You could argue that one’s bookshelf is as intimate and revealing a sight as one’s medicine cabinet. The ways we read—and the stories that transport and captivate us—reflect the essence of how we see the world, what we want for ourselves, and what subjects we feel are most pressing in our cultural moment.
So it should come as no surprise that, when hoards of our era’s brightest minds—from epidemiologists to illustrators and poets—converged on Aspen for the 20th iteration of the Ideas Festival, CULTURED seized the opportunity to gaze into their proverbial bookshelves. Here, we asked a selection of this year’s speakers about the books they read to sharpen—and entertain—their era-defining intellects. From Winston Churchill’s biographies to the timeless lessons of The Little Prince, the books that captivate them are as varied as their work.
John Palfrey. Image courtesy of the MacArthur Foundation.
John Palfrey, President of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
Describe the type of reader you are in three words.
Eager. Overly ambitious.
If you could press one great book into someone’s hands, what would it be?
I think everyone needs to read Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny if they haven’t already.
One book you return to when you’re starved for inspiration?
Any biography of Winston Churchill. I read at least one Churchill book a year, and I look forward to it.
One book that helped you understand the world we live in right now?
The last few years have given rise to many options, but I’ll give the “highest impact” award to Isabel Wilkerson for Caste.
One book that ruined you, in the best possible way?
The Brothers Karamazov. It rocked my world, so much so that I tried taking Russian in college so that I could read it in the original and not in translation. That goal still eludes me.
One book your childhood self loved?
I can still hear Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows read by one of my parents.
Portrait of Sam Fragoso by Jenna Jones.
Sam Fragoso, Writer, Filmmaker, and Host of Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso Podcast
Describe the type of reader you are in three words.
Purposeful, animated, amused.
What’s one book that helped you understand the world we live in right now?
Has right now ever changed more frequently than it is right now? On protest and polarization, I turn to Citizen by Claudia Rankine and Why We’re Polarized by Ezra Klein.
One book that ruined you, in the best possible way?
My mother lent me The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes in college. When she asked for it back, I had to go to the bookstore to get her a new copy that wasn’t water-damaged.
One book you reference often in your work?
Life Itself by Roger Ebert.
How do you find your next book?
I make a weekly podcast, Talk Easy, that tends to feature authors. The next book finds me.
One book you return to when you’re starved for inspiration?
This has become a favorite of most artists I know—A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders.
Heidi Erwin. Image courtesy of Webby.
Heidi Erwin, Senior Game Designer at The New York Times
If you could press one great book into someone’s hands, what would it be?
The Little Prince. It spits such facts. Something from this book comes up at least once a month in my mind. Most recently: the idea of loving one rose the most despite the many roses that look identical to it. Because that’s your rose.
What’s one book your childhood self loved?
Matilda. There’s something real about the idea that your creative energy can trouble you if you don’t find an outlet for it, and how that same energy can be magical when you do.
How do you find your next book?
When there’s a topic plaguing me, I search the Internet for books that I hope will shift how I’m thinking about it. I trust books to bring new ways of thinking into my life—and I have faith that those new ways of thinking can be everything.
Describe the type of reader you are in three words.
Save me, perspective.
Portrait of Nora Lawrence by Erin Baiano. Image courtesy of Storm King Art Center.
Nora Lawrence, Artistic Director and Chief Curator of Storm King Art Center
Describe the type of reader you are in three words.
First, anxious and distracted. Once I get immersed in something, obsessive.
How do you figure out whether or not you like a book?
I just start. I also never read reviews until I’m done, but I read many after I finish.
What’s one book that helped you understand the world we live in right now?
Hellen Phillips’s Hum, a terrifying but extremely readable book about parenting, A.I., and our potential (and devastating) near-future.
One book that taught you something new about your own industry?
Svetlana Alpers’s The Art of Describing was formative for me.
One book you return to when you’re starved for inspiration?
I turn to poetry in those moments: Ones that come to mind right away include Seamus Heaney’s “Oysters,” Edna St. Vincent Millay’s “Dirge without Music,” and Marie Howe’s “What the Living Do.”
One book you stopped reading in the middle and never finished?
I am not a completionist about reading—there are so many good books out there that I really don’t feel bad about putting one down if it doesn’t move me.
Yana Peel. Image courtesy of Chanel.
Yana Peel, President of Arts, Culture & Heritage at Chanel
Describe the type of reader you are in three words.
Adventurous. Demanding. Eclectic.
What’s one book that helped you understand the world we live in right now?
Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right by Arlie Russell Hochschild made clear a politic that was both far removed from my life in London and simultaneously urgent around the world.
One book that ruined you, in the best possible way?
At nearly 150 years old, Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina—about a woman who wants, but cannot have—is a timeless tragedy. Night by Elie Wiesel must also be mentioned. No explanation needed.
One book that taught you something new about your own industry?
William Middleton’s biographies of Karl Lagerfeld (Paradise Now) and the de Menils (Double Vision). Both are incredible stories about art, culture and creation.
One trashy book to wedge in your vacation bag?
Anything by Truman Capote—or about him: Swan Song, Capote’s Women, Party of the Century… Read them all.
One book you stopped reading in the middle and never finished?
Virginia Woolf’s The Waves, because of its unconventional narrative structure—but Mrs. Dalloway, annotated by Merve Emre, is a favorite.
If your bookshelf could talk, what would it say?
“Thanks for making me look so good with the full set of ‘Yves Klein blue’ Fitzcarraldo Editions. But please organize me in a logical manner!”