Episode · The Ezra Klein Show · 2026-03-20
Ezra Klein & Naomi Klein: books mentioned on The Ezra Klein Show
Naomi Klein on Trumpism and Our Age of ‘Unlikely Bedfellows’ | The Ezra Klein Show
Naomi Klein recommended Empire of AI by Karen Hao, Here Where We Live Is Our Country by Molly Crabapple, and Fire Alarm by Michael Löwy, and discussed No Logo by Naomi Klein and Outrages by Naomi Wolf. Ezra Klein discussed The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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No Logo
No Logo is a 1999 book by Naomi Klein that served as both an inspiration for and a chronicle of the burgeoning anti-globalization movement of the late twentieth century.
Discussed“You know, it was clear like we had the in No No Logo I wrote about the first um celebrities who were themselves lifestyle brands, like Michael Jordan and Oprah.”
Where to get it
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The Beauty Myth
The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf is a landmark feminist critique arguing that societal standards of physical attractiveness are weaponized against women to undermine their political and social gains.
Discussed“Her heyday was was um the 1990s with a breakthrough book called The Beauty Myth. It came out when I was uh an undergrad.”
Where to get it
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Outrages
Outrages by Naomi Wolf is a historical nonfiction book that examines same-sex desire and state suppression in nineteenth-century Britain.
Discussed“Yeah, so the year year before the pandemic in 2019 she published a book called Outrages ; and she very famously made um a a a basic like a a foundational factual error in that book where she misinterpreted a phrase in the historical record.”
Where to get it
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Empire of AI
Empire of AI by Karen Hao is an investigative non-fiction book that explores the human and material costs behind the rapid rise of artificial intelligence and Sam Altman's OpenAI.
Recommended“All right, so this is a little bit obvious, but but but Empire of AI um ; by Karen Hao. ; ; Just because it's it it's just such an incredible combination of just on the ground globe-trotting investigative reporting making the material inputs and human inputs of AI visible, but then it has this big idea thesis around empire”
Where to get it
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Here Where We Live Is Our Country
Molly Crabapple's Here Where We Live Is Our Country is a captivating historical work that explores the story of the Jewish Bund and the enduring search for political and cultural alternatives.
Recommended“Um I guess we've been talking around this, but um my my friend Molly Crabapple has an absolutely brilliant book coming out ; called Here Where We Live Is Our Country, the story of the Jewish ; un- Bund, and it's available for pre-order, comes out in April, and I think it gets at what an alternative story of hearness”
Where to get it
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Fire Alarm
Fire Alarm by Michael Löwy is a close intellectual commentary and philosophical analysis of Walter Benjamin's famous text On the Concept of History, written while Benjamin was fleeing the Gestapo in 1940.
Recommended“And the third book is a book called Fire Alarm, Reading Walter Benjamin's On the Concept of History by Michael Löwy. ; Um and Walter Benjamin is the is this is the text that he wrote ; ; right before he took his own life fleeing the Gestapo in 1940. ; Um and it gets at this idea of the”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (3) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
“And I've been wanting to return to that theme, which was actually the subject of my first book uh that I wrote in the late 1990s and came out in 2000, No Logo.”
“Um and yeah, she wrote a bunch of best-selling books. She wrote a book called Fire with Fire.”
“This is sort of what I wrote about in The Shock Doctrine. This is the the revolution against regulation”