Well-read in No Time: 100 Short Nonfiction Books
The How to be Well-read in No Time: 100 Short Nonfiction Books list comprises the greatest short factual works ever written. The titles cover a wide range of subjects including politics, economics, art, literary criticism, philosophy, science, sociology, biography, and history. They range in time mainly from the enlightenment era to the present day.
1. The Prince
By Niccolo Machiavelli | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
When Machiavelli's brief treatise on Renaissance statecraft and princely power was posthumously published in 1532, it generated a debate that has raged unabated until the present day. Based upon Machiavelli's first-hand experience as an emissary of the Florentine Republic to the courts of Europe, The Prince analyses the ... More »
2. Civilization and Its Discontents
By Sigmund Freud | Used Price: 70% Off
Freud’s seminal volume of twentieth-century cultural thought grounded in psychoanalytic theory, now with a new introduction by Christopher Hitchens. Written in the decade before Freud’s death, Civilization and Its Discontents may be his most famous and most brilliant work. It has been praised, dissected, lambasted, interpreted, and reinterpreted. ... More »
3. Fear and Trembling
In this rich and resonant work, Soren Kierkegaard reflects poetically and philosophically on the biblical story of God's command to Abraham, that he sacrifice his son Isaac as a test of faith. Was Abraham's proposed action morally and religiously justified or murder? Is there an absolute duty to ... More »
4. A Room of One's Own
By Virginia Woolf | Used Price: 90% Off
Collecting two book-length essays, "A Room of One's Own and Three Guineas" is Virginia Woolf's most powerful feminist writing, justifying the need for women to possess intellectual freedom and financial independence. This "Penguin Modern Classics" edition is edited with an introduction and notes by Michele Barrett. "A Room ... More »
5. The World of Odysseus
By Moses Finley | Used Price: 80% Off
The World of Odysseus is a concise and penetrating account of the society that gave birth to the Iliad and the Odyssey--a book that provides a vivid picture of the Greek Dark Ages, its men and women, works and days, morals and values. Long celebrated as a pathbreaking ... More »
6. The Origin of Others
By Toni Morrison | Used Price: 60% Off
America's foremost novelist reflects on the themes that preoccupy her work and increasingly dominate national and world politics: race, fear, borders, the mass movement of peoples, the desire for belonging. What is race and why does it matter? What motivates the human tendency to construct Others? Why does ... More »
7. The Music of Life: Biology Beyond Genes
By Denis Noble
The gene's eye view of life, proposed in Richard Dawkins acclaimed bestseller The Selfish Gene, sees living bodies as mere vehicles for the replication of genetic codes. But in The Music of Life, world renowned physiologist Denis Noble argues that, to truly understand life, we must look beyond ... More »
8. Black Skin, White Masks
By Frantz Fanon
Few modern voices have had as profound an impact on the black identity and critical race theory as Frantz Fanon, and Black Skin, White Masks  represents some of his most important work. Fanon’s masterwork is now available in a new translation that updates its language for a new ... More »
9. The Problems of Philosophy
By Bertrand Russell | Under $1.00
'Is there any knowledge in the world which is so certain that no reasonable man could doubt it?' Philosophy is the attempt to answer such ultimate questions, not carelessly and dogmatically, as we might deal with them in ordinary life, but critically, after analysing how and why the ... More »
10. The Art of Always Being Right
By Arthur Schopenhauer; A.C. Grayling
Beware who you give this book to.' Financial Times 'I recommend that you keep this delightful essay at your side.' Observer 'Dryly witty essay' Alain de Botton, Sunday Telegraph We all sit through meetings with that one person who seems to be able to persuade everyone. What is ... More »
11. Why I Write
By George Orwell | Under $1.00
Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves—and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives—and destroyed them. Now, Penguin brings you the works of ... More »
12. Double Helix
By James D. Watson | Used Price: 90% Off
Published to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Nobel Prize for Watson and Crick’s discovery of the structure of DNA, an annotated and illustrated edition of this classic book gives new insights into the personal relationships between James Watson, Frances Crick, Maurice Wilkins, and Rosalind Franklin, and the ... More »
13. Common Sense
By Thomas Paine | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
Published anonymously in 1776, the year of the American Declaration of Independence, Paine's "Common Sense" became an immediate best-seller, with fifty-six editions printed in that year alone. It was this pamphlet, more than any other factor, which helped to spark off the movement that established the independence of ... More »
14. America
By Jean Baudrillard | Used Price: 60% Off
From the sierras of New Mexico to the streets of New York and LA by night—â€Âa sort of luminous, geometric, incandescent immensityâ€Â—Baudrillard mixes aperçus and observations with a wicked sense of fun to provide a unique insight into the country that dominates our world. In this new edition, ... More »
15. Ill Fares the Land
By Tony Judt | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
A gift to the next generation of engaged citizens, from one of our most celebrated intellectuals. As the economic collapse of 2008 made clear, the social contract that defined postwar life in Europe and America-the guarantee of security, stability, and fairness-is no longer guaranteed; in fact, ... More »
16. The Motorcycle Diaries
By Ernesto Che Guevara | Used Price: 70% Off
 The book of the popular movie STARRING GAEL GARCIA BERNAL NOW A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER  The young Che Guevara’s lively and highly entertaining travel diary, ... More »
17. Ways of Seeing
By John Berger | Under $1.00
John Berger’s Classic Text on Art John Berger's Ways of Seeing is one of the most stimulating and the most influential books on art in any language. First published in 1972, it was based on the BBC television series about which the (London) ... More »
18. Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals
By John Gray | Used Price: 60% Off
The British bestseller Straw Dogs is an exciting, radical work of philosophy, which sets out to challenge our most cherished assumptions about what it means to be human. From Plato to Christianity, from the Enlightenment to Nietzsche and Marx, the Western tradition has been based on arrogant and ... More »
19. The Society of the Spectacle
By Guy Debord | Used Price: 50% Off
The Das Kapital of the 20th century. An essential text, and the main theoretical work of the situationists. Few works of political and cultural theory have been as enduringly provocative. From its publication amid the social upheavals of the 1960's up to the present, the volatile theses of ... More »
20. On Violence
By Hannah Arendt | Used Price: 80% Off
An analysis of the nature, causes, and significance of violence in the second half of the twentieth century. Arendt also reexamines the relationship between war, politics, violence, and power. “Incisive, deeply probing, written with clarity and grace, it provides an ideal framework for understanding the turbulence of our ... More »
21. Liberty before Liberalism
Liberty before Liberalism is a classic essay examining what liberal thought was in Ancient - Greek and Roman - times. Skinner uses this exploration of classical republican thought to explain the significance of intellectual history and the history of ideas. More »
22. Existentialism Is a Humanism
It was to correct common misconceptions about his thought that Jean-Paul Sartre, the most dominent European intellectual of the post-World War II decades, accepted an invitation to speak on October 29, 1945, at the Club Maintenant in Paris. The unstated objective of his lecture (“Existentialism Is a Humanismâ€Â) was ... More »
23. The Perpetual Race of Achilles and the Tortoise
In this collection of wise, witty and fascinating essays, Borges discusses the existence (or non-existence) of Hell, the flaws in English literary detectives, the philosophy of contradictions, and the many translators of "1001 Nights". Varied and enthralling, these pieces examine the very nature of our lives, from cinema ... More »
24. Representations of the Intellectual
By Edward W. Said | Used Price: 70% Off
In this series of essays, based on his 1993 Reith Lectures, Edward Said explores what it means to be an intellectual today. It is, he argues, the intellectual's role to represent a message or view not only to, but for, a public, and to do so as an ... More »
25. Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda
By Noam Chomsky | Used Price: 70% Off
Noam Chomsky’s backpocket classic on wartime propaganda and opinion control begins by asserting two models of democracy—one in which the public actively participates, and one in which the public is manipulated and controlled. According to Chomsky, "propaganda is to democracy as the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state," ... More »
26. Days of Reading
By Marcel Proust | Used Price: 80% Off
In these inspiring essays about why we read, Proust explores all the pleasures and trials that we take from books, as well as explaining the beauty of Ruskin and his work, and the joys of losing yourself in literature as a child. Throughout history, some books ... More »
27. The Athenian Revolution
By Josiah Ober | Used Price: 70% Off
Where did "democracy" come from, and what was its original form and meaning? Here Josiah Ober shows that this "power of the people" crystallized in a revolutionary uprising by the ordinary citizens of Athens in 508-507 B.C. He then examines the consequences of the ... More »
28. On the Medieval Origins of the Modern State
By Charles Tilly; Joseph R. Strayer
The modern state, however we conceive of it today, is based on a pattern that emerged in Europe in the period from 1100 to 1600. Written from the experience of a lifetime of teaching and research in the field, this short, clear book is ... More »
29. Discourse on Inequality
One of the most respected translations of this key work of 18th-century philosophy, this text includes a brief introduction to the two works as well as abundant notes that range from simple explanations to speculative interpretations. More »
30. The Myth of Sisyphus
By Albert Camus | Used Price: 70% Off
Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives - and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the ... More »
31. The Hedgehog and the Fox: An Essay on Tolstoy's View of History
By Isaiah Berlin | Used Price: 50% Off
"The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing." This ancient Greek aphorism, preserved in a fragment from the poet Archilochus, describes the central thesis of Isaiah Berlin's masterly essay on Leo Tolstoy and the philosophy of history, the subject of ... More »
32. Hiroshima
By John Hersey | Used Price: 80% Off
"At, exactly fifteen minutes past eight in the morning on August 6, 1945, Japanese time, at the moment when the atomic bomb flashed above Hiroshima, Miss Toshiko Sasaki, a clerk in the personnel department of the East Asia Tin Works, had just sat down at her place in ... More »
33. Beyond Good and Evil
By Friedrich Nietzsche | Used Price: 80% Off
Nietzsche's mature masterpiece, Beyond Good and Evil considers the origins and nature of Judeo-Christian morality; the end of philosophical dogmatism and beginning of perspectivism; the questionable virtues of science and scholarship; liberal democracy, nationalism, and women's emancipation. A superb new translation by Marion Faber, this highly annotated edition ... More »
34. Pandemics: What Everyone Needs To Know
From HIV to H1N1, pandemics pose one of the greatest threats to global health in the twenty-first century. Defined as epidemics of infectious disease across large geographic areas, pandemics can disseminate globally with incredible speed as humans and goods move faster than ever before. While vaccines, drugs, quarantine, ... More »
35. Climate Change: A Very Short Introduction
By Mark Maslin | Used Price: 50% Off
Climate change is still, arguably, the most critical and controversial issue facing the world in the twenty-first century. Previously published as Global Warming: A Very Short Introduction, the new edition has been renamed Climate Change: A Very Short introduction, to reflect the important change in the terminology of ... More »
36. The Communist Manifesto
By Karl Marx; Friedrich Engels | Under $1.00
The Communist Manifesto is a short 1848 publication written by the political theorists Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. It has since been recognized as one of the world's most influential political manuscripts. Commissioned by the Communist League, it laid out the League's purposes and program. It presents an ... More »
37. The Character of Physical Law
By Richard Feynman | Used Price: 70% Off
In these Messenger Lectures, originally delivered at Cornell University and recorded for television by the BBC, Richard Feynman offers an overview of ... More »
38. Experience And Education
By John Dewey | Used Price: 80% Off
Experience and Education is the best concise statement on education ever published by John Dewey, the man acknowledged to be the pre-eminent educational theorist of the twentieth century. Written more than two decades after Democracy and Education (Dewey's most comprehensive statement of his position in educational philosophy), this ... More »
39. The Leafcutter Ants: Civilization by Instinct
By E. O. Wilson; Bert Holldobler | 70% Off
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning authors of The Ants comes this dynamic and visually spectacular portrait of Earth's ultimate superorganism.The Leafcutter Ants is the most detailed and authoritative description of any ant species ever produced. With a text suitable for both a lay and a scientific audience, the book ... More »
40. The Two Cultures
By C. P. Snow | Used Price: 50% Off
This book is the most important gift that anyone can have in order to better understand the role of science and technology, future of education and research in society. It's cultures worth adopting as your own. More »
41. The Rule of Law
By Tom Bingham | Used Price: 60% Off
"The Rule of Law" is a phrase much used but little examined. The idea of the rule of law as the foundation of modern states and civilizations has recently become even more talismanic than that of democracy, but what does it actually consist of? In this brilliant short ... More »
42. The Spirit in Man, Art and Literature
By Carl Jung | Used Price: 60% Off
The Spirit in Man, Art and Literature offers unique and penetrating insights into the lives and opinions of some of the most significant players in the cultural life of the twentieth century. Carl Gustav Jung was at the heart of that cultural life, pioneering, along with Freud, a ... More »
43. What is Life?
Nobel laureate Erwin Schrödinger's What is Life? is one of the great science classics of the twentieth century. It was written for the layman, but proved to be one of the spurs to the birth of molecular biology and the subsequent discovery of DNA. What is Life? appears ... More »
44. Jefferson and Civil Liberties: The Darker Side
By Leonard W. Levy | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
In the most controversial analysis ever written of the apostle of American liberty, the distinguished constitutional historian Leonard W. Levy examines Jefferson’s record on civil liberties and finds it strikingly wanting. Clearing away the saintliness that surrounds the hero, Mr. Levy tries to understand why the “unfamiliarâ€Â Jefferson ... More »
45. Israel/Palestine: How to End the War of 1948
By Tanya Reinhart | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
In Israel/Palestine, Reinhart traces the development of the Security Barrier and Israel’s new doctrine of "disengagement," launched in response to a looming Palestinian-majority population. Examining the official record of recent diplomacy, including United States–brokered accords and talks at Camp David, Oslo, and Taba, Reinhart explores the fundamental power ... More »
46. The Four Little Dragons: Spread of Industrialization in East Asia
By Ezra F. Vogel | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
Japan and the four little dragons--Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Singapore--constitute less than 1 percent of the world's land mass and less than 4 percent of the world's population. Yet in the last four decades they have become, with Europe and North America, one of the ... More »
47. Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth
By James Lovelock | Used Price: 80% Off
In this classic work that continues to inspire its many readers, James Lovelock deftly explains his idea that life on earth functions as a single organism. Written for the non-scientist, Gaia is a journey through time and space in search of evidence with which to support a new ... More »
48. Quantum Physics: Illusion or Reality?
By Alastair Rae
The Institute for Mathematical Sciences at the National University of Singapore hosted a two-month research program on "Mathematical Theory and Numerical Methods for Computational Materials Simulation and Design" from 1 July to 31 August 2009. As an important part of the program, tutorials and special lectures were given ... More »
49. Pedagogy of the Oppressed
By Paulo Freire | Used Price: 60% Off
This text argues that the ignorance and lethargy of the poor are the direct result of the whole economic, social and political domination. The book suggests that in some countries the oppressors use the system to maintain a 'culture of silence'. Through the right kind of education, the ... More »
50. What Is History?
By E. H. Carr | Under $1.00
What is History? is Edward Carr's brilliant work of historical theory. The text is based on The George Macaulay Trevelyan Lectures presented at University of Cambridge in 1961. More »
51. The Elements of Style
By E. B. White; William Strunk | Under $1.00
You know the authors' names. You recognize the title. You've probably used this book yourself. This is The Elements of Style, the classic style manual, now in a fourth edition. A new Foreword by Roger Angell reminds readers that the advice of Strunk & White is as valuable ... More »
52. The Medium is the Massage
By Marshall McLuhan; Quentin Fiore | 50% Off
Well known for coining the term 'Global Village', Marshall McLuhan's thinking was, and still is, revolutionary. His theories, many of which are illustrated in this astonishing 'inventory of effects', force us to question how modes of communication have shaped society. This is an astonishing work by a truly ... More »
53. The Treason of the Intellectuals
By Julien Benda
Julien Benda’s classic study of 1920s Europe resonates today. The “treason of the intellectualsâ€Â is a phrase that evokes much but is inherently ambiguous. The book bearing this title is well known but little understood. This edition is introduced by Roger Kimball. From the time of the ... More »
54. A Little Gay History: Desire and Diversity across the World
By R. B. Parkinson; Kate Smith; Max Carocci
How old is the oldest chat-up line between men? Who was the first lesbian? Were ancient Greek men who had sex together necessarily gay? And what did Shakespeare think about cross-dressing? "A Little Gay History" takes objects ranging from Ancient Egyptian papyri and the erotic scenes on the ... More »
55. The Greek Philosophers from Thales to Aristotle
With an new foreword by James Warren Long renowned as one of the clearest and best introductions to ancient Greek philosophy for non-specialists, W.K.C Guthrie’s The Greek Philosophers offers us a brilliant insight into the hidden foundations of Greek philosophy – foundations that underpin Western thought today. ... More »
56. We Have Never Been Modern
By Bruno Latour
With the rise of science, we moderns believe, the world changed irrevocably, separating us forever from our primitive, premodern ancestors. But if we were to let go of this fond conviction, Bruno Latour asks, what would the world look like? His book, an anthropology of science, shows us ... More »
57. The Gift
By Marcel Mauss | Used Price: 50% Off
Since its first publication in English in 1954, The Gift, Marcel Mauss's groundbreaking study of the relation between forms of exchange and social structure, has been acclaimed as a classic among anthropology texts.A brilliant example of the comparative method, ?The Gift? presents the first systematic study of the custom—widespread ... More »
58. The Sovereignty of Good
By Iris Murdoch | Used Price: 70% Off
Iris Murdoch once observed: 'philosophy is often a matter of finding occasions on which to say the obvious'. What was obvious to Murdoch, and to all those who read her work, is that Good transcends everything - even God. Throughout her distinguished and prolific writing career, she explored ... More »
59. Historical Capitalism with Capitalist Civilization
In this short, highly readable book, the master of world-systems theory provides a succinct anatomy of capitalism over the past five hundred years. Considering the way capitalism has changed and evolved over the centuries, and what has remained constant, he outlines its chief characteristics. In particular, he looks ... More »
60. Morality: An Introduction to Ethics
By Bernard Williams | Used Price: 50% Off
In Morality Bernard Williams confronts the problems of writing moral philosophy, and offers a stimulating alternative to more systematic accounts which seem nevertheless to have left all the important issues somewhere off the page. Williams explains, analyses and distinguishes a number of key positions, from the purely amoral ... More »
61. Mysticism: Christian and Buddhist
By D. T. Suzuki | Used Price: 80% Off
If the Western world knows anything about Zen Buddhism, it is down to the efforts of one remarkable man, D.T. Suzuki. The twenty-seven year-old Japanese scholar first visited the West in 1897, and over the course of the next seventy years became the world's leading authority on Zen. ... More »
62. Why Leaders Lie
By John J. Mearsheimer | Used Price: 50% Off
For more than two decades, John J. Mearsheimer has been regarded as one of the foremost realist thinkers on foreign policy. Clear and incisive as well as a fearlessly honest analyst, his coauthored 2007 New York Times bestseller, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, aroused a firestorm ... More »
63. The Moral Law
Few books have had as great an impact on intellectual history as Kant's The Moral Law. In its short compass one of the greatest minds in the history of philosophy attempts to identify the fundamental principle 'morality' that governs human action. Supported by a clear introduction and ... More »
64. Lives of a Cell
By Lewis Thomas | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
Elegant, suggestive, and clarifying, Lewis Thomas's profoundly humane vision explores the world around us and examines the complex interdependence of all things. Extending beyond the usual limitations of biological science and into a vast and wondrous world of hidden relationships, this provocative book explores in personal, poetic essays ... More »
65. Design as Art
By Bruno Munari | Used Price: 60% Off
How do we see the world around us? "The Penguin on Design" series includes the works of creative thinkers whose writings on art, design and the media have changed our vision forever. Bruno Munari was among the most inspirational designers of all time, described by Picasso as 'the ... More »
66. The Golem: What You Should Know About Science
By Harry Collins | Used Price: 60% Off
Harry Collins and Trevor Pinch liken science to the Golem, a creature from Jewish mythology, powerful yet potentially dangerous, a gentle, helpful creature that may yet run amok at any moment. Through a series of intriguing case studies the authors debunk the traditional view that science is the ... More »
67. On Bullshit
One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit. Everyone knows this. Each of us contributes his share. But we tend to take the situation for granted. Most people are rather confident of their ability to recognize bullshit and to avoid ... More »
68. The Limits of State Action
By Wilhelm von Humboldt; J. W. Burrow | 50% Off
This text is important both as one of the most interesting contributions to the liberalism of the German Enlightenment, and as the most significant source for the ideas which John Stuart Mill popularized in his essay On Liberty. Humboldt's concern is to define the criteria by which the ... More »
69. Gibbon
By J. W. Burrow
To read Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is no light undertaking. It covers twelve centuries, three continents, and seven volumes, 'a kind of bridge', as Thomas Carlyle wrote, 'that connects the antique with the modern ages. And how gorgeously does it swing across the ... More »
70. Blood and Guts: A Short History of Medicine
By Roy Porter | Used Price: 50% Off
"Chock-full of astonishing facts and fascinating illustrations."—Booklist An eminently readable, entertaining romp through the history of our vain and valiant efforts to heal ourselves. Mankind's battle to stay alive and healthy for as long as possible is our oldest, most universal struggle. With his characteristic wit and vastly ... More »
71. Letters to a Young Novelist
By Mario Vargas Llosa | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
Mario Vargas Llosa condenses a lifetime of writing, reading, and thought into an essential manual for aspiring writers. Drawing on the stories and novels of writers from around the globe—Borges, Bierce, Céline, Cortázar, Faulkner, Kafka, Robbe-Grillet—he lays bare the inner workings of fiction, all the while urging young ... More »
72. Why Europe? The Rise of the West in World History 1500-1850
Part of McGraw-Hill's Explorations in World History series, this brief and accessible volume explores one of the biggest questions of recent historical debate: how among all of Eurasia’s interconnected centers of power, it was Europe that came to dominate much of the world. Author Jack Goldstone presents ... More »
73. Rethinking History
By Keith Jenkins | Used Price: 70% Off
History means many things to many people. But finding an answer to the question 'What is history?' is a task few feel equipped to answer. If you want to explore this tantalising subject, where do you start? What are the critical skills you need to begin to make ... More »
74. The Ethics of Ambiguity
By Simone de Beauvoir | Used Price: 50% Off
From the groundbreaking author of The Second Sex comes a radical argument for ethical responsibility and freedom. In this classic introduction to existentialist thought, French philosopher Simone de Beauvoir’s The Ethics of Ambiguity simultaneously pays homage to and grapples with her French contemporaries, philosophers Jean-Paul Sartre and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, ... More »
75. A History of the Cuban Revolution
By Aviva Chomsky | Used Price: 60% Off
A History of the Cuban Revolution presents a concise socio-historical account of the Cuban Revolution of 1959, an event that continues to spark debate 50 years later. Balances a comprehensive overview of the political and economic events of the revolution with a look at the revolution's social ... More »
76. The Second World War
By A.J.P. Taylor | Under $1.00
Provides an overview of World War II from the invasion of Poland to V-J day, and covers major campaigns and battles. More »
77. Top Heavy: The Increasing Inequality of Wealth in America and What Can Be Done About It
By Edward N. Wolff | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
A revised and expanded edition of the shocking study that changed the way we think of wealth in America. A work that sparked widespread controversy when it was first published, Top Heavy is acclaimed economist Edward N. Wolff's eloquent presentation of the facts of wealth inequality in the ... More »
78. Women & Power: A Manifesto
By Mary Beard
Why the popular resonance of 'mansplaining' (despite the intense dislike of the term felt by many men)? It hits home for us because it points straight to what it feels like not to be taken seriously: a bit like when I get lectured on Roman history on Twitter. ... More »
79. A Rulebook for Arguments
A Rulebook for Arguments is a succinct introduction to the art of writing and assessing arguments, organized around specific rules, each illustrated and explained soundly but briefly. This widely popular primer--translated into eight languages--remains the first choice in all disciplines for writers who seek straightforward guidance about ... More »
80. The First Crusade
By Steven Runciman | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
When Pope Urban II rose to his feet to address the multitudes gathered before him at the Council of Clermont in 1095, his appeal was simple: let Western Christendom march to the aid of their brethren in the East. Whether the Crusades are regarded as the most idealistic ... More »
81. Accumulation and Power: Economic History of the United States
By Richard B. DuBoff | Used Price: 60% Off
"This book represents a high-quality, successful attempt to forge the beginnings of a new paradigm for American economic history, one that does not assume that the market solves all problems in the best of all possible ways. In spite of the fact that the book is frontier research, ... More »
82. The Specter of Communism: The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1917-1953
By Melvyn Leffler; Eric Foner | Price: $0.01
The Hill and Wang Critical Issues Series: concise, affordable works on pivotal topics in American history, society, and politics. The Specter of Communism is a concise history of the origins of the Cold War and the evolution of U.S.-Soviet relations, from the Bolshevik revolution to the death of ... More »
83. On Liberty
By John Stuart Mill | Used Price: 90% Off
John Stuart Mill is one of the few indisputably classic authors in the history of political thought. On Liberty, first published in 1851, has become celebrated as the most powerful defense of the freedom of the individual and it is now widely regarded as the most ... More »
84. Medieval Women
By Eileen Power | Used Price: 50% Off
Throughout her career as a medieval historian, Eileen Power was engaged on a book on women in the Middle Ages. She did not live to write the book but some of the material she collected found its way into her popular lectures on medieval women. These lectures were ... More »
85. The Divided Self: An Existential Study in Sanity and Madness
By R. D. Laing | Under $1.00
Dr. Laing's first purpose is to make madness and the process of going mad comprehensible. In this, with case studies of schizophrenic patients, he succeeds brilliantly, but he does more: through a vision of sanity and madness as 'degrees of conjunction and disjunction between two persons where the ... More »
86. The Spanish Civil War: A Very Short Introduction
By Helen Graham | Used Price: 80% Off
Amid the many catastrophes of the twentieth century, the Spanish Civil War continues to exert a particular fascination among history buffs and the lay-reader alike. This Very Short Introduction integrates the political, social and cultural history of the Spanish Civil War. It sets out the domestic and international ... More »
87. Islam: A Short History
By Karen Armstrong | Under $1.00
No religion in the modern world is as feared and misunderstood as Islam. It haunts the popular imagination as an extreme faith that promotes terrorism, authoritarian government, female oppression, and civil war. In a vital revision of this narrow view of Islam and a distillation of years of ... More »
88. Nations and Nationalism
By Ernest Gellner | Used Price: 50% Off
From reviews of the first edition: "Brilliant, provocative . . . a great book."—New Statesman "An important book . . . It is a new starting line from which all subsequent discussions of nationalism will have to begin."—New Society "A better explanation than anyone has yet offered of ... More »
89. The Great Financial Crisis: Causes and Consequences
By John Bellamy Foster; Fred Magdoff | Price: $0.01
In the fall of 2008, the United States was plunged into a financial crisis more severe than any since the Great Depression. As banks collapsed and the state scrambled to organize one of the largest transfers of wealth in history, many—including economists and financial experts—were shocked by the ... More »
90. A Question of Trust
By Onora O'Neill | Used Price: 90% Off
Can trust be restored by making people and institutions more accountable? Or do complex systems of accountability and control damage trust? Onora O'Neill challenges current approaches, investigates sources of deception in our society and re-examines questions of press freedom. This year's Reith Lectures present a ... More »
91. An Experiment in Criticism
By C. S. Lewis
Why do we read literature and how do we judge it? C. S. Lewis's classic An Experiment in Criticism springs from the conviction that literature exists for the joy of the reader and that books should be judged by the kind of reading they invite. He argues that ... More »
92. Empire and Superempire: Britain, America and the World
By Bernard Porter | Used Price: 90% Off
The present American “empireâ€Â is often compared with the British one of yore—not surprising in view of the fact that Afghanistan and Iraq were once British imperial stamping grounds, too. But how alike are the two empires really? What are the connections between them? And what can we ... More »
93. The Art of Being
By Erich Fromm | Used Price: 60% Off
How can we realize and actualize love, reason, and meaningful, productive work? Fromm here offers an Art of Well-Being, a way of living based on authentic self-awareness that comes only through honest self-analysis. He warns of the pitfalls of our attaining enlightenment without effort, or believing that life ... More »
94. Antigone Rising: The Subversive Power of the Ancient Myths
A witty, inspiring reckoning with the ancient Greek and Roman myths and their legacy, from what they can illuminate about #MeToo to the radical imagery of Beyoncé. The picture of classical antiquity most of us learned in school is framed in certain ways -- glossing over misogyny ... More »
95. Why Nuclear Disarmament Matters
By Hans Blix | Rock-bottom Price: $0.01
In 2002 Dr. Hans Blix, then chief United Nations weapons inspector, led his team on a search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Before the United ... More »
96. The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments For Capitalism Before Its Triumph
In this volume, Albert Hirschman reconstructs the intellectual climate of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to illuminate the intricate ideological transformation that occurred, wherein the pursuit of material interests--so long condemned as the deadly sin of avarice--was assigned the role of containing the unruly ... More »
97. The Demise of Nuclear Energy?: Lessons for Democratic Control of Technology
By Joseph G. Morone; Edward J. Woodhouse
A nonpartisan analysis of America's nuclear industry-how it was implemented, why it has been so unsuccessful, and what lessons it can teach us for future energy policymaking. Joseph Morone and Edward Woodhouse argue that a radically altered form of nuclear power could provide a more acceptable and less ... More »
98. Man's Search for Meaning
By Viktor E. Frankl | Used Price: 70% Off
With a new Foreword by Harold S. Kushnerand a new Biographical Afterword by William J. Winslade Psychiatrist Viktor Frankl's memoir has riveted generations of readers with its descriptions of life in Nazi death camps and its lessons for spiritual survival. Between 1942 and 1945 Frankl labored in four ... More »
99. Feminism is for Everybody
By bell hooks
A study of black and post-colonial writing in Britain - and the extent to which Britain's colonial heritage has shaped present-day formulations of British culture. More »
100. An Introduction to Mathematics
By Alfred North Whitehead | Price: $0.01
This distinguished little book is a brisk introduction to a series of mathematical concepts, a history of their development, and a concise summary of how today's reader may use them. More »
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