Person
Ada Palmer's books and book recommendations
Across 2 podcasts. Every show Ada Palmer appears on, in one place — not just one.
Ada Palmer is an American historian and writer. She is an associate professor at the University of Chicago and wrote the science fiction series Terra Ignota. The first novel in the series, Too Like the Lightning, was published in May 2016. The work has been well received by critics and was a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Novel. She received the 2017 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. Her scholarly work Inventing the Renaissance won the 2026 Hugo Award for Best Related Work. Appearing on the Dwarkesh Podcast, Palmer recommended Niccolò Machiavelli's The Prince, advising readers to view it in the context of the author's profound patriotism and as a private job application written during exile. She also cited Anton M. Matytsin's The Specter of Skepticism in the Age of Enlightenment to detail historical raids on clandestine bookshops. Furthermore, she discussed Machiavelli's political insights in The Prince and The Discourses on Livy, and referenced Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire to illustrate historical perspectives on the Roman Empire.
Books by Ada Palmer
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Too Like the Lightning
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Seven Surrenders
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The Will to Battle
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Perhaps the Stars
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Reading Lucretius in the Renaissance
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Sundown
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Trace Elements
Books recommended by Ada Palmer
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The prince
The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli is a classic Renaissance treatise that outlines the pragmatic realities, strategies, and moral compromises involved in the acquisition and preservation of political power.
Discussed“By the time he's writing The Prince, it's dozens, in fact, the majority of these places.”
Where to get it
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The Specter of Skepticism in the Age of Enlightenment
The Specter of Skepticism in the Age of Enlightenment by Anton M.
Recommended“There's a brilliant analysis in Anton Matytsin's book, The Specter of Skepticism in the Age of Enlightenment.”
Where to get it
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“The” History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon is a monumental multi-volume historical work chronicling the trajectory of Western civilization from the height of the Roman Empire through the fall of Byzantium.
Discussed“So much so that when Gibbon is writing The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in multiple volumes, in the late 18th century he says that there's never been a better time for humanity than during the era of the five good emperors.”
Where to get it
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Areopagitica
Areopagitica by John Milton is a historically significant prose tract defending freedom of speech and opposing government licensing of the press.
Discussed“Milton writes this big treatise about why freedom of the press is important, the Areopagitica.”
Where to get it
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Candide
Candide by François Voltaire is a classic philosophical novella that satirizes naive optimism through the absurd misfortunes and adventures of its young protagonist.
Discussed“This is very much what Voltaire depicts in Candide, which is full of contrived and improbable reunions and encounters that clearly serve to teach us a moral lesson.”
Where to get it
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Common Sense
Common Sense by Thomas Paine is a deeply influential 1776 political pamphlet that articulated arguments for American independence from Great Britain and helped ignite the American Revolution.
Discussed“We all know Thomas Paine's "Common Sense".”
Where to get it
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De Rerum Natura
De Rerum Natura by Titus Lucretius Carus is a classical philosophical poem exploring Epicurean physics, atomism, and the nature of the universe.
Discussed“is Lucretius’ On the Nature of Things, De rerum natura, which is our best capsule of ancient atomism and the atoms and vacuum theory of matter.”
Where to get it
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Discourses on Livy
Discourses on Livy is Niccolò Machiavelli's major historical and political treatise examining the mechanics of republics and the history of Rome.
Discussed“This goes back to the thing in The Discourses.”
Where to get it
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History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Complete and Unabridged
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Complete and Unabridged is a sweeping historical work by Edward Gibbon chronicling the trajectory of the Roman civilization.
Discussed“So much so that when Gibbon is writing The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in multiple volumes, in the late 18th century he says that there's never been a better time for humanity than during the era of the five good emperors.”
Where to get it
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L'Encyclopédie
L'Encyclopédie is a monumental 18th-century French reference work edited by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert that sought to compile and disseminate human knowledge across the arts, sciences, and trades.
Discussed“This is why, for example, Diderot's and d'Alembert's Encyclopédie is approved by the French censors, but banned by the Pope as of volume seven, I think it is, the letter H.”
Where to get it
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Leviathan
Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes is a foundational political treatise arguing that in the absence of a powerful central authority, human life would exist in a state of perpetual and violent conflict.
Discussed“Machiavelli becomes exciting first in the aftermath of the publication of Hobbes's Leviathan, because Hobbes's Leviathan hits European thought like a truck full of bricks.”
Where to get it
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Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost by John Milton is a monumental epic poem that explores the biblical fall of man, the temptation of Adam and Eve by Satan, and the ultimate loss of Eden.
Discussed“Paradise Lost is published under the censorious regime.”
Where to get it
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Rameau's nephew,
Discussed“Diderot has other work that's about sexuality. He has a lot of discussions sexuality in Rameau's Nephew.”
Where to get it
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Romeo and Juliet
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is a timeless tragedy about two young lovers from feuding families whose deaths ultimately reconcile their households.
Discussed“This is where Romeo and Juliet is really helpful for us to understand.”
Where to get it
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The Gentleman's Magazine
Discussed“That's a copy of The Gentleman's Magazine, another example of technology taking a leap forward in the 18th century.”
Where to get it
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The Histories (King Henry IV. Part 1 / King Henry IV. Part 2 / King Henry V / King Henry VI. Part 1 / King Henry VI. Part 2 / King Henry VI. Part 3 / King Henry VIII / King John / King Richard II / King Richard III)
Discussed“Remember those very telling lines in Henry IV Part II where young Henry V is advised by his father, "Busy minds with foreign wars achieve peace at home by sending our ambitious noblemen to other places to fight wars."”
Where to get it
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The Nun. by Diderot. Translated from the French. ... of 2; Volume 1
The Nun by Denis Diderot is an 18th-century epistolary novel that chronicles the harrowing experiences of a young woman forced into a convent against her will.
Discussed“He of course famously went to the Bastille for writing The Nun, which is a pornographic lesbian novel about nuns.”
Where to get it
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The Poetic Edda
Discussed“And this is one of the big problems with paywalls because all of this is in journals that are behind paywalls or the ridiculous Oxford Annotated Poetic Edda, three volumes, $300 a volume. No wonder nobody has this book.”
Where to get it
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The swerve
The swerve by Stephen Greenblatt is an acclaimed historical non-fiction work examining how the rediscovery of a long-lost Latin codex by Lucretius helped shape the emergence of the modern world.
Discussed“Many people are familiar with Greenblatt's book, The Swerve, which credits a lot of change to the materialist science that this poem articulates.”
Where to get it
Appearances
Other mentions (3: passing, ad reads, own books)
“Or we would say Lucretius's De rerum natura, which I did my dissertation on...”
“There's a much more complex story, which you know is told in my book, which refers to Greenblatt's. If anyone enjoyed The Swerve, you would really enjoy the more detailed zoom-in that Inventing the Renaissance has.”
“Milton of Paradise Lost fame wrote our first big defense of the free press.”