what was going on in the world. Yet I was being asked to spend up to an hour waiting to rejoin the men. That night at Joe’s—he was especially guilty of keeping the men around his table—I told him I was sure he would understand if I quietly left when the women were dismissed. Far from understanding, Joe was upset. Defensively, he insisted that the separation didn’t last a full hour but only long enough for the men to go to the bathroom. I maintained that that was nonsense, that I liked early evenings, that I looked forward to my reading, and, further, that I wasn’t trying to tell him what to do but only stating what I wanted to do. Joe couldn’t accept the idea of my leaving and promised that if I stayed he would let everyone—men and women—remain at the table.”

  • Steve Jobs and Einstein, both by Walter Isaacson
  • Mao: The Unknown Story by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday
  • Just Kids by Patti Smith

From my time at Halter

  • The Hard Thing about Hard Things, by Ben Horowitz 
  • Zero to One, by Peter Thiel
  • The Singularity is Near, by Ray Kurzweil
  • The Quantum Frontier, by Don Lincoln
  • Sapiens, by Yuval Noah Harari (although in my opinion this essay by Erik Hoel is better)

Twitter core

Tech side:

  • Surely You’re Joking, Mr Feynman!
  • The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn
  • The Elephant in the Brain, Robin Hanson
  • Essays by Francis Bacon, Francis Bacon (translated by Jonathan Bennett)

“This same truth is a naked and open daylight, which doesn’t show the masks and mummeries and triumphs of the world in half as stately and dainty a way as do the candle-lights of truth mixed with error. Truth may come to the price of a pearl, which shows best by day, but it won’t rise to the price of a diamond or other gemstone that shows best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie always adds pleasure.”

Soft side:

  • Eastern Body, Western Mind, Anodea Judith
  • Impro, Keith Johnstone
  • Be Here Now, Ram Dass

General interest non-fiction

Classics

  • The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera
  • Dream of the Red Chamber, Cao Xueqin
  • Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
  • Infinite Jest, DFW
  • East of Eden, Steinbeck
  • The Illiad
  • The Odyssey
  • Gilead, Marilynne Robinson

“I feel sometimes as if I were a child who opens its eyes on the world once and sees amazing things it will never know any names for and then has to close its eyes again.”

Fiction and autofiction

  • Trip, Taipei, and Leave Society, all by Tao Lin
  • My Struggle, Karl Ove Knausgård
  • Early Work, Andrew Martin
  • Real Life, Brandon Taylor
  • 10:04, The Topeka School, and other works by Ben Lerner
  • Let Me Tell You What I Mean by Joan Didion
  • Every Sally Rooney novel
  • Big Little Lies, Liane Moriarty

Great manuals

A Guide to Modern Cookery

  • Released in 1903 by elite chef Auguste Escoffier, this manual covers a style of French cooking more elaborate and uncompromising than anything I found in Paris. It’s interesting to compare his recipe for a simple blond roux with the bastardized version now taught by the Auguste Escoffier School of Culinary Arts.

You Don’t Know JS by Kyle Simpson

  • Programming books are probably defunct due to LLMs, but I have fond memories of using this series to go from “can read React documentation” to “no one has a more thorough understanding of the event loop than I” in a couple of days. Great resources for intermediate practitioners are so underrated.

Sex and love

  • Diary of Anaïs Nin, Volume VI
  • Call Me By Your Name, André Aciman
  • Vox, Nicholson Baker
    • The book Monica Lewinsky gifted Bill Clinton.

Sci-fi and historical fiction

  • The Culture novels by Ian Banks
  • The Nexus Trilogy by Ramez Naam
  • Remembrance of Earth’s Past by Liu Cixin (i.e. The Three Body Problem)
  • Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson
  • Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel

Kids’ books and fantasy series

  • The Curse of Chalion and Paladin of Souls, both by Lois McMaster Bujold
  • Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
  • Tomorrow When the War Began, by John Marsden
  • ASOIAF, GRRM
  • Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling
  • CHERUB, Robert Muchamore

Fanfiction & AO3 Core

At least vaguely political

  • The Privileged Poor, Anthony Abraham Jack
  • Poor Economics, Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo
  • James Comey’s A Higher Loyalty
  • Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
  • Houllebecq’s Submission
  • Hillybilly Elegy, JD Vance

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