Category: Books

The best business books aren’t in the management section

by  Tyler Cowen in

I expand on this theme in my latest Bloomberg column, here is one excerpt from that:

I thus have a modest proposal for anyone interested in business books: Read books about specific businesses or industries that you already know a lot about. That way, you will have enough contextual knowledge for the book to be meaningful. Of course many people don’t work at a company or industry big or famous enough that there are books about it, so I have a corollary proposition: You will learn the most about management by reading books about sports and musical groups.

And this:

Many music and sports books are not only written for obsessed fans, but also written by obsessed fans. Traditional business books, in contrast, are frequently written to get consulting work or on to the speaker’s circuit. The incentive is not to offend anybody and to put forward some “least common denominator” insights, rather than say anything truly original that might be complicated to explain. The end result is a bookstore section that would be mind-numbing to have to read.

There is much more of interest at the link, recommended.

*Cosmic Connections*

by  Tyler Cowen in

The author is Charles Taylor (yes, the Charles Taylor) and the subtitle is Poetry in the Age of Disenchantment.  This book is a very good introduction to romanticism, and also to the poetry of romanticism, noting that its degree of originality may depend on how much you already know.  I liked the chapters on Rilke and Mallarme best, here is one excerpt:

It follows that for Rilke, our full capacity to Praise can only be realized if we take account of the standpoint of the dead.  The medium of Preisen is Gesang [song].  thus the voice which most fully carries this song would have to be that of the gold Orpheus, who moves in both realms, that of the living and that of the dead.

And the sonnet is the medium.  As its name suggests, it is a poetic form which asks to be heard, and not only read on the page.  These two modes of reception are essential to all poetry, but in the sonnet the musical dimension becomes the most important avenue to the message.

So a praise-song from both sides, that of the dead, as well as the living.  They call on Orpheus, the singer-god who moves between the two realms.  Hence the Sonnets to Orpheus.

I am very glad to see that Taylor is still at it, and 640 pp. at that.  Furthermore, this book is (unintentionally?) a good means for thinking about just how much deculturation has taken place.

*Playing Possum: How Animals Understand Death*

by  Tyler Cowen in

That is a forthcoming book by Susana Monsó, and I found it both interesting and illuminating.  Here is one excerpt:

This fixation on the face suggests that Firuláis’s initial motivation was probably not to eat his human, but rather that this behavior started as an attempt to make him react.  Our face is the part of our bodies that our canine friends pay the most attention to, for it is key to understanding our emotions and communicating with us.  Consequently, it is to be expected that Firuláis, upon seeing his caretaker lying still after the gunshot, began to try to get a reaction from him by nudging his face with his snout.  In the absence of a response, and in order to calm himself down or out of sheer frustration, he might have started licking, the nibbling, and once blood was drawn the temptation to take a bit might have been overwhelming.  That is, it’s likely that Firuláis’s love for his keeper and his anguish upon his lack of response were at the root of his behavior.

Talk about “model this”!  Comparative thanatology edition, of course.  You can pre-order here.

*In This Economy*, by Kyla Scanlon

by  Tyler Cowen in

The subtitle is How Money & Markets Really Work.  I am a big fan of Kyla Scanlon (see the link for her other work), who is a force of nature.  She graduated from Western Kentucky University in 2019, and she has a new and very effective approach to how to talk.  I first learned of her through her explanatory videos, and it turns out she does one almost every day.

Apart from being very well done, this economics book has two notable features.  First, it elevates Kyla’s notion of “vibes” as a significant determinant of economic activity.  I use the older (and less vibey) terminology of “cultural contagion,” but in any case I consider this a neglected and under-analyzed set of forces, including in the economic realm.

Second, this is the first popular economics book I have seen that takes 2024 seriously.  Imagine you trained a “large language human” on what people actually talk and worry about today, and set that human loose to write an economics book.  This is what you would get.  It is a good and bracing shock to those who have trained their memories on some weighted average of the more distant past.

As an aside, here are some of Kyla’s favorite poems.  Why are there no major MSM profiles of her?

*Crooked Plow*

by  Tyler Cowen in

That is a recently translated Brazilian novel by Itamar Vieira Junior, set in Bahia.  It is better to read this one without any spoilers.  And I am pleased to announce that we have another great Latin American (and Brazilian) novel, worthy of entering the canon.

I haven’t seen a good ungated review of the book, as no one seems to care.  I did like this NYRoB (gated) review.  Further on the plus side, the book is also short and an easy read.

*Best Things First*

by  Tyler Cowen in

The author is Bjorn Lomborg, and the subtitle is The 12 most efficient solutions for the world’s poorest and our global SDG promises.  I missed this book when it first came out last year.  Here is what Lomborg presents as the twelve best global investments, in no particular order:

Tuberculosis

Maternal and newborn health

Malaria

Nutrition

Chronic diseases

Childhood immunization

Education

Agricultural R&D

e-procurement

Land tenure security

Trade

Skilled migration

Late Admissions

by  Alex Tabarrok in

NYTimes: Glenn C. Loury’s new book, “Late Admissions,” is unlike any economist’s memoir I have ever read. Most don’t mention picking up streetwalkers. Or smoking crack in a faculty office at Harvard’s Kennedy School — or in an airplane at 30,000 feet. Or stealing a car. Or having sex on a beach in Israel with a mistress and attracting the attention of the Israel Defense Forces. Or later being arrested and charged with assaulting her. Or cuckolding a best friend….“Late Admissions” passes the Orwell Test. “An autobiography is only to be trusted when it reveals something disgraceful.”

Of course, even given all this, Loury has had a successful career as an economist and as a public intellectual.

Here’s a less salacious Conversations with Tyler and here is EconTalk both with Loury.

*Unit X*

by  Tyler Cowen in

The subtitle of this new and excellent book is How the Pentagon and Silicon Valley are Transforming the Art of War.  It is written not by journalists but two insiders to the process, namely Raj M. Shah and Christopher Kirchoff.  Here you can read about Eric Schmidt, Brendan McCord, Anduril, Palantir, and much more.

I am not yet finished with the book, in the meantime here is one short excerpt, one that sets the stage for much of what follows:

It turned out that before Silicon Valley tech could be used on the battlefield, we had to go to war to buy it.  We had to hack the Pentagon itself — its archaic acquisition procedures, which prevent moving money at Silicon Valley speed.  In Silicon Valley, deals are done in days.  The eighteen- to twenty-four month process for finalizing contracts used by most of the Pentagon was a nonstarter.  No startup CEO trying to book revenue can wait for the earth to circle the sun twice.  We needed a new way.

And this bit:

Ukraine avoided power interruptions in part because its over-engineered power grid boasts twice the capacity that the country needs — ironically, the system was originally designed by the Soviets to withstand a NATO attack.

The authors understand both the worlds of tech and bureaucracy very well, kudos to them.  Due out in July.

My excellent Conversation with Benjamin Moser

by  Tyler Cowen in

Here is the audio, video, and transcript.  Here is the episode summary:

Benjamin Moser is a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer celebrated for his in-depth studies of literary and cultural figures such as Susan Sontag and Clarice Lispector. His latest book, which details a twenty-year love affair with the Dutch masters, is one of Tyler’s favorite books on art criticism ever.

Benjamin joined Tyler to discuss why Vermeer was almost forgotten, how Rembrandt was so productive, what auctions of the old masters reveals about current approaches to painting, why Dutch art hangs best in houses, what makes the Kunstmuseum in the Hague so special, why Dutch students won’t read older books, Benjamin’s favorite Dutch movie, the tensions within Dutch social tolerance, the joys of living in Utrecht, why Latin Americans make for harder interview subjects, whether Brasilia works as a city, why modernism persisted in Brazil, how to appreciate Clarice Lispector, Susan Sontag’s (waning) influence, V.S. Naipaul’s mentorship, Houston’s intellectual culture, what he’s learning next, and more.

Excerpt:

COWEN: You once wrote about Susan Sontag, and I quote, “So much of Sontag’s best work concerns the ways we try, and fail, to see.” Please explain.

MOSER: This is what On Photography is about. This is what Against Interpretation is about in Sontag’s work. Of course, in my new book, The Upside-Down World, I talk about how I’m not really great at seeing, particularly. I’m not that visual. I’m a reader. I’m a bookworm. Often, when I’ve looked at paintings, I’ve realized how little I actually see. Sometimes I do feel embarrassed by it. You’ll read the label and it’ll be three sentences, and it’ll say like, A Man with a Dog. You’re like, “Oh, I didn’t even see the dog.” You know what I mean?

On these very basic levels, I just think, “Oh, if someone doesn’t point it out to me, I really don’t see.” I think that that was one of the fascinating things about Sontag, that she was not really able to see. She was actually quite terrible at seeing, and this was especially true in her relationships. She was very bad at seeing what other people were thinking and feeling.

I think because she was aware of that, she tried very hard to remedy it, but it’s just not something you can force. You can’t force yourself to like certain music or to like certain tastes that you might not actually like.

COWEN: What was Sontag most right about or most insightful about?

MOSER: I think this question of images — what images do — and photography and how representations, metaphors can pervert things. She had a very deep repulsion to photography. She really hated photography, and this is why a lot of photographers hated her because they felt this, even though she didn’t really say it. She really didn’t trust it. She really thought it was wicked. At the same time, for somebody who had a deficit, I guess you could say, in seeing, she really relied on it to understand the world.

I think that tension is very instructive for us, because now, she already says 50 years ago, “There are all these images. We don’t know what to do with them. We don’t know how to process them.” Forget AI, forget Russian trolls on Twitter. She uses this word I really like, hygiene, a lot. She talks about mental hygiene and how you can clean the rusty pipes in your brain. That’s why I think reading her helped me at least to understand a lot of what I’m seeing in the world.

COWEN: Do you think she will simply end up forgotten?

Again, I am happy to recommend Benjamin’s latest book The Upside-Down World: Meetings with Dutch Masters.

Ryan Bourne’s *The War on Prices*

by  Tyler Cowen in

The subtitle is Hw Popular Misconceptions about Inflation, Prices, and Value Create Bad Policy.  I am happy to have blurbed this book, here is part of the Amazon description:

Was inflation’s recent spike exacerbated by corporate greed? Do rent controls really help the needy? Are U.S. health care prices set in a Wild West marketplace? Do women get paid less than men for the same work, and do they pay more than men for the same products? The War on Prices is an eye-opening book that answers all these burning questions and more, as top economists debunk popular misconceptions about inflation, prices, and value.

Henry Oliver’s *Second Act* is coming out in the UK

by  Tyler Cowen in

An excellent book, here is the UK Amazon link, I am not sure of the U.S. plans.  The subtitle is What Late Bloomers Can Tell You About Success and Reinventing Your Life.

Here is one excerpt:

What this showed is that processing speed (matching numbers and symbols) peaks much earlier than working memory (unfamiliar shapes and reciting lists of numbers). These are both aspects of fluid intelligence, but they peak at different times. The idea that fluid intelligence is one thing and declines early isn’t quite right. There are many aspects to intelligence and they peak at different ages throughout our lives. The authors of the study say: ‘Not only is there no age at which humans are performing at peak at all cognitive tasks, there may not be an age at which humans are at peak on most cognitive tasks.’

One of the very best books written on talent.  Here is a Dan Rothschild thread on the book.  Dan writes: “…this isn’t a self-help book per se. But it provides exceptional context for thinking about aging, talent, and finding purpose in life, through the lives of people who led extraordinary lives in unpredictable ways.”  Here is Henry Oliver on Twitter.