Here are 100 books that Caesar and Christ fans have personally recommended if you like
Caesar and Christ.
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Epictetus has rung my bell ever since I first encountered him forty years ago as a young graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania. I was, and am, consistently moved by his frank, emphatic, almost confrontational style of teaching. Whenever I read his Discourses, it lifts my spirits, inspires me, and makes me feel wiserâeven stronger. So, I naturally want to read the insights other authors have about his earnest, gripping brand of Stoicism. The wisdom of Epictetusâ teachings never fades. He equips his readers with the philosophical tools for crafting a life of freedom, resilience, and joy. Who doesnât want that?
What I loved about this book is its lucid, ambitious, and exceptionally insightful treatment of Epictetus as a Socratic moral teacher.
I admired how Long brought Epictetus to life not only as a philosopher but also as a pedagogue ardently committed to human flourishing. His analysis of Epictetusâs use of the Socratic method, his compelling interpretation of prohairesis as âvolition,â and his explanation of Epictetusâs theology as both intimate and distinctly Stoic were masterful.
I especially appreciated how Long captured Epictetusâs tone, rhetorical range, and practical urgency. His emphasis on Epictetusâs originalityâparticularly in appropriating Socratic methodsâwas spot on, making the book an engaging and invaluable contribution to understanding Epictetus.
The philosophy of Epictetus, a freed slave in the Roman Empire, has been profoundly influential on Western thought: it offers not only stimulating ideas but practical guidance in living one's life. A. A. Long, a leading scholar of later ancient philosophy, gives the definitive presentation of the thought of Epictetus for a broad readership. Long's fresh and vivid translations of a selection of the best of Epictetus' discourses show that his ideas are as valuable and striking today as they were amost two thousand years ago. The translations are organized thematically within the framework of an authoritative introduction and commentary,âŚ
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to runâŚ
Iâm a misplaced law professor, you might say: I never wanted to be a lawyer; I went to law school almost by accident; and for four decades Iâve used law as a window into my deeper interestsâ religion, history, and philosophy. I couldnât make myself write books unless the subjects were personally engaging; and in defiance of editors, I insist on writing readable prose. If this adds up to âdilettante,â so be it. My books, published by the university presses of Harvard, Oxford, Notre Dame, Duke, and NYU, as well as Eerdmans, have dealt with constitutional law; Roman, medieval, and modern history; legal philosophy; and religious freedom.
This book (actually, this series of volumes) is of course an epic and a classic. And deservedly soâeven though most scholars no longer find Gibbonâs account of the causes of Romeâs fall persuasive.Â
Right or wrong, the book is a model of a study that is both immersed (sometimes admiringly and sometimes caustically) in individual characters and episodes and yet also intensely interested in the big picture. And the elegant, witty prose makes the book a pleasure to read.Â
Analyses of modern Western decline often look for parallels in ancient Rome, and Gibbonâs study is almost a mandatory point of departure.
Edward GibbonÂÂs classic timeless work of ancient Roman history in 6 volumes collected into 2 boxed sets, in beautiful, enduring hardcover editions with elegant cloth sewn bindings, gold stamped covers, and silk ribbon markers.
When I headed the Executive Education Center at the University of Michigan I had the opportunity to meet with many great leaders and observe them in action. I also enjoy interacting with faculty colleagues who conduct state-of-the-art research on leadership. Because of this experience, I believe that leaders are made, not born, and that reading biographies, psychological studies, philosophical commentary, histories, and fiction like the books on my list is one of the best ways to gain insight into what you need to become a great leader.Â
Leaders should develop a philosophy of lifeâa north star that will guide them through difficult times. This timeless classic by Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius provides a combination of wisdom and practical advice that serves as a reference both for those in a leadership position and for individuals seeking a deeper understanding of their daily lives. Here is a sample: âThe longest-lived and those who will die soonest lose the same thing. The present is all that they can give up, since that is all you have, and what you do not have, you cannot lose.â
A Penguin Great Ideas edition of Stoic philosophy in wise and practical aphorisms that have inspired Bill Clinton, Ryan Holiday, Anna Kendrick and many more.
Few ancient works have been as influential as the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, philosopher and emperor of Rome (A.D. 161-180). A series of spiritual exercises filled with wisdom, practical guidance, and profound understanding of human behavior, it remains one of the greatest works of spiritual and ethical reflection ever written. Marcus's insights and advice-on everything from living in the world to coping with adversity and interacting with others-have made the Meditations required reading for statesmenâŚ
The Year Mrs. Cooper Got Out More
by
Meredith Marple,
The coastal tourist town of Great Wharf, Maine, boasts a crime rate so low you might suspect someoneâs lying.
Nevertheless, jobless empty nester Mallory Cooper has become increasingly reclusive and fearful. Careful to keep the red wine handy and loath to leave the house, Mallory misses her happier selfâand soâŚ
Iâm a career financial and business journalist, only recently turned novelist. Iâm obsessed with the way that history repeats itself in the financial markets and that we never seem to learn our lessons. Fear and greed have always driven the behavior of bankers, traders, and investors; and they still do today, only barely inhibited by our regulatory system. I want to help people understand how markets work, and I like combining fiction with fact to explain these systems and how theyâre abused. With that in mind, I work during the day as a reporter at NPR and by night as a scribbler of historical fiction with a financial twist.
I love the way Wolfe brings one of the more arcane areas of the financial markets to life - namely bankruptcy workout - and skewers the greed and ambition of real estate investors in the 1990s.
Iâm a huge admirer of Wolfeâs technique of writing a novel using journalistic interviews, and Iâm struck by the way he nails the characters and actions when he describes how the bankruptcy process works. And all while keeping the reader absolutely hooked on the narrative.
I go back to Wolfeâs novels again and again, not just to be amused and entertained but to get a real insight into the dark heart and often absurd workings of the financial system.
A dissection of greed-obsessed America a decade after The Bonfire of the Vanities and on the cusp of the millennium, from the master chronicler of American culture Tom Wolfe
Charlie Croker, once a fabled college football star, is now a late-middle-aged Atlanta real estate entrepreneur-turned conglomerate king. His expansionist ambitions and outsize ego have at last hit up against reality. Charlie has a 28,000 acre quail shooting plantation, a young and demanding second wife and a half-empty downtown tower with a staggering load of debt. Wolfe shows us contemporary America with all the verve, wit, and insight that have madeâŚ
I learned about Stoicism through its connection to Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, whose founder, Albert Ellis, was influenced by Stoic philosophy. Since I had an interest in philosophy, I decided to look more into Stoicism, andâto my surpriseâI learned that philosophy could be practical (who knew?!), and that others were trying to put Stoicism into practice today! This led me to try to find other Stoics by founding the New York City Stoics in 2013, followed by co-founding a non-profitâThe Stoic Fellowshipâto help other people do the same in 2016. Iâve now given talks on Stoicism worldwide in addition to co-writing a book on Stoic practice.
I first got into Stoicism the way most people do: to feel better and get control over my emotions. But after I studied and practiced it more, I realized that I got into it for the wrong reasons! Stoicismâs goal isnât to get control over emotionsper se,but to eliminate a subset of themâthe passionsâbecause they stem from false beliefs. And you canât control them; according to Stoic theory, once you let the passions arise by agreeing with the false underlying beliefs, they control you.Graverâs book was pivotal for my understanding of the Stoic theory of emotions in a deeper and more accurate way.
On the surface, stoicism and emotion seem like contradictory terms. Yet the Stoic philosophers of ancient Greece and Rome were deeply interested in the emotions, which they understood as complex judgments about what we regard as valuable in our surroundings. "Stoicism and Emotion" shows that they did not simply advocate a suppression of feeling, as stoicism implies in today's English, but instead conducted a searching examination of these powerful psychological responses, seeking to understand what attitude toward them expresses the deepest respect for human potential. In this work, Margaret R. Graver gives a compelling new interpretation of the Stoic position.âŚ
After learning Latin in college and studying Italian philosophy in graduate school, I stumbled into Rome for the first time over a decade ago as faculty on a study-abroad trip. In two weeks, I learned more about history and life than I had in two decades of study. Iâve been lucky enough to go back every summer since, with the sad exception of the pandemic years. I adore Rome. It didnât help that a few years ago, in the Basilica of San Clemente, I fell head over heels for a Renaissance art historian and tried her patience with poetry until she married me.
All the easily-portable volumes in Princeton University Pressâs âAncient Wisdom for Modern Readersâ can be read in the time it takes to drink two glasses of wine (along with this book, one of my other favorites is How to Drink by the Renaissance humanist Vincent Obsopoeus).
For all their quarrels, ancient philosophers agree that the art of life is the preparation for death. Nobody expresses that wisdom with more panache than Seneca, a philosopher, financier, tutor to Nero, and playwright.
This selection from his works teaches us how to face the death and destruction that we see everywhere in Romeâand everywhere else too.
I turn to Senecaâs essays and letters for a good reminder to live with a minimum of regret and resentment.
Timeless wisdom on death and dying from the celebrated Stoic philosopher Seneca
"It takes an entire lifetime to learn how to die," wrote the Roman Stoic philosopher Seneca (c. 4 BC-65 AD). He counseled readers to "study death always," and took his own advice, returning to the subject again and again in all his writings, yet he never treated it in a complete work. How to Die gathers in one volume, for the first time, Seneca's remarkable meditations on death and dying. Edited and translated by James S. Romm, How to Die reveals a provocative thinker and dazzling writer whoâŚ
Donât mess with the hotheadâor he might just mess with you. Slater IbĂĄĂąez is only interested in two kinds of guys: the ones he wants to punch, and the ones he sleeps with. Things get interesting when they start to overlap. A freelance investigator, Slater trolls the dark side ofâŚ
I have always loved the Stoics, from the first time I read Seneca. I appreciate that they seek to speak to a wider audience than most philosophers, on issues that concern many: happiness, anxiety, pain, loss. The Stoics were wonderful writers, whose influence has been manifest throughout western philosophy. And they extended their expertise beyond the academy, and were very involved in politics. Seneca was the advisor to the emperor Nero; Cicero, who dabbled in Stoicism, was perhaps the most famous senator of Rome. Marcus Aurelius was emperor.
Karen Armstrongâs book on St Paul âher secondâis wonderful. It takes into account recent scholarship on the historical Paul, and in accessible fashion, explains what was controversial about his agenda, and what was likely omitted or edited out of his work. Paulâs mission was influenced in no small part by the prevalent Stoic thinkingâabove all, cosmopolitanism: Paul was a cosmopolitan, literally, a citizen of no placeâbut of the universe itself. And central to his understanding of Jesusâ teaching, Paul wished to wash away the parochial distinctions that divide us. Hence the baptismal cry he advised: no more Greek or Jew, man or woman, master or slave!
St Paul is known throughout the world as the first Christian writer, authoring fourteen of the twenty-seven books in the New Testament. But as Karen Armstrong demonstrates in St Paul: The Misunderstood Apostle, he also exerted a more significant influence on the spread of Christianity throughout the world than any other figure in history.
It was Paul who established the first Christian churches in Europe and Asia in the first century, Paul who transformed a minor sect into the largest religion produced by Western civilization, and Paul who advanced the revolutionary idea that Christ could serve as a model forâŚ
Like everyone else, I have life-long experience of caring and not caring for things; being sometimes careful and other times careless. Communication has been my central interest as a historical sociologist, and Iâve been considering its relationship to care (attachment, affection, worry, and burden) and security. I have always liked the word care, employing it often in the sense of warm attachment, but I have been looking at how care can at times enact control, violence, or abandonment.
I loved that Hamiltonâs unpacking of the etymology of security led right to the notion of care.
This book had a shaping impact on how I think about care and its ties to security â a relation that continues to animate my interests. I learned that my cares (affections, attachments, worries) may mobilize me to enhance my security, which also may be done inadvertently at the expense of someone elseâs. To put it another way, when we seek security, we are seeking to let go of our cares or to care less.
Security attends to the âinflated focusâ on security as an instrument of control in contemporary cultural life and does so richly, drawing upon cultural forms such as fables, literature, and art in a beautiful and provocative text.
From national security and social security to homeland and cyber-security, "security" has become one of the most overused words in culture and politics today. Yet it also remains one of the most undefined. What exactly are we talking about when we talk about security? In this original and timely book, John Hamilton examines the discursive versatility and semantic vagueness of security both in current and historical usage. Adopting a philological approach, he explores the fundamental ambiguity of this word, which denotes the removal of "concern" or "care" and therefore implies a condition that is either carefree or careless. Spanning textsâŚ
Epictetus has rung my bell ever since I first encountered him forty years ago as a young graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania. I was, and am, consistently moved by his frank, emphatic, almost confrontational style of teaching. Whenever I read his Discourses, it lifts my spirits, inspires me, and makes me feel wiserâeven stronger. So, I naturally want to read the insights other authors have about his earnest, gripping brand of Stoicism. The wisdom of Epictetusâ teachings never fades. He equips his readers with the philosophical tools for crafting a life of freedom, resilience, and joy. Who doesnât want that?
I enjoyed how Scaltsas and Mason curated a diverse yet cohesive set of essays that illuminate Epictetus from fresh and engaging angles.
I was particularly impressed by the introduction, which was clear, concise, and inviting. The various contributions are generally of high caliber, but that of Julia Annas is a real gem. Her insights into Stoic ethics and everyday roles are both profound and eminently practical. I also found very valuable the essays on logic, theology, and personhood, each of which combines erudition with probing exposition.
The Stoic philosopher Epictetus has been one of the most influential of ancient thinkers, both in antiquity itself and in modern times. Theodore Scaltsas and Andrew S. Mason present ten specially written papers which discuss Epictetus' thought on a wide range of subjects, including ethics, logic, theology, and psychology; explore his relations to his predecessors (including his two philosophical heroes, Socrates and Diogenes the Cynic, as well as the earlier Stoic tradition); and examine his influence on later thinkers. Written by some of the leading experts in the field, the essays in this volume will be a fascinating resource forâŚ
As a painfully shy child, I found friendship, adventure and ultimately my own voice reading aboutâand spending time withâanimals. Animals felt safer to talk to than people, and they gave me the gift of their presence and time to practice communication. Overtime, I conquered my extreme shyness, obtained a Masters degree in counseling, and, eventually, began writing about the many ways animals can help people. There is no denying the role that animalsâand books about animalsâhave played in my life. And by sharing this list, I hope to help others find that same comfort and inspiration.
It is a quirky, fun, and surprisingly deep book about the gifts our animal friends have to give us. David Cary Lane is a gifted storyteller and poet whose words and stories invite you to ponder the beautiful lessons our canine friends have to teach us.
This book looks like a fun and light-hearted read, but as you turn the first page, you will quickly realize it is so much more. It is an invitation to slow down, a call to be present, and a collection of heartfelt wisdom meant to be savored and reflected on often. This delightful book will stay with you long after you finish reading.
The perfect gift book for dog lovers and wisdom seekers!
Dogs are our best friends, but could they also be among our wisest teachers? Could their inner worlds hold secrets to a life of deep meaning?
Blending the timeless truths found in stoic philosophy and transcendent spirituality, The Puppy Prophet follows Daisy, a wise, old stray nearing the end of her days, as she poetically explores lifeâs most profound mysteries of love, hope, fear, friendship, God, and even death.
Beautifully illustrated, wildly fun and one-of-a-kind, The Puppy Prophet takes readers on a powerful journey that is thought-provoking, inspiring, and perfectlyâŚ
