Helen Lewis

Products they talk about

• Christie Malry's Own Double-Entry👍 Recommends

  …book recommendation capturing alienation and resentment in modern society

  “I have Christy Mallory's own double entry by B.S. Johnson, an English writer of the 20th century. It is about a young alienated guy who discovers double entry bookkeeping, you know, the idea that for every debit there's a credit. And he decides that for every slight that's been done to him, he gets now to enact one on society.”

  on The Ezra Klein Show

• Madame de Pompadour👍 Recommends

  …book recommendation on French royal history and elite society before the revolution

  “Nancy Mitford's biography of Madame de Pompadour, Mistress of Louis XV of France. Nancy Mitford, she was a brilliant historical biographer. She wrote biographies of Frederick the Great, of Louis XIV, the Sun King, but I think this one is extraordinary. So, Louis XV is the king before the revolution, right? That was Louis XVI. And this is a portrait of Versailles during that period.”

  on The Ezra Klein Show

• The Genius Factory👍 Recommends

  …book recommendation about eugenics and the attempt to create superior offspring through sperm donation

  “I have brought The Genius Factory by David Plotz, which is the story of one mad eugenicist millionaire who decides that the way to solve all of America's problem is to get lots of Nobel Prize winners to donate their sperm. And give it to couples to make babies. Let me just shock you, doesn't go well. A lot of the people turn out not to be Nobel Prize winners.”

  on The Ezra Klein Show