An American Renaissance Reading List
AR Staff, American Renaissance, January 14, 2017
We asked some of our friends to recommend two books–one fiction, the other non-fiction.
Fiction: Submission by Michel Houellebecq — has already been well reviewed among the alt-right but an interesting subtext to the book is why Islam would be attractive to Westerners who live empty lives.
Non-fiction: Sexual Utopia in Power by F. Roger Devlin. Explains sexual dynamics in the same way that people such as J. Philippe Rushton and Michael Levin explained racial dynamics. This is true gender studies and is what should be taught and debated in universities.
Fiction: Arthur Koestler’s Darkness at Noon. This is not merely because I am absolutely confident the 1960s student Marxists I went to college with would have put us all in the Gulag if they could, and I brood about what it would have been like, but because of the 1930s Communists’ extraordinary facility for coming up with fantastic plots and conspiracy theories and getting people who know should better to take them seriously — just like today’s Cultural Marxists, who are of course their spiritual and in many cases physical descendants.
Non-fiction: Marlborough: His Life and Times by Winston S. Churchill. About his ancestor, Captain-General of the anti-French coalition in the War of the Spanish Succession. All of us have reservations about Churchill, but this book is an amazing achievement — Leo Strauss, who otherwise leaves me completely cold, called it “the greatest historical work written in our century, an inexhaustible mine of political wisdom and understanding, which should be required reading for every student of political science.” I was particularly intrigued to note the similarities between Marlborough’s generalship and that of Robert E. Lee.
Fiction: Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis. By far the best portrayal of whites at their most decadent, debased, and deracinated.
Non-fiction: The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli. Love it or hate it, it is a necessary primer for anyone interested in politics.
Fiction: The Stranger by Albert Camus. This novel, and existentialism in general, are easy to smear, so I’ll recommend it without comment; you’ll just have to trust me.
Non-fiction: The Dispossessed Majority by Wilmot Robertson. No other book addresses every aspect of white dispossession. Everything is covered: foreign policy, art, religion, economics — not just the obvious subjects of crime and immigration.
Fiction: The Transylvanian Trilogy by Miklós Bánffy, a.k.a. The Hungarian War and Peace. Human drama played out on a broad social-historical-political canvas.
Non-fiction: 1066: The year of the Conquest by David Howarth. A good, crisp, readable account of a time when the English at least had the guts to resist invasion.
Dr. Devlin notes that he has already recommended a number of books and authors when he was interviewed at length for American Renaissance.
Fiction: Johannes V. Jensen’s Fire and Ice; the first volume of his trilogy, The Long Journey. Nobel Prize Laureate tells the story of how hominid apes became human and how the races of mankind diverged. Best recommendation is Wikipedia’s claim that Jensen’s “often dubious racial theories have damaged his reputation.”
Non-fiction: Robert R. Reilly’s The Closing of the Muslim Mind: How Intellectual Suicide Created the Modern Islamist Crisis. It’s not just terrorism. The rejection of any concept of a law-governed natural order, as well as of human reason, makes the Muslim view of the world difficult for Westerners even to imagine, but this book brings it home to the reader.
Fiction: George Orwell’s 1984: I’ve yet to read a more visceral portrayal of collective insanity!
Non-fiction: Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations: no better introduction to the ancient wisdom of our forefathers, to basic ethics, and to living the life of a man.
Fiction: Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole.
Non-fiction: Leviathan and Its Enemies by Sam Francis.
Fiction: The Brothers Karamazov (1880) by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. I know a man who learned German just so he could read Nietzsche in the original. If I had another life to live I would learn Russian so I could read The Brothers. This mighty philosophical novel is a study of faith, reason, and morality — and also a spellbinding murder mystery. It is one of the great achievements of our species.
Non-fiction: Forbidden Grounds: The Case Against Employment Discrimination Laws by Richard Epstein. In a 1992 review, I wrote that this book was “exhaustively researched, clearly written, persuasively argued, published by a prestige press, and likely to have virtually no influence.” I was right. It is an intellectual battering ram against every argument in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, and every other law that forces us to hire and do business with people we’d rather avoid.
Non-fiction: Race and Education, 1954-2007 by Raymond Wolters. This is a truly outstanding analysis of race and American education — detailed and politically incorrect. One of the best books I’ve ever read. An eye-opener.
Fiction: I can’t recommend a fiction book since the only fiction I read is what most others call “non-fiction.” [Editor’s note: One imagines that the author’s implicit recommendation is The Trial by Franz Kafka.]
Fiction: Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein. This sci-fi classic offers the best critique of democracy you’ll find.
Non-fiction: 1453: The Holy War for Constantinople and the Clash of Islam and the West by Roger Crowley. This book is a reminder that disunity in the Occident has terrifying consequences.
Fiction: Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. Prophetic novel about a false, future, engineered regime, where people are created in test tubes and fed antidepressants — and the inevitable result of government trying to create universal happiness.
Non-fiction: March of the Titans, A Complete History of the White Race by Arthur Kemp. Arthur Kemp’s definitive history of the White Race, its vast achievements, empires, creations, and heritage throughout 350 centuries. Should be used as a textbook instead of the anti-White textbooks and curriculum we unfortunately have now.
Fiction: The Red and the Black by Stendhal. Are you wandering around a post-revolutionary nation trying to get ahead in all the chaos? This book is for you.
Non-fiction: Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt: Towards a Secular Theocracy by Paul Gottfried. Why do today’s whites hate themselves? This book is the closest thing to an answer I have ever found.
Fiction: The Camp of the Saints by Jean Raspail. The most prophetic novel since World War II, an allegory of the West’s downfall as a result of Third-World migration.
Non-fiction: The Tyranny of Guilt: An Essay on Western Masochism by Pascal Bruckner. Citing some extreme formulations of white guilt, the author argues that Western and especially European masochism should stop so that we may become rational again.
Fiction: Beau Geste by Percival Wren. This is a swashbuckling tale of service in the French Foreign Legion. It is a wonderful adventure story but — more important — its heroes hew to a demanding code of honor. Perhaps no living person ever behaved with such limpid integrity, but any man — young or old — who thrills to the ideals of Beau Geste will have glimpsed our higher nature.
Non-fiction: Race, Evolution, and Behavior by J. Philippe Rushton. This is the most important book ever written about race. In a sensible world, Rushton would have won a Nobel Prize for this comprehensive study of how — and why — the races differ.
Fiction: Plato’s Republic. Reading The Republic is an invaluable exercise, particularly for young people whose brains have been thoroughly washed. Under the tutelage of one of the West’s greatest minds, readers question their core beliefs and imagine how an ideal society might look.
Non-fiction: A Troublesome Inheritance by Nicholas Wade. This accessible book outlines the biological reality and evolutionary history of race differences. It contains many little-known, but startling facts about race–offering useful information for race realists who like to debate.
I don’t read much fiction. So I’ll recommend two non-fiction books:
We Are Doomed by John Derbyshire. A lively, incisive discussion of most of the major issues that animate the alt-right.
White Guilt by Shelby Steele. An insightful assessment of the malady that besets modern whites. Without meaning to do so, Steele reinforces much of what Jared Taylor has written in his book, White Identity, and much of what Kevin MacDonald has suggested in his essays on evolutionary psychology.
A number of these books have been reviewed at American Renaissance and/or by the recommending author. An appendix below.
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
The Transylvanian Trilogy by Miklós Bánffy
We Are Doomed by John Derbyshire
Forbidden Grounds by Richard Epstein
Leviathan and Its Enemies by Sam Francis
Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt by Paul Gottfried
The Long Journey by Johannes V. Jensen
The Camp of the Saints by Jean Raspail
Race, Evolution, and Behavior by J. Philippe Rushton
White Guilt by Shelby Steele
A Troublesome Inheritance by Nicholas Wade
Race and Education, 1954-2007 by Raymond Wolters
