Life and Fate
Vasily Grossman
Mentioned 2 days ago
Platner’s Top Campaign Strategist on What Went Wrong
Book Recommendations
The Ezra Klein Show
Ezra Klein invites you into a conversation on something that matters. How do we address climate change if the political system fails to act? Has the logic of markets infiltrated too many aspects of our lives? What is the future of the Republican Party? What do psychedelics teach us about consciousne...
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The Shame
Makenna Goodman
Mentioned 2 days ago
Platner’s Top Campaign Strategist on What Went Wrong
The Fourth Branch
Daniel Squadron
Mentioned 2 days ago
Platner’s Top Campaign Strategist on What Went Wrong
The Avoidable War
Kevin Rudd
Mentioned 1 week ago
What Xi Jinping Wants
The Party's Interests Come First
Joseph Torigian
Mentioned 1 week ago
What Xi Jinping Wants
The Souls of China
Ian Johnson
Mentioned 1 week ago
What Xi Jinping Wants
The Beginning Comes After the End
Rebecca Solnit
Mentioned 2 weeks ago
The Very Good and Very Bad News on Climate
Here Comes the Sun
Bill McKibben
Mentioned 2 weeks ago
The Very Good and Very Bad News on Climate
The Glorians
Terry Tempest Williams
Mentioned 2 weeks ago
The Very Good and Very Bad News on Climate
The Carbon Wave
Leah C. Stokes
Mentioned 2 weeks ago
The Very Good and Very Bad News on Climate
Brought to You By
Amy Westervelt
Mentioned 2 weeks ago
The Very Good and Very Bad News on Climate
The Holocaust and the Nakba
Bashir Bashir
Mentioned 2 weeks ago
A Radical Vision for Israelis and Palestinians
Most Recommended
How the War Was Won
Air-Sea Power and Allied Victory in World War II (Cambridge Military Histories)
Klein praised the book for its unromantic view of World WarII, noting its focus on production, logistics and the claim that there were no decisive battles.
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I have recently re-read How the War Was Won by Phillips O'Brien, who's a military historian, and it's a book about World War II, but he's become a prolific commentator on the war in U...
— Episode: The Inflation Story Has Changed Dramatic...
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Episode: The Inflation Story Has Changed Dramatically. Paul...
Klein praised the book for its unromantic view of World WarII, noting its focus on production, logistics and the claim that there were no decisive battles.
"
I have recently re-read How the War Was Won by Phillips O'Brien, who's a military historian, and it's a book about World War II, but he's become a prolific commentator on the war in Ukraine, and it's mostly... It's this wonderfully unromantic anti-glory view of war. It's all about, look, it's really about modern wars, about production and logistics. The opening sentence is, I think, there were no decisive battles in World War II.
Ninth House (Ninth House Series, 1)
Klein described the fantasy novel as a fun, dark portrayal of Yale secret societies performing satanic rituals.
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I just read a fantasy novel by Leigh Bardugo called Ninth House, which is set at Yale. ... the conceit of the book is that the secret societies are, in fact, evil places that carry out dark satanic ri...
— Episode: The Inflation Story Has Changed Dramatic...
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Episode: The Inflation Story Has Changed Dramatically. Paul...
Klein described the fantasy novel as a fun, dark portrayal of Yale secret societies performing satanic rituals.
"
I just read a fantasy novel by Leigh Bardugo called Ninth House, which is set at Yale. ... the conceit of the book is that the secret societies are, in fact, evil places that carry out dark satanic rituals. And it was just so much fun to have my college re-represented as a place of dark and terrible secrets.
The Profiteers
How Business Privatizes Profits and Socializes Costs
The book was highlighted as a fascinating story about Bechtel and the massive infrastructure projects that shaped the 20thcentury American West, including the Hoover Dam and nuclear power.
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There's a great book I'd recommend by Sally Denton called The Profiteers, which is about this company Bechtel, which helped build the Hoover Dam and became the megainfrastructure buil...
— Episode: How the $500 Billion Attention Industry...
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Episode: How the $500 Billion Attention Industry Really Wor...
The book was highlighted as a fascinating story about Bechtel and the massive infrastructure projects that shaped the 20thcentury American West, including the Hoover Dam and nuclear power.
"
There's a great book I'd recommend by Sally Denton called The Profiteers, which is about this company Bechtel, which helped build the Hoover Dam and became the megainfrastructure builders of the 20th century.
Jim Ravel's theatrical pickpocketing
The book was suggested as an obscure 1980s howto guide for performance pickpocketing, still available through a magician's website and useful for learning the craft of magical sleightofhand.
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The book called Jim Revell's Theatrical Pickpocketing... came out in the 80s, but is still available... it's basically a very practical howto guide to do pickpocketing as an entertainment performance.
— Episode: How the $500 Billion Attention Industry...
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Episode: How the $500 Billion Attention Industry Really Wor...
The book was suggested as an obscure 1980s howto guide for performance pickpocketing, still available through a magician's website and useful for learning the craft of magical sleightofhand.
"
The book called Jim Revell's Theatrical Pickpocketing... came out in the 80s, but is still available... it's basically a very practical howto guide to do pickpocketing as an entertainment performance.
Babel
Or the Necessity of Violence
Ezra Klein said he and his teenage daughter had just finished reading the novel, calling it a dark, magical fantasyhistorical story set in an alternate Oxford and a "ripsnorter of a good story."
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My teenage daughter and I just finished reading Babel or The Necessity of Violence, which is a novel by RF Kuang. It's a fantasy historical novel set in an alternative Oxford. It's al...
— Episode: How Liberals — Yes, Liberals — Are Hobbl...
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Episode: How Liberals — Yes, Liberals — Are Hobbling Govern...
Ezra Klein said he and his teenage daughter had just finished reading the novel, calling it a dark, magical fantasyhistorical story set in an alternate Oxford and a "ripsnorter of a good story."
"
My teenage daughter and I just finished reading Babel or The Necessity of Violence, which is a novel by RF Kuang. It's a fantasy historical novel set in an alternative Oxford. It's all about themes of colonialism and translation and it's dark and it's magical and it's just a rip snorter of a good story.
Presidents, Populism, and the Crisis of Democracy
Ezra Klein summarized the book's argument that a sense that government no longer works creates fertile ground for populist authoritarians like Trump.
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There's a book by William Howell and Terry Moe, a political scientist, called Presidents, Populism, and the Crisis of Democracy. They basically make this argument that one of the thin...
— Episode: How Liberals — Yes, Liberals — Are Hobbl...
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Episode: How Liberals — Yes, Liberals — Are Hobbling Govern...
Ezra Klein summarized the book's argument that a sense that government no longer works creates fertile ground for populist authoritarians like Trump.
"
There's a book by William Howell and Terry Moe, a political scientist, called Presidents, Populism, and the Crisis of Democracy. They basically make this argument that one of the things that creates fertile ground for populist authoritarians, which you see in many different countries but Trump represents here, is this sense that government doesn't really work anymore.
Fixer-Upper
How to Repair America’s Broken Housing Systems
The book was introduced as a clear overview of America's housing policy failures and was highlighted as a solutionfocused work that frames the crisis in democratic terms.
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She is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute and she's the author of the new book fixerupper How to repair America's broken housing systems.
— Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — P...
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Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — Particularl...
The book was introduced as a clear overview of America's housing policy failures and was highlighted as a solutionfocused work that frames the crisis in democratic terms.
"
She is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institute and she's the author of the new book fixerupper How to repair America's broken housing systems.
Which is one of the clearest overviews of America's housing policy failures and just its housing policies that you'll find.
One of the reasons I wrote the book is that it feels to me like this is not a political conversation that gets had in the right places by the right people.
The Homevoter Hypothesis
How Home Values Influence Local Government Taxation, School Finance, and Land-Use Policies
The book was cited as an influential work explaining how homeowners prioritize protecting property values, shaping political resistance to housing reforms.
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There is an economist called Bill Fishel who wrote a very influential book called The Home Voter Hypothesis which essentially says that homeowners become singleissue voters based on protecting the val...
— Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — P...
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Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — Particularl...
The book was cited as an influential work explaining how homeowners prioritize protecting property values, shaping political resistance to housing reforms.
"
There is an economist called Bill Fishel who wrote a very influential book called The Home Voter Hypothesis which essentially says that homeowners become singleissue voters based on protecting the value of their property because it's such a major investment.
Neighborhood Defenders
Participatory Politics and America's Housing Crisis
The book was highlighted as a valuable political science work that examines the nittygritty of local participation and smallD democracy.
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There are three political scientists Katie Einstein, David Glick, and Maxwell Palmer who have written a book called Neighborhood Defenders and a bunch of papers since then which are j...
— Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — P...
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Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — Particularl...
The book was highlighted as a valuable political science work that examines the nittygritty of local participation and smallD democracy.
"
There are three political scientists Katie Einstein, David Glick, and Maxwell Palmer who have written a book called Neighborhood Defenders and a bunch of papers since then which are just a fantastic insight into the nittygritty politics of who shows up and participates.
Made (Manhattan Ruthless)
The memoir was referenced as the source material for a Netflix series that illustrates the challenges of the social safety net and illegal ADUs.
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And the last one I'm going to cheat a little bit it's the Netflix of a book so Made, which is a Netflix series based on Stephanie Lann's memoir and it's a very popular TV class around this series so i...
— Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — P...
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Episode: Best Of: Why Housing Is So Expensive — Particularl...
The memoir was referenced as the source material for a Netflix series that illustrates the challenges of the social safety net and illegal ADUs.
"
And the last one I'm going to cheat a little bit it's the Netflix of a book so Made, which is a Netflix series based on Stephanie Lann's memoir and it's a very popular TV class around this series so it shows you how broken the social safety net is.
Seeking Truth and Hiding Facts
Information, Ideology, and Authoritarianism in China
Ezra Klein described it as an analysis of the Chinese Communist Party's internal contestation and the shift to using GDP statistics for legitimacy, noting its focus on the party's neopolitical turn under Xi Jinping.
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It's called Seeking Truth and Hiding Facts, Information Ideology and Authoritarianism in China. And it really is about the sources of domestic contestation and evolution of what the C...
— Episode: Is This How a Cold War With China Begins...
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Episode: Is This How a Cold War With China Begins?
Ezra Klein described it as an analysis of the Chinese Communist Party's internal contestation and the shift to using GDP statistics for legitimacy, noting its focus on the party's neopolitical turn under Xi Jinping.
"
It's called Seeking Truth and Hiding Facts, Information Ideology and Authoritarianism in China. And it really is about the sources of domestic contestation and evolution of what the Chinese Communist Party has been, how a revolutionary communist party came to embrace GDP statistics as its measure of legitimacy, and how once those numbers didn't quite add up, how under Xi Jinping, the Chinese Communist Party has embraced sort of a neopolitical turn to legitimize their continued rule.
Our Missing Hearts
Reese's Book Club
Ezra Klein called it a cautionary tale about the cultural and educational anxieties in America, linking it to fears of Chinese influence and historic familyseparation policies.
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It's called Our Missing Hearts. And it's really a cautionary tale about many of the, I think, unfortunately, real dynamics that we're already seeing as sort of a combination of concer...
— Episode: Is This How a Cold War With China Begins...
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Episode: Is This How a Cold War With China Begins?
Ezra Klein called it a cautionary tale about the cultural and educational anxieties in America, linking it to fears of Chinese influence and historic familyseparation policies.
"
It's called Our Missing Hearts. And it's really a cautionary tale about many of the, I think, unfortunately, real dynamics that we're already seeing as sort of a combination of concerns about the protection of American culture and traditions, and what is being taught in schools, along with the dose of suspicion of anything of Asian or Chinese origin, and family separation policies, which are unfortunately part of our history and our present.
From the Soil
The Foundations of Chinese Society
Ezra said it was a popular English translation of Fei Xiaotong's essays and the best text to understand China's long agrarian roots and their influence on modern society.
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My answer is, read the English translations of essays by the Chinese anthropologist Fei Xiaotong. His last name is spelled F-E-I. There's one book that's very popular. It's called From the Soi...
— Episode: There’s Been a Revolution in How China I...
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Episode: There’s Been a Revolution in How China Is Governed
Ezra said it was a popular English translation of Fei Xiaotong's essays and the best text to understand China's long agrarian roots and their influence on modern society.
"
My answer is, read the English translations of essays by the Chinese anthropologist Fei Xiaotong. His last name is spelled F-E-I. There's one book that's very popular. It's called From the Soil, The Foundations of Chinese Society. This book might seem unrelated to modern China, which is highly industrialized, but it's actually the best text to understand China because for thousands of years, China was an agrarian society. Many of the political systems, the social customs and norms evolved and emerged out of agrarian conditions. Because they have been in place for thousands and thousands of years, they endure until this day. And they coexist in tension with a modern China.
Fei Xiaotong and Sociology in Revolutionary China (Harvard East Asian Monographs)
Ezra described it as a biography that provides the story behind Fei Xiaotong's ideas and his unique background bridging East and West.
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The second book I would recommend is a biography of Fei Xiaotong. It's called Fei Xiaotong and Sociology in Contemporary China. The reason I recommend that is I like to read about a set of ideas and t...
— Episode: There’s Been a Revolution in How China I...
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Episode: There’s Been a Revolution in How China Is Governed
Ezra described it as a biography that provides the story behind Fei Xiaotong's ideas and his unique background bridging East and West.
"
The second book I would recommend is a biography of Fei Xiaotong. It's called Fei Xiaotong and Sociology in Contemporary China. The reason I recommend that is I like to read about a set of ideas and then to read the story behind the ideas. And so the story behind this man called Fei Xiaotong is that he is one of the very, very few elites in China who was Western-educated and was trained at LSE. And during the 1940s, he spent time in the United States. What shaped his ability to read China the way he does is that he is described as a marginal man, a man who lives in both East and the West, in both of which he's more or less a stranger.
The Fractalist
Memoir of a Scientific Maverick
Ezra highlighted it as Mandelbrot's autobiography that tells the fascinating story of the creator of fractal geometry and his struggle for acceptance.
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So this book is called The Fractalist, Memoirs of a Scientific Maverick by Benoit Mandelbrot. And this is the pioneer of the geometry of fractals, which is the geometry of complex sha...
— Episode: There’s Been a Revolution in How China I...
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Episode: There’s Been a Revolution in How China Is Governed
Ezra highlighted it as Mandelbrot's autobiography that tells the fascinating story of the creator of fractal geometry and his struggle for acceptance.
"
So this book is called The Fractalist, Memoirs of a Scientific Maverick by Benoit Mandelbrot. And this is the pioneer of the geometry of fractals, which is the geometry of complex shapes that we see in nature. And this is his own autobiography. It is really a fascinating story about a mathematical genius who is not accepted for many, many years by society because his genius was so wide that it could not fit in any given disciplinary box. And it was only at a very old age that he finally was tenured at Yale. I believe he was given tenure at 75 years old. So it's a fascinating story about creativity, and it's always nice to be reminded of the spirit of creativity and also the resistance to creativity that we experience in the human world.
The Tea Party and the Remaking of Republican Conservatism
The study was described as a great work that captured the dynamics of the Tea Party era.
"
Theda Skocpol and Vanessa Williamson did a great study of the Tea Party years ago that really got at this.
— Episode: How Right-Wing Media Ate the Republican...
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Episode: How Right-Wing Media Ate the Republican Party
The study was described as a great work that captured the dynamics of the Tea Party era.
"
Theda Skocpol and Vanessa Williamson did a great study of the Tea Party years ago that really got at this.
Asymmetric Politics
Ideological Republicans and Group Interest Democrats
The work was mentioned as framing the ideological differences between the Democratic and Republican parties.
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You see this in this book, Asymmetric Politics by Matt Grossman and David Hopkins.
— Episode: How Right-Wing Media Ate the Republican...
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Episode: How Right-Wing Media Ate the Republican Party
The work was mentioned as framing the ideological differences between the Democratic and Republican parties.
"
You see this in this book, Asymmetric Politics by Matt Grossman and David Hopkins.
Dreamland
The Secret History of Area 51
The work was highlighted as a forthcoming book about the U.S. immigration diversity lottery.
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It's called Dreamland, America's Immigration Lottery in an Age of Restriction by Carly Goodman.
— Episode: How Right-Wing Media Ate the Republican...
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Episode: How Right-Wing Media Ate the Republican Party
The work was highlighted as a forthcoming book about the U.S. immigration diversity lottery.
"
It's called Dreamland, America's Immigration Lottery in an Age of Restriction by Carly Goodman.
The Code of Capital
How the Law Creates Wealth and Inequality
The book was presented as a recent work that completely reimagines how the base layer of the economy functions, arguing that law constructs capital rather than markets alone.
"
And her most recent book, which is called The Code of Capital, completely reimagines how we think about this base layer of our economy.
— Episode: A Guide to the ‘Legal Fictions’ That Cre...
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Episode: A Guide to the ‘Legal Fictions’ That Create Wealth...
The book was presented as a recent work that completely reimagines how the base layer of the economy functions, arguing that law constructs capital rather than markets alone.
"
And her most recent book, which is called The Code of Capital, completely reimagines how we think about this base layer of our economy.
Your book is The Code of Capital. It was great chatting with you.
Capital in the Twenty First Century
The book was mentioned as a source of data that the guest used as ammunition to think about legal structures behind wealth and inequality.
"
I have to mention Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century. Many of the data that he provided there were for me ammunition to think about the legal structures that MindHack actually can help explain the...
— Episode: A Guide to the ‘Legal Fictions’ That Cre...
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Episode: A Guide to the ‘Legal Fictions’ That Create Wealth...
The book was mentioned as a source of data that the guest used as ammunition to think about legal structures behind wealth and inequality.
"
I have to mention Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century. Many of the data that he provided there were for me ammunition to think about the legal structures that MindHack actually can help explain the data underneath.
Note: The book recommendations on this page are discovered automatically from podcast transcripts, and may be incorrect or incomplete.