As of now, I’m partway through:
- Essays in Indian History – Irfan Habib
- An underrated Marxist economic historian
- The Islamic Enlightenment – Christopher de Bellaigue
- Honestly, I thought this was going to be about, like, al-Farabi. It’s not; it’s about the development of modern nation-states in the Islamic world in the 19th century. It’s popular history and I have to imagine specialists would not appreciate it, but, I mean, it’s an enjoyable read.
- Our Women on the Ground – ed. Zahra Hankir
- 19 essays by Arab women reporters about their experiences. You know the Matt Pearce tweet about wanting New Yorker fact check standards but friend at the bar tone? Good example.
- Eichmann in Jerusalem – Hannah Arendt
- I mean, everyone knows this one and I’m not very far in. First impression is just how many disses she fits in, in all directions.
- Les Fleurs du Mal – Charles Baudelaire
- Can’t get enough. Something about the meter.
We’ll see which, if any, gets the first write-up. Maybe it’ll be Dani Rodrik’s “Growth Strategies”, which I just read a couple weeks ago.
Mather on Books 