Skip to main content

Non-Fiction Reading

These are the non-fiction books that have most informed my thinking on the topics I write about:

The Climate Crisis

Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology after the End of the World, All Art is Ecological, and Dark Ecology - Timothy Morton

This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate - Naomi Klein

Regenesis: Feeding the World without Devouring the Planet - George Monbiot

The Shock of the Anthropocene - Christophe Bonneuil and Jean-Baptiste Fressoz

The Uninhabitable Earth - David Wallace-Wells

The Ecological Other: Environmental Exclusion in American Culture - Sarah Jaquette Ray

Rainforest: Dispatches from Earth's Most Vital Frontlines - Tony Juniper

When the Rivers Run Dry: The Global Water Crisis and How to Solve it - Fred Pearce

Planet on Fire: A Manifesto for the Age of Environmental Breakdown - Laurie Laybourn-Langton and Mathew Lawrence

Activism

Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds - adrienne maree brown

The Fire Next Time - James Baldwin

Pedagogy of the Oppressed - Paolo Freire

Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology - David Graeber

Black Resistance to British Policing - Adam Elliot-Cooper

Rest is Resistance - Tricia Hersey

The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. - Martin Luther King Jr., Edited by Claybourne Carson

The Power of Nonviolent Resistance - M. K. Gandhi

The Intersectional Environmentalist - Leah Thomas

Why You Should be a Trade Unionist and Always Red - Len McCluskey

How to Blow Up a Pipeline - Andreas Malm

Common Sense for the 21st Century - Roger Hallam

Feminism

all about love: new visionsthe will to change: men, masculinity and loveAin't I a Woman?, and Outlaw Culture - bell hooks

Feminism, Interrupted: Disrupting Power - Lola Olufemi

On Violence and On Violence Against Women - Jacqueline Rose

The Transgender Issue: An Argument for Justice - Shon Faye

Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men - Caroline Criado Perez

Entitled: How Male Privilege Hurts Women - Kate Manne

None of the Above: Reflections on Life Beyond the Binary - Travis Alabanza

Racial Justice

Don't Touch My Hair - Emma Dabiri

Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire - Akala

Why Indigenous Literatures Matter - Daniel Heath Justice

The Autobiography of Malcolm X - Malcolm X and Alex Haley

Freedom is a Constant Struggle - Angela Y. Davis

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave - Frederick Douglass

Capitalism

The Communist Manifesto - Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

No Logo and The Shock Doctrine - Naomi Klein

Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? - Mark Fisher

Who Really Feeds the World? The Failures of Agribusiness and the Promise of Agroecology - Vandana Shiva

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism - Shoshanna Zuboff

Platform Capitalism - Nick Srnicek

Private Island: Why Britain Now Belongs to Someone Else - James Meek

Art

Ways of Seeing - John Berger

The Prometheans: John Martin and the Generation that Stole the Future - Max Adams

How to Write an Autobiographical Novel - Alexander Chee

The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable - Amitav Ghosh

How Plays Work - David Edgar

Obedience, Struggle and Revolt: Lectures on Theatre - David Hare

The Ode Less Travelled: Unlocking the Poet Within - Stephen Fry

Science, Maths and Technology

The Order of Time, Seven Brief Lessons in Physics, Reality is Not What it Seems, and Helgoland - Carlo Rovelli

Quantum: Einstein, Bohr, and the Great Debate about the Nature of Reality - Manjit Kumar

Behave: The Biology of Humans at our Best and Worst - Robert Sapolsky

Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy - Cathy O'Neill

Imagining Numbers: (particularly the square root of minus fifteen) - Barry Mazur

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Suicide or Solidarity

Content warnings: discussion of suicide, self-harm, grief, genocide Don't set yourself on fire. The act of self-immolation as a form of political protest has a long history, and in recent months, some people have committed suicide by fire in response to the genocide in Gaza. Every single one of these people deserves immense respect for their empathy, for their integrity, and their commitment to standing in solidarity with the people of Palestine.  But I've been in a protest group where two young people set themselves on fire for the cause, and this kind of protest cannot be valorised. The romanticisation of self-sacrifice leads to nothing but grief. We must find a way to appreciate and acknowledge the sincerity of those who self-immolate for a political message, while strictly dissuading any further acts of suicide. This is for a very simple reason: unnecessary violence cannot end unnecessary violence. There are compelling arguments as to why violence, in many circumstances, is

Cancel All Non-Vegans

Content warnings: Discussion of animal abuse, misogyny, racism, and vegetarianism. Supposedly a fighter for social justice, Jeremy Corbyn spent much of his life eating the products of animal suffering. It's about time somebody said it. I say it with my chest: Cancel all non-vegans. Cancel all non-vegans. Cancel all non-vegans. Cancel all non-vegans. Cancel all non-vegans. Racists don't deserve platforms, respect, or sympathy. Misogynists don't deserve platforms, respect, or sympathy. Homophobes, transphobes, Israel apologists, and other violent bigots do not deserve to be pandered to, catered for, or listened to. We need them as far out of our social discourse as possible. Most reasonable people accept this. Violent people do not deserve our protection. So why are we blind to the violence of animal-eaters? My Dad's a racist. I disowned him for watching a Ben Shapiro video in 2020. My mother, seemingly sweet and kind-natured, regularly eats the flesh of once-sentient bei

Just Do Better.

This week, I left Just Stop Oil. Since April this year, I have given months of my life, multiple arrests, my mind, my voice, my heart and my energy to Just Stop Oil. It’s cost me a relationship, the respect of some friends, and caused many arguments with my family. The arrests mean I’ll likely struggle to work in the education sector, and limit my general career prospects. More than that, working for Just Stop Oil has come at the cost of my mental health. I’ve noticed myself reading less, sleeping badly, spending most of my days angry, in despair, and have developed bad habits of toxic resentment that will take a long time to work beyond. My issues with Just Stop Oil started right at the first talk I went to, given by two people I’ve got deep love and respect for and have been on arrestable actions with since. Their messaging was about “the truth”, and about how high-profile “sacrifice” is needed to stop oil before we reach a “tipping point”. This initial talk exhibited all the problem