The Best Books I've Read in 2025

It's coming to the end of the year now and there have been a number of books that I've read this year that have truly stuck out to me as exceptional. So, here

they are. My name is Joe Folly and this is unsolicited advice. The Red and the Black by Stond. I actually originally read this as an ebook, but I liked it so much that I went out and got a physical

copy just cuz physical copies are are a bit more pleasant to read. It's also one of the greatest psychological novels of all time, and I just really don't see people talk about it all that much, at

least not online. It follows an extremely clever, socially climbing young man named Julian Surell as he interacts with French society in the 1830s. I don't want to spoil it here

1830s. I don't want to spoil it here because unlike some of the others on this list, the plot is genuinely a huge part of its appeal. But the reason that I'm recommending it is because it

explores a whole number of frustrations and ideas about love that are hugely relevant today. I actually wish that I

relevant today. I actually wish that I read this before I'd written my video on love last year. Stondal is in my view one of the most perceptive writers on the topic of romance ever. This comes

out probably most straightforwardly in his book Deamore or on love which is a collection of his firstirhand anecdotal observations about romantic and erotic

love. But quite a lot of those insights

love. But quite a lot of those insights are manifest in the red and the black, but in just a more entertaining narrative form. One of the truths about

narrative form. One of the truths about love and attraction that Stondal explores, which I just don't see too many people talk about today, is that attraction isn't really up to you. We're

often attracted to people for really quite strange reasons that are sometimes completely peculiar to us and might not make any sense to the people around us.

Maybe that person fills some emotional need that we didn't even know we had.

Maybe they feed into some unnurtured aspect of our identity. Perhaps we just love them simply because they seem to not love us and we want to desperately prove to them that we are worthy of

their love. Stondal's characters often

their love. Stondal's characters often get caught in these frustrating cycles of attraction. And if like myself, you

of attraction. And if like myself, you too have ended up in deeply embarrassing situations in the pursuit of romance, then the red and the black will give you some ample material for reflecting upon

that. I do plan to make a whole video

that. I do plan to make a whole video about it at some point, but I really just would encourage you to read it firsthand. Is it's it's also just very

firsthand. Is it's it's also just very funny. It's very well written. Stondal

funny. It's very well written. Stondal

is a great writer. I don't think that's too controversial to say. I also think that he is very underrated as a philosophical thinker. In some ways, I

philosophical thinker. In some ways, I think of him like the Machaveli or Thusidities of relationships. His

commitment to an empirically grounded view on love, displaying it with warts and all is honestly kind of refreshing to see in a sea of idealistic narratives

on display at the moment. At the same time, I don't think that Stondal is ever unrealistically cynical either. He is

astute and perceptive enough to capture both the highs and lows of romantic companionship and I just really appreciate that in him. If you do need any more motivation to read Stondal, his

writings were actually the inspiration for the modern psychological theory of limrance which is a kind of obsessive quite unhealthy attraction that completely captures those who feel it.

It was in the novels and writings of Standal that Dorothy Tennov found some of the germs for her now really quite influential psychological theory. I've

often thought that most of us have just a touch of the lirant in us even if we don't carry it to the same pathological extreme as the people that Tennov is talking about. And I do think that

talking about. And I do think that Stondal can help us better understand this part of ourselves. Also, the really nice thing about the red and the black is that it is neatly split into two

halves. And you can sort of read the

halves. And you can sort of read the first half as a semi-standalone novel if you want to. I don't know if this is sacriage to admit, but I actually just much prefer the first half of the book.

And while I have read the whole thing, I've actually reread the first half of it a couple of times over the course of this year because it's just that good.

And if something is good enough to reread three times in a year, I I think it's worth recommending. But before

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out. But anyway, back to the video. Next

up, we have Michelle Deontaine's essays.

Deontaine was a French nobleman who did what almost every bookish nerd has wanted to do at some point. He shut

himself up in a castle with a metric ton of books and wrote about basically whatever took his fancy for a decade and change. The result of this is

a work that spans just an enormous number of topics written by an absolute genius who does genuinely have something worthwhile to add to each of them.

There's something for everyone in Montaigne's essays. For lovers of

Montaigne's essays. For lovers of learning, there is his essay on the education of children. One of my favorite essays is one of his early psychological ones where he argues that

psychologically speaking, we naturally seek to discharge our passions in nearby targets and that if we don't do this, we get incredibly frustrated and may even

turn these destructive passions inward and use them to gnarore away at ourselves. You can recognize in this the

ourselves. You can recognize in this the germ of nature's theory of drives turned inward which would later be developed by Freud into his theory of repression.

Look, I know that nature did read Montaigne and I don't have any idea if this particular essay inspired his own psychological observations, but either way, I think it is a real mark of the

precience of Montaigne's thought. And it

is worth noting that nature greatly admired Montaigne. Perhaps the thing

admired Montaigne. Perhaps the thing that Montaigne is best known for today is his revival of Peronian skepticism, which was an ancient Greek school of philosophy that emphasized the doubt and

fallibility of all human knowledge. This

in turn made Montaigne one of the earliest proponents of limited religious tolerance since he thought that we should be wary of thinking that our own religious beliefs are certain since we

are fallible human agents. He thought

this despite being a very devout Catholic himself during the uh hot European wars of religion. So this alone makes him a very interesting thinker to

read. The other reason that I love this

read. The other reason that I love this book is that you can dip in and out of it pretty easily. And Montaigne writes in an incredibly entertaining and really quite witty way. I have my own copy of the essays on my coffee table and have

had it there for the past few months and it's just wonderful picking it up when I'm bored or procrastinating reading an essay that's often like 10 to 20 pages

and is also written really clearly and is also incredibly interesting and then I can just go back to whatever I was doing or whatever I was meant to be doing. The fact that Montaigne writes on

doing. The fact that Montaigne writes on so many different subjects and is so refreshingly anti-dogmatic means that you will almost always come away from reading one of his essays having

developed your own thoughts on the subject further. And these thoughts may

subject further. And these thoughts may be very different to Monta. For example,

take one of his essays on human pride.

There he argues that pride is a particularly penicious vice because people who are in the process of improving themselves and potentially becoming more virtuous are particularly susceptible to it. It makes vice

something that you can't just work your way out of in a straightforward linear fashion because any improvement has the potential to grow your pride as well.

Nonetheless, Montaigne seems to recommend trying to avoid communicating your own glories as much as possible, listing off various different examples of those who have deliberately done this

and received praise as a result. The

irony, of course, being that if this was your aim, then you would be avoiding glory just because you're secretly hoping that this will lead to even greater glory. Now, you may not agree

greater glory. Now, you may not agree with Montaigne, but he becomes a very clever interlocutor for your own thinking and understanding. It helps

that he doesn't write in riddles and is pretty easy to get to grips with, so you don't have to worry too much about misinterpreting him. Like any thinker,

misinterpreting him. Like any thinker, it is possible to get the wrong end of the stick. But on the whole, Montaigne

the stick. But on the whole, Montaigne is a very, very clear writer, and you're just not that likely to get stuck in an interpretive quagmire. My own copy of

interpretive quagmire. My own copy of the essays also has Montaigne's letters and travel journal attached. And while

they're less straightforwardly philosophical, it's just lovely to see how Montaigne observes the world. You

get a real sense for his love of Greek and Roman literature and history since not only does he reference them almost continually in his essays, they feature in his travel journals as well in I

don't know really sweet ways. At one

point he approaches some Italian peasants to ask them about some finer points of the work of Plenny the Younger as if he just expects everyone to have read everything that he has and

unsurprisingly they haven't. I just like little stories like this. They really

humanize Montaigne. My copy is the Everyman Classics version, and I also just really like how the pages feel. So,

yes, would highly recommend. Next up, we have Alber Camu from the absurd to revolt by John Foley. This was, if memory serves, actually the very first book that I read at the beginning of

this year, and it has completely changed the way I see Kimu and his work. Like

many people, I had read a lot of Kamu's novels and fiction as well as the myth of Capifas and the Rebel and sort of didn't know how to reconcile later Kimu with early Camu. Whereas the earlier

Kamu seems basically unconcerned with ethics and values the quantity of life over its quality and you know generally puts forward a more a more

stereotypically absurdist outlook. The

later Kimu seems much more worried about morality and solidarity with our fellow man and valuing all life. It's a little bit less let's imagine sisfas happy and a bit more let's face the struggles of

the world together. This change even occurs in his heroes. Whereas Muro in the stranger is ultimately an indifferent murderer. Dr. Ryu in the

indifferent murderer. Dr. Ryu in the plague even manages to stir himself to moral outrage at points and is certainly not indifferent in the face of pain. He

fights against it with all of his being and ends the novel resigned to remembering the suffering of others so that he can honor them. This can make reading Camu a bit of a bewildering

experience. It's as if there are two

experience. It's as if there are two separate writers battling it out for the soul of Albear. And the topic of Foley's book is reconciling this seeming contradiction within Kamu's philosophy

and charting the development in his work. Hence the title from the absurd to

work. Hence the title from the absurd to revolt. How does Kamu go from merely

revolt. How does Kamu go from merely saying imagine Sisphus happy to becoming one of the foremost humanists of the midentieth century? For Foley, this was

midentieth century? For Foley, this was largely due to two pretty cataclysmic events. The first is the Second World

events. The first is the Second World War and the second is the atrocities committed in the USSR and specifically how Kamu saw people within French

academia defend them. Both of these thus shocked Kamu out of his general indifference. He could not remain placid

indifference. He could not remain placid in the face of the Nazi menace nor the atrocious goolag system. And while Muro may have shrugged his shoulders at suffering, Kimu just couldn't keep this

up. It's a pretty understandable shock

up. It's a pretty understandable shock to the system. I imagine that would change many of our outlooks as well.

This caused Kamu to try to see what ethics and care you can do within an absurdist framework. Is there room for

absurdist framework. Is there room for things like resisting suffering and caring for your fellow human being without taking a dreaded leap of faith into positing an objective meaning for

life or objective ethics? Kamu thinks

that there is, but it is an open question whether he is right. I

obviously can't go too much into it here, but I have made a couple of videos about Kimu's thought this year, and they do both touch upon the theme of this development. I wanted to recommend this

development. I wanted to recommend this book for a couple of reasons. The first

is that the later Kamu is just often overshadowed by earlier Kamu. The myth

of Seisphus and the Stranger are, at least in my estimation, more widely read than The Plague and the Rebel. And even

fewer people have read some of Kamu's bridging works like Caligula or the essay Neither victims nor executioners.

This sort of means that our popular picture of Kamu is kind of stuck in the first twoish years of what was an almost 20-year career. That's a real shame and

20-year career. That's a real shame and Foley's book is a muchneeded correction to this. Secondly, we get an absolutely

to this. Secondly, we get an absolutely wonderful chapter on the dispute between Camu and Jean Paulatra, including how they fell out and why it got so bitter.

Foley compares different sources as well as giving some muchneeded skepticism to the reports of Simone Devoir, who as Sartra's life partner is obviously

something of a biased source. And

lastly, there just aren't that many thorough academic books on Kamu's work as a philosopher. For a thinker who so captures public imagination, he is often

neglected by the academy. This is for a whole host of reasons, including but not limited to his falling out with a lot of French academics and the fact that so much of his lorded work is novelistic in

nature. So, it's just refreshing to have

nature. So, it's just refreshing to have a really highquality scholarly work on Camu. And if I'm honest, I think there

Camu. And if I'm honest, I think there is so much more room for work in this area. I think that a great PhD thesis

area. I think that a great PhD thesis would be comparing NZ's work to Camuzo's and seeing what impact he had on his thoughts, but we won't get into any of that hit. If you want to help me make

that hit. If you want to help me make more videos like this, then please consider subscribing either to the channel or if you're feeling incredibly generous and want to gain access to exclusive content, including my slow

motion bookbybook bookshelf tour, then consider subscribing to the Patreon.

Though it's absolutely no pressure. The

links are in the description. Next up,

we have No Longer Human by Osamu Daai. I

was admittedly a little bit skeptical about this book at first. It had been recommended to me a whole bunch of times, but whenever I'd looked into it further, it sort of seemed like it would

be a little bit edge for the sake of edge, if that makes sense. But I was absolutely monumentally wrong, and if I wore a hat, I would eat it. No Longer

Human follows Oba Yoo, a young Japanese man from a fading aristocratic family who just can't learn to connect with or relate to others. He interacts with the

world as if he is behind soundproof glass. The exact reasons behind this are

glass. The exact reasons behind this are only ever hinted at, but the book explores the effects that this sorry state has on Yo's life and his mental

state, and suffice to say, it's not overwhelmingly positive. The title is

overwhelmingly positive. The title is sometimes translated as disqualified from humanity, and it comes from Yozo's feeling that he was just not quite like

all the people around him, that he was something lesser and vaguely disgusting.

The tone and overall feel reminded me a lot of Kfka's writings, but instead of it being set in an absurd world, it is set in 20th century Japan. I've since

read another novel by Dari called The Setting Sun. And honestly, I think it's

Setting Sun. And honestly, I think it's a bit of a toss-up between the two novels which one I personally prefer.

There aren't many authors who can be as unrelentingly bleak as Dari is, yet at the same time not come across as trite or as I just said, edgy for the sake of

being edgy. And to be honest, if you

being edgy. And to be honest, if you just had the book described to you as it was to me, you might think that it is simple voyerism but just applied to

suffering. But his books so clearly come

suffering. But his books so clearly come from such a a personal place that they're infused with so many little details of pain that they avoid cliche

almost entirely. Instead, you get the

almost entirely. Instead, you get the personal experience of Dari himself laser beamed into your head in exquisite, torturous intricacy. I

wouldn't really describe No Longer Human as a pleasant read. It has its moments of levity, but it took me a while to get through it just because it would make me feel quite sad after reading a few chapters. But that's not necessarily a

chapters. But that's not necessarily a bad thing. If it is the hallmark of a

bad thing. If it is the hallmark of a great novel to make you feel, this certainly made me feel. And sure, the feeling it gave me was on Wii. But I do think that's probably the intended

effect. It also forces you to ask what I

effect. It also forces you to ask what I think is a vitally important question for each of us. What is authenticity?

And what does it mean to be authentic? A

lot of Yozo's issues come about because he can't act naturally. He is so terrified of the people around him that he only feels safe interacting with them

through a carefully crafted conscious persona. We must ask ourselves to what

persona. We must ask ourselves to what extent we do the same. unrestrained

authenticity is not necessarily a great thing in all cases, but neither is the kind of extreme self- concealment pursued by Yo. I'm a complete sucker for questions like this in literature. And

amidst all the tragic events, it is the part of the novel that has really stuck with me, especially since, and this may come as a shock, I too am prone to overthinking from time to time. Okay,

our next book is The Right to Oblivion by Lowry Presley. Pretty much everyone agrees that privacy is important. But

why exactly? Surely, if we have nothing to hide, then we have nothing to fear.

Presley's book, The Right to Oblivion, is an extremely detailed argument attempting to answer this concern about the importance of privacy, both at the individual level and at the societal

one. I have a whole video going through

one. I have a whole video going through this book in a fair amount of detail, so I'll just give its broad contours here.

Essentially, Presley argues that privacy is not about controlling information about you, but instead about ensuring that no information is created in the

first place when you are in private. To

use his example, say you are staying in a hotel room and somebody spies on you while you're there. You don't do anything that you would not normally be happy for people to see. You might read

a book, you watch a bit of telly, and then you go to bed. You never find out about this voyer and they never tell anyone what totally unremarkable things they saw. Now, I bet you still think

they saw. Now, I bet you still think that this situation is undesirable, that it is harmful. But what harm has actually been done? Presley argues that

the harm comes from the creation of facts about what you were doing at that particular time in your hotel room and how now there is the opportunity for someone to read into your character

about it. If no one had watched you,

about it. If no one had watched you, then it would be totally indeterminate what you had done in that time. At the

very least, no one could say either way.

But since someone was watching you, there are now definite and communicable facts about what you were up to, even if they weren't actually communicated. And

even though they are totally unremarkable facts, Presley argues that their mere existence is a huge part of why we would feel violated in this situation. This is just one of the

situation. This is just one of the arguments that Presley gives. Later in

the book, Presley discusses controversial legal cases like a man in Germany who was granted the right to be forgotten after he was released from prison for a crime he had committed

decades ago. Presley argues that having

decades ago. Presley argues that having information about you die out over time as it becomes less and less relevant to predicting your behavior now and judging

your character now is exceptionally important since it does mean that our personalities in the eyes of other people can't be frozen for all time. We

are then given the space and opportunity to change and grow and for other people's views of us to change and grow with that. However, the kind of

with that. However, the kind of unrelenting permanence of the data about us that's stored online presents real problems for this in the future. Will

there come a time where there's just no way we could feasibly allow our past to be eroded by the sands of time? Presley

thinks this might come to pass, and he views this eventuality as downright dystopian. It's easy to see why. This is

dystopian. It's easy to see why. This is

a really good book, and it's also incredibly readable. While Presley does

incredibly readable. While Presley does bring in a lot of different philosophers, he's always very clear in introducing their ideas and outlining where they'll be relevant to his own

line of argument. It is an academic work of philosophy, but at the same time, it's clear that Presley has worked very hard to make sure that you don't have to have a strong background in philosophy

to understand it. I'm actually a pretty good example of this since I wasn't familiar with many many of the thinkers that Presley talks about in his book.

Say for Hannah Arent and I guess Charles Taylor if we're stretching a little bit cuz I don't know him that well. But

either way, my point is I didn't know most of the thinkers that Presley brought in, but I still found the book enjoyable and understandable. Okay, next

up we have Realism for Realistic People by Hassokch Chan. So, if you've been hanging around the channel for a while, then you'll know that I am a pretty big fan of philosophical pragmatism. I plan

to make a whole video on the subject at some point. But one thing about talking

some point. But one thing about talking about pragmatism is that coming up with a definition of pragmatism is actually pretty hard to pin down. It doesn't help that when someone says pragmatism, a lot

of people immediately think of ideas like you should believe whatever's useful in the short term or the truth is whatever works for you, which are either straw men of what real pragmatist

thought or they just reflect these like one or two incredibly controversial lectures that William James gave that probably don't even reflect his own views in their full sophistication. And

my favorite aspect of realism for realistic people is the simple fact that it tackles these misconceptions about pragmatism pretty much headon and then

defines and explains a much more accommodating form of pragmatic philosophy. I should admit a personal

philosophy. I should admit a personal bias here. Hasso Chang supervised me for

bias here. Hasso Chang supervised me for part of my masters and in addition to being incredibly clever, he's also a really nice guy. Essentially, Chang

argues that we can capture most if not all of what we want from realism in philosophy of science, like theory convergence and reliability and

stability and solving the so-called no miracles problem within a pragmatist view instead of a realist one. Chang's

thesis here is specifically in the philosophy of science. But his arguments are ultimately applicable to far far more than just this. Among other things, Chang comes up with the definition of

our empirical usage of the word true in terms of maximizing operational coherence, which is the ability of something, be it a theory, a proposition

or otherwise, to perform coherent activities in the world, or I should say facilitate us to perform coherent activities in the world. I can't really

summarize Chang's thesis in any minimally adequate way here. So, I'll

just highlight one particularly perceptive observation. Often times in

perceptive observation. Often times in debates around realism and anti-realism, be it in science or ethics or what have you, people assume that under an

anti-realist or non-realist position, anything goes. and truth or reality or

anything goes. and truth or reality or ethics or anything are just up to each of us subjectively to work out. But

Hassoc points out that this just doesn't follow. It's perfectly possible to

follow. It's perfectly possible to account for the peculiarly human elements of inquiry and so dip your toe into non-realism with merely the concept

of mind framing while explicitly denying any element of mind control and so not having it end up in an anything goes scenario. I feel like I use this example

scenario. I feel like I use this example all the time, but let's check out the Vickenstein duck rabbit illusion. Some

people see this as a rabbit and some people see it as a duck. And you can switch between the two based on your own conceptual framing. How you perceive the

conceptual framing. How you perceive the duck is mindframed. However, this

doesn't mean that what you perceive is totally mind controlled. You can't

suddenly force yourself to see a gorilla or a banana in this image because our perceptions are not entirely up to us.

And that holds whether you are a robust realist or a neocant or a pragmatist.

Aside from his main points, Hassok's book is absolutely filled with these little aha moments. And as I said, they are often relevant to far more than simply philosophy of science. Its

observations really, I would argue, are relevant to philosophy as a whole. In

fact, if I were to recommend everyone read one book by a still living philosopher that would fundamentally reorient how they perceive the process of philosophical inquiry, it would

probably be this one. Also, as a sort of special mention, I suppose I also highly recommend this book, which is Cheryl Misak's Pragmatism from Pierce and James

to Ramsay and Vickenstein. I can't

include it on this list as I read it last year, not this year, so it doesn't fit the video. But it is an absolutely fantastic book. Uh it takes you through

fantastic book. Uh it takes you through kind of from the end of the 19th century all the way through to mid 20th century in pragmatist thought. And it is also

brilliant for dispelling some of those caricatures about pragmatism that we talked about. Also, anything by Hugh

talked about. Also, anything by Hugh Price is brilliant if you want some modern pragmatist philosophical literature. I just have to get stuck

literature. I just have to get stuck into Richard Rosy until I understand him and then my full pragmatist awakening will be complete. Next, we have

Alexander Neyas's nature life as literature, although with a bit of a twist. I've always been a real fan of

twist. I've always been a real fan of Brian Lighter's interpretations of Friedri Ner and he was really really critical of this book. So for a long time I was quite hesitant about it. But

this year I picked it up for myself and I actually really enjoyed it. It made me see nature in a very different light.

Neas's thesis and interpretation is quite complex. But essentially the

quite complex. But essentially the throughine of his thought is that his interpretation of nature sees life and the world more generally as analogous to

a literary text. All of nature's key ideas from the will to power to the eternal return and perspectivism are seen and interpreted through this lens.

Nature's project then in its kind of normative or therapeutic sense as it's sometimes put is seen as providing what he thinks is a truly lifeaffirming

interpretation of the literature of reality if that makes sense. Now as I said lighter heavily critiques this view for a number of pretty plausible reasons. He says it doesn't do justice

reasons. He says it doesn't do justice to nature's admiration for contemporary German materialism, nor for his avowed commitment to something at least akin to genuine historical fidelity in works

like the genealogy of morals. So I'm

sort of going to make this a twin recommendation. Although I read lighter

recommendation. Although I read lighter before this year, I'm going to recommend this book as a pair with Brian Lighter's Nature on Morality. The two interpreters work fantastically as sort of contrast

media for one another, if that makes sense. And personally, I had quite a lot

sense. And personally, I had quite a lot of fun rereading nature on morality while I was reading nature life as literature as they sort of they naturally form a conversation despite

the fact that this one was written in 1985 and lighters was written in 2002.

So, I don't know. I I can only say that I personally enjoyed that experience.

The place where lighter does praise Nyamass's interpretation is in Neymar's treatment of the eternal recurrence or the eternal return. And I also thought this was probably the strongest and most

interesting part of the book, though that could just be Lighter's unconscious influence going into it. Essentially,

Neymar sees the eternal recurrence as falling out of nature's general skepticism about a division between necessary and accidental properties of objects as well as a view of an object's

properties as the sum of their effects on other objects. Uh this means that nature's view of the world at least for Namas sees everything's relationship with everything else as essential to

making the world what it is and making it what it is. And thus to wish for one part of the world to be different would be to wish for it all to be different.

Thus for Namas the eternal recurrence becomes kind of a thought experiment, but it's also reminding the reader that they can't pick and choose parts of reality. If they affirm part of it, then

reality. If they affirm part of it, then they affirm all of it. And if they reject part of it, then they reject all of it. I don't know if I wholeheartedly

of it. I don't know if I wholeheartedly agree that this is what nature meant with the eternal recurrence. But even if it's not, I think it is still an extremely worthwhile philosophical

argument in its own right. And I do think that it is at very least a quite plausible interpretation of nature. It

essentially allows us to recapture some of the parthole relationship of other philosophical systems and especially ancient ones like stoicism without positing an overarching tilos to the

universe. And I think that's just kind

universe. And I think that's just kind of I think that's interesting in its own right. Another nature book I wanted to

right. Another nature book I wanted to shout out is nature's system by John Richardson. It's quite a dense book and

Richardson. It's quite a dense book and I've been reading it quite slowly, but I'm about 2/ird of the way through it and I'm absolutely loving it so far.

Another one from nearer the beginning of the year is Morie Clark's nature on truth and philosophy which isn't just a good book on nature's theory of truth.

But the second chapter also contains a pretty good survey of lots of 20th century theories of truth more generally. I'm always a big fan of Clark

generally. I'm always a big fan of Clark and her work on nature and this book has pretty much changed the landscape of how we view nature's ideas about truth. It

kind of made waves in the '9s. So, it's

worth reading if you are interested in secondary literature on nature. But

anyway, back to Namas. I would read Namas's book in conjunction with lighters as seeing where they disagree is in some ways even more valuable than reading them in isolation. They disagree

on almost everything, but they each give pretty strong and I would say plausible arguments for their view. It's also just nice for elucidating one of the frustrating truths about nature more

generally that there are a truly astonishing number of plausible readings for his work. And I just think this is generally worth acknowledging when we're reading him because I know otherwise I

think that we can get very fixed into one particular mode of interpreting nature and forget that there are plausible alternatives. I've certainly

plausible alternatives. I've certainly done that with lighter's general naturalistic interpretation of nature for example. Okay, next up we have The

for example. Okay, next up we have The Letters to Feliz and The Letters to Melena by France Kfka. I know that these are two books, but I read them together and they're relatively similar and I

feel like I can talk about them as one book. Each one is a collection of

book. Each one is a collection of letters from France Kafka, two women he became entangled with. His two-time

fiance but no time wife, Feliz Bower, and Melena Jasena. Kfka is a surprisingly enigmatic figure, especially given that we know quite a lot about him in terms of bare

particular facts. His writings are often

particular facts. His writings are often full of despair and absurdity and fear, while many of the personal anecdotes we have about him paint him as quite cheerful and upbeat and sociable. But

I've often found that it's in his letters that we find the closest bridge between these two pictures of Kfka. His

letters to Feliz in particular really display the full range of his emotional spectrum. One moment he is elated and we

spectrum. One moment he is elated and we can see that affable joyous Kfka that Max Broad talks about but then he'll worry about what Feliz thinks of him or he'll worry about the state of his

writings or just his own abilities and suddenly he is in despair and he's ringing his anxious hands over what he should do and writing endless letters [clears throat] to Feliz to seek

reassurance from her of her feelings.

The Kfka of Joseph Kay and Gregel Samza suddenly re-emerges. I've read a fair

suddenly re-emerges. I've read a fair bit of Kfka's diaries, and it is remarkable how similar the tone is in his diary entries and his letters.

They're both pretty candid concerning his feelings and his desires, and if anything, he sometimes comes across as more vulnerable in his letters. A great

many of his diary entries are just quite business-like. I think my favorite

business-like. I think my favorite letters are those that deal with Kfka's relationship with writing. Kfka is known for putting himself in his works, but in his letters, it's so clear that his

writing means more to him than anything else. Sometimes he even sort of

else. Sometimes he even sort of emotionally lashes out at his lovers because he is worried that being with them will tear him away from his work.

The letters really are a peak behind the parchment at what made Kfka tick. I

don't want to say much more than that because I will go on forever about them, but I reference them a lot in this video if you fancy checking it out. Okay, next

up we have Marx Aurelius's meditations and also uh this which is the the Cambridge companion to Mark Aurelius's meditations. So, I'm kind of cheating

meditations. So, I'm kind of cheating with this one because I have read the meditations before, but I was a teenager and I'd actually barely revisited it since. Mark Zurelius has sort of a

since. Mark Zurelius has sort of a strange place in stoicism scholarship because I don't know in my experience he just gets a lot less respect than most other thinkers. There's a quote I think

other thinkers. There's a quote I think it might actually be from John Cers where he says that Marcus Aurelius is seen as something like the unimaginative disciple who somehow got it wrong which

is just a quite funny way of putting it but that is in my experience at least how he is often seen. the meditations is sometimes held up unfavorably to more

sophisticated philosophical texts like Epictitus' discourses and is so judged lacking and personally speaking I've been guilty of this as well but on

reflection this is kind of unfair to Aurelius this is his personal journal and however we ended up with it it's unlikely that it was intended by him for

publication so this is like comparing someone's private writings to another person's public polished ones. I'm

currently writing a video on the meditations, so I won't go into too much detail here. In fact, it may end up

detail here. In fact, it may end up being the next video that I put out. But

when I went back to the meditations with a careful eye, I was surprised at just how interesting Aurelius's thoughts and reflections were, and specifically how he often melds Orthodox Stoic teachings

with other philosophers and philosophies that he is clearly quite interested in like Heracitis and Plato. And I was also just struck by his I don't know

semi-instrumentalist view of philosophy more generally whereby it is the means through which we achieve a good life rather than something pursued for the

sake of truth or as an end in itself.

I'm kind of I'm kind of strawmaning him there. But in a nutshell I suppose uh

there. But in a nutshell I suppose uh with the requisite distortions of simplification that is one of the things that struck me about him. I also did want to give a shout out to the Cambridge Companion to the meditations.

I've put it back down, so I'll just get it up again. It was incredibly helpful in helping me see some of the deeper aspects of the meditations. And after

reading the introduction to this, I was determined to give Orurelius another shot. So, that was the spur that got me

shot. So, that was the spur that got me to revisit it. It's got some fantastic essays and it goes quite deep into the kind of nuances of the original Greek and it canvases different ways of

interpreting Aurelius's work. The final

essay is also really interesting and it covers the connection between the meditations and modern psychotherrapeutic techniques. The thing

psychotherrapeutic techniques. The thing I really came to appreciate this time around was viewing the meditations as less a work of traditional philosophical

argumentation and more an attempt to apply philosophy in practice. I know

that sounds obvious, but it involves a whole set of different evaluative criteria when we're reading the book.

the repetitions and the supposed lack of rigor and the lack of detailed outlines of stoic principles explained explicitly just makes a lot more sense when we are

viewing this as a tool that Marcus was using for essentially bringing his own life and character in line with his principles. And this means that a lot of

principles. And this means that a lot of interesting philosophy is assumed or alluded to rather than outright stated or argued for. But this is probably more in line with what Aurelius was aiming

towards. So yes, past me was deeply

towards. So yes, past me was deeply unfair to Marcus Aurelius and I have an awful lot more time for him after revisiting him this year. I still

wouldn't recommend the meditations as your first foray into stoic philosophy because as I said a lot of the in-depth stoic ideas are alluded to rather than

explained or argued for but as like the second book on stoicism that you read maybe after Epictitus or maybe just after a general introduction like a modern academic general introduction I

actually think that this is fantastic and I know that's not exactly a niche opinion you know Markius's meditations is ood, but oh well, I'm just kind of punishing my past self for his rank

arrogance. And finally, we have The

arrogance. And finally, we have The Grapes of Roth by John Steinbeck. I

almost don't want to say too much about this book. It is fantastic and

this book. It is fantastic and horrifying in so many different ways, and I also just don't want to spoil it.

On the blurb, it says, "I've done my damnedest to rip a reader's nerves to rags. I don't want him satisfied." Which

rags. I don't want him satisfied." Which

kind of sums it up, to be honest. Like a

lot of other of Steinbeck's works, this story is set in and primarily about America in the 1930s and specifically the impact of the Great Depression on the rural United States. We follow the

Jode family as they attempt to escape povertystricken Oklahoma for the supposed sunny uplands of California, but when they arrive, they find that they have been sold a false promise.

It's it's sort of a difficult book to read, and that's not because it's badly written. It's written absolutely

written. It's written absolutely wonderfully. It's just that it's kind of

wonderfully. It's just that it's kind of unrelentingly sad and depressing. And

what's more, Steinbeck's really good at getting you to care about characters.

So, it is just that bit more soul crushing. But it is because of this that

crushing. But it is because of this that I want to recommend it. Steinbeck pulls

absolutely no punches in his descriptions of human misery and poverty and pain. The book made me furious more

and pain. The book made me furious more than once, but it was a it was a good kind of fury. And as a pretty relaxed and quite upbeat guy, it does take a lot to make me upset or angry. So, it is a

real testament to the book's quality that it managed to do that. Uh, again, I I just don't know what more to say about the book without giving away some of the

main plot points. So, I can only really say that it has emotionally affected me more than any other book this year. And

if that is not high praise for a novel, then I really don't know what is. Having

said that, The Grapes of Roth is quite a difficult place to start with Steinbeck.

The language is just it's not necessarily the easiest to understand at first read, if that makes sense. It kind

of similar to what we were talking about with McCarthy in the last video. He

often meshes a kind of biblical style of language with naturalistic descriptions, and that can make it a little bit confusing at first. It takes a while to settle into. Though if you do fancy an

settle into. Though if you do fancy an easier route into Steinbeck, I would recommend Of Mice and Men. I know that it's assigned in so many schools and almost everyone knows what happens and how it ends and it's become a bit of a

meme, at least in the UK, but it does really get you used to Steinbeck's particular way of writing in a gentler way, which can be, as I said, a little bit unfamiliar if you've not read much

of him before. Also, while Of Mice and Men is undeniably heartbreaking, it's a little less gut-wrenchingly brutal than The Grapes of Wrath. So, yeah, those are

my favorite books that I have read this year. If you fancy it, then please leave

year. If you fancy it, then please leave your own lists of your favorites as well. I'm always looking for good books

well. I'm always looking for good books to read. If you want to check out some

to read. If you want to check out some of my other book recommendations, I've got a video on that right here. Thank

you so much for watching and have a wonderful