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Reading lists

What to read if you loved Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

The Last Tree on Easter Island

In twenty short books, Penguin brings you the classics of the environmental movement. 
 
This is Jared Diamond's haunting account of visiting the mysterious stone statues of Easter Island, showing how a remote civilization destroyed itself by exploiting its own natural resources - and why we must heed this warning. 
 
Over the past 75 years, a new canon has emerged. As life on Earth has become irrevocably altered by humans, visionary thinkers around the world have raised their voices to defend the planet, and affirm our place at the heart of its restoration. Their words have endured through the decades, becoming the classics of a movement. Together, these books show the richness of environmental thought, and point the way to a fairer, saner, greener world.

Jared Diamond (b.1937) is Professor of Geography at UCLA and a noted polymath whose books about human societies blend biology, geography, anthropology, linguistics and history.

Over the past 75 years, a new canon has emerged. As humans have driven the living planet to the brink of collapse, visionary thinkers around the world have raised their voices to defend it. Their words have endured, becoming the classics that define the environmental movement today. 
 
This is his haunting account of visiting the mysterious stone statues of Easter Island, showing how a remote civilization destroyed itself by exploiting its own natural resources - and why we must heed this warning.

How Nations Cope with Crisis and Change

Upheaval

'A riveting and illuminating tour of how nations deal with crises - which might hopefully help humanity as a whole deal with our present global crisis' YUVAL NOAH HARARI, author of SAPIENS 
 
** NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER** 
 
Author of the landmark international bestsellers Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse, Jared Diamond has transformed our understanding of what makes civilizations rise and fall. Now, at a time when crises are erupting around the world, he explores what makes certain nations resilient, and reveals the factors that influence how nations and individuals can respond to enormous challenges. 
 
In a riveting journey into the recent past, he traces how six distinctive modern nations - Finland, Chile, Indonesia, Japan, Germany and Australia - have survived defining catastrophes, and identifies patterns in their recovery. Looking ahead, he investigates the risk that the United States and other countries, faced by grave threat, are set on a course towards catastrophe. 
 
Adding a rich psychological dimension to the in-depth history, geography, biology and anthropology that underpin all of Diamond's writing, Upheaval is epic in scope, but also his most personal book yet. 
 
'Fascinating ... I finished the book even more optimistic about our ability to solve problems than I started' BILL GATES 
 
'Jared Diamond does it again: another rich, original and fascinating chapter in the human saga - with vital lessons for our difficult times' STEVEN PINKER

Fascinating... I'm a big fan of everything Jared has written, and his latest is no exception. ... I finished the book even more optimistic about our ability to solve problems than I started.

Bill Gates, Summer Reading Recommendations 2019

Upheaval is bold, wide-ranging and original ... probes large and important questions. Unlike most social scientists, Diamond can write invigorating prose that carries the reader along with its sweep ... It deserves to be widely read and pondered.

A riveting and illuminating tour of how nations deal with crises-which might hopefully help humanity as a whole deal with our present global crisis.

Yuval Noah Harari, author of 'Sapiens' and '21 Lessons for the 21st Century'

Jared Diamond is an undisputed global star of comparative history... Britain could learn from this book about how other nations have dealt with turmoil... He finds intellectually stimulating and unusual examples that provide much food for thought.

Diamond writes so well, and his frame of reference (across disciplines and languages) is so considerable, that almost everything he describes comes across as fresh.

[Diamond] wears the mantle of a modern-day prophet . . . opens textures of historical possibility. Only the most obtuse reader of his latest book, on national resilience, could miss the signs and portents with which it is studded ... The prophet spares us chiselled commandments, but we have been warned.

As a meditation about a world on edge, it is well worth reading

Persuasive . . . runs refreshingly counter to conventional wisdom

Jared Diamond does it again: another rich, original, and fascinating chapter in the human saga-with vital lessons for our difficult times.

Steven Pinker, author of 'Enlightenment Now'

Upheaval is a brilliant, gripping, personal account of nations in crisis, informed by how people respond to crisis. It's an especially timely read today, when nations are stressed and have much to learn about how to survive big challenges. I urge you to read it.

Paul Ehrlich, author of 'Jaws: The Story of a Hidden Epidemic'

In Upheaval, I find eye-opening lessons about the political and psychological forces that lead to crisis and then resilience, how individuals and nations experience trauma in similar ways, and what that suggests about our future and the world's . . . wise and beautiful.

Diane Ackerman, author of 'The Zookeeper's Wife'

Jared Diamond is one of the deepest thinkers and most authoritative writers of our time-arguably of all time-and Upheaval proves his prescience in analyzing historical crises within nations at a time when national crises have erupted around the world . . . No scientist has ever won the Nobel Prize for literature. Jared Diamond should be the first.

Michael Shermer, publisher of Skeptic magazine and author of 'Heavens on Earth'

Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the seminal million-copy-bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of Time magazine's best non-fiction books of all time, Collapse, a No. 1 international bestseller, and The World Until Yesterday, among other books. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond's work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

In his landmark international bestsellers Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse, Jared Diamond transformed our understanding of what makes civilizations rise and fall. Now in the third book in this monumental trilogy, he reveals how successful nations recover from crisis. 
 
Diamond shows us how seven countries have survived defining upheavals in the recent past - from the forced opening up of Japan and the Soviet invasion of Finland to the Pinochet regime in Chile - through selective change, a process of painful self-appraisal and adaptation more commonly associated with personal trauma. Looking ahead to the future, he investigates whether the United States, and the world, are squandering their natural advantages and are on a devastating path towards catastrophe. Is this fate inevitable? Or can we still learn from the lessons of the past? 
 
Exhibiting the awe-inspiring grasp of history, geography, economics and anthropology that marks all Diamond's work, Upheaval reveals how both nations and individuals can become more resilient. The result is a book epic in scope, but also his most personal yet.

(Patterns of Life)

Guns, Germs and Steel

A series of special editions of the best popular science books to explore the patterns of our planet. Designed by Patternity, the award-winning creative studio and pattern consultancy.

A book of remarkable scope... One of the most important and readable works on the human past

Fascinating, coherent, compassionate and completely accessible

A prodigious, convincing work, conceived on a grand scale

The most absorbing account on offer of the emergence of a world divided between have and have-nots... Never before put together so coherently, with such a combination of expertise, charm and compassion

Diamond's sideways-on view of human development may well establish its author as one of the very few scientists to have changed the way we think about history

This is the book that turned me from a historian of medieval warfare into a student of humankind

Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of TIME’s best non-fiction books of all time, the number-one international bestseller Collapse, and most recently The World Until Yesterday. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond’s work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

Read this specially designed new edition of Jared Diamond’s Pulitzer-prize winning exploration of what makes us human. 
 
 Why has human history unfolded so differently across the globe? In this Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Jared Diamond puts the case that geography and biogeography, not race, moulded the contrasting fates of Europeans, Asians, Native Americans, sub-Saharan Africans, and aboriginal Australians. An ambitious synthesis of history, biology, ecology and linguistics, Guns, Germs and Steel remains a groundbreaking and humane work of popular science. 
 
PATTERNS OF LIFE: SPECIAL EDITIONS OF GROUNDBREAKING SCIENCE BOOKS

A short history of everybody for the last 13,000 years

'A book of big questions, and big answers' Yuval Noah Harari, bestselling author of Sapiens 
 
A short history of everybody for the last 13,000 years; now with a new afterword to mark the 20th anniversary of publication

**WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE** 
 
 'A book of big questions, and big answers' Yuval Noah Harari, bestselling author of Sapiens 
 
 Why has human history unfolded so differently across the globe? And what can it teach us about our current crisis? 
 
 Jared Diamond puts the case that geography and biogeography, not race, moulded the contrasting fates of Europeans, Asians, Native Americans, sub-Saharan Africans, and aboriginal Australians. 
 
 An ambitious synthesis of history, biology, ecology and linguistics, Guns, Germs and Steel is a ground-breaking and humane work of popular science that can provide expert insight into our modern world. 
 
'The most absorbing account on offer of the emergence of a world divided between have and have-nots... Never before put together so coherently, with such a combination of expertise, charm and compassion' The Times

One of the best books I've reviewed this year.

Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of TIME’s best non-fiction books of all time, the number one international bestseller Collapse and most recently The World UntilYesterday. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond’s work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

'A book of big questions, and big answers' Yuval Noah Harari, bestselling author of Sapiens 
 
 Why has human history unfolded so differently across the globe? And what can it teach us about our current crisis? 
 
 Jared Diamond puts the case that geography and biogeography, not race, moulded the contrasting fates of Europeans, Asians, Native Americans, sub-Saharan Africans, and aboriginal Australians. 
 
 An ambitious synthesis of history, biology, ecology and linguistics, Guns, Germs and Steel is a ground-breaking and humane work of popular science that can provide expert insight into our modern world. 
 
 **WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE** 
 
 **Over One Million Copies Sold**

What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?

The World Until Yesterday

Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the seminal million-copy-bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of TIME's best non-fiction books of all time, and Collapse, a #1 international bestseller. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond's work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

The no. 1 bestselling author of Collapse and Guns, Germs and Steel explores the profound lessons that traditional societies offer us today 
 
Over the past 500 years, the West achieved global dominance, but do Westerners necessarily have better ideas about how to raise children, care for the elderly, or simply live well? In this epic journey into our past, Jared Diamond reveals that traditional societies around the world offer an extraordinary window into how our ancestors lived for the majority of human history - until virtually yesterday, in evolutionary terms. Drawing on decades of his own fieldwork, Diamond explores how tribal people approach essential human problems, from health and diet to conflict resolution and language, and discovers they have much to teach us. 
 
Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the seminal million-copy-bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of TIME's best non-fiction books of all time, and Collapse, a #1 international bestseller. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond's work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive

Collapse

The No.1 International Bestseller that has sold over 15,000 hardbacks and over 165,000 paperbacks (Vista) and counting

From the author of Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive is a visionary study of the mysterious downfall of past civilizations. 
 
Now in a revised edition with a new afterword, Jared Diamond's Collapse uncovers the secret behind why some societies flourish, while others founder - and what this means for our future. 
 
What happened to the people who made the forlorn long-abandoned statues of Easter Island? 
What happened to the architects of the crumbling Maya pyramids? 
Will we go the same way, our skyscrapers one day standing derelict and overgrown like the temples at Angkor Wat? 
 
Bringing together new evidence from a startling range of sources and piecing together the myriad influences, from climate to culture, that make societies self-destruct, Jared Diamond's Collapse also shows how - unlike our ancestors - we can benefit from our knowledge of the past and learn to be survivors. 
 
'A grand sweep from a master storyteller of the human race' - Daily Mail 
 
'Riveting, superb, terrifying' - Observer 
 
'Gripping ... the book fulfils its huge ambition, and Diamond is the only man who could have written it' - Economis 
 
'This book shines like all Diamond's work' - Sunday Times

Jared Diamond is Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles. Until recently he was Professor of Physiology at the UCLA School of Medicine. He is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the widely acclaimed Guns, Germs, and Steel: the Fates of Human Societies, which also is the winner of Britain's 1998 Rhone-Poulenc Science Book Prize.

From groundbreaking writer and thinker Jared Diamond comes the epic, visionary book, now in a revised edition with a new afterword, on the mysterious collapse of past civilizations - and what this means for our future. Why do some societies flourish, while others founder? What happened to the people who made the forlorn long-abandoned statues of Easter Island or to the architects of the crumbling Maya pyramids? Will we go the same way, our skyscrapers one day standing derelict and overgrown like the temples at Angkor Wat? 
 
Bringing together new evidence from a startling range of sources and piecing together the myriad influences, from climate to culture, that make societies self-destruct, Collapse also shows how unlike our ancestors we can benefit from our knowledge of the past and learn to be survivors.

how our animal heritage affects the way we live

The Rise And Fall Of The Third Chimpanzee

How our animal heritage affects the way we live

Eloquent and knowledgeable account of the tiny genetic difference between humans and chimps

Some biologists are just scientists; but some truly are thinkers. Jared Diamond is one of the latter. Whatever he applies himself to, his contribution is original and worthwhile

A fascinating portrait with more than enough uncomfortable facts to stop any dinner-party conversation in its tracks - an important book

Confirms Diamond as an impressive scholar and popularizer-an enjoyable, stimulating and audacious book

Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of TIME’s best non-fiction books of all time, the number one international bestseller Collapse and most recently The World UntilYesterday. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond’s work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

From the Pulitzer Prize winning author of Guns, Germs and Steel 
 
More than 98 % of human genes are shared with two species of chimpanzee. The 'third' chimpanzee is man. 
 
Jared Diamond surveys our life-cycle, culture, sexuality and destructive urges both towards ourselves and the planet to explore the ways in which we are uniquely human yet still influenced by our animal origins.

Jared Diamond

Jared Diamond's erudite, engaging and thought-provoking book takes us a huge step forward toward understanding how circumstances and individual talents, determination and strategy make leaders that have the potential to change our world (hopefully for the better)

Daron Acemoglu, Nobel Laureate and co-author of Why Nations Fail

We live in turbulent times, and our societies look to exceptional individuals to navigate us out of crisis. But do leaders matter? And, if yes, what determines a leader’s success? A must-read from the grand master of analytic history

Peter Turchin, author of End Times

An undisputed global star of comparative history

One of the few people who have changed the way we see human nature and our history

Wears the mantle of a modern-day prophet

One of the most interesting and arresting writers of our age

The most considered, courageous and sensitive teller of the human story writing today

A master of at least nine academic disciplines, from anthropology to ornithology, and the subject of his books is never less than everything

“Thought-provoking… with a staggeringly broad view of the world.”

“Diamond turns his polymathic mind to leadership… It is a rollicking read.”

(When) Do Leaders Make a Difference?

We often read history as the biographies of ‘great men’ who shaped the world. But are leaders, whichever field they are in, really that influential? Should CEOs be given large bonuses when a company performs well? Why, when a political leader is assassinated, is their successor as likely to improve as damage a country? When do we know if firing a coach has changed the fortunes of the team? 
 
World-renowned historian and bestselling author Jared Diamond argues that leaders are neither heroic exceptions nor products of circumstance. Looking at four difference spheres: history, business, sport and religion, Diamond asks under which conditions is a leader most likely to make a difference and why. 
 
Drawing on the life and career of iconic leaders – from Botswana president Seretse Khama to legendary UCLA football coach John Wooden – Diamond shows us how leadership effectiveness is determined by a range of complex interrelated factors, from resources to geography, culture to technology. 
 
Profits, Prophets, Coaches and Kings is a thought-provoking assessment of when leaders can bring about effective change, when they don’t, and perhaps whether we need them at all.

Jared Diamond

Books by Jared Diamond

Articles featuring Jared Diamond

What to read if you loved Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

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