Books of Titans Podcast

I find it helpful to take a step back from day to day reading to consider overall themes that show up over spans of reading time. That’s what I do in this episode. I look at the first half of reading for 2025 and talk about the 19 books I’ve read so far. I then talk about my favorite books, things I enjoy about Greek Literature, and share the one idea so far this year that has had the biggest impa...

Last week, I discussed Anabasis by Xenophon, which covers the failed attempt of Cyrus the Younger to rule the Persian Empire with the help of 10,000+ Greek Mercenaries. The Education of Cyrus covers a different Cyrus, Cyrus the Great (600 - 530BC). This is the Cyrus in the Bible. The Cyrus of the British Museum’s Cyrus Cylinder. The Cyrus who conquered the Babylonians. The Education of Cyrus diffe...

The Persian Cyrus the Younger recruits Greek mercenaries (12,900 to be exact, although Ten Thousand has a nicer ring to it) to help him try to claim the throne of Persia. The battle doesn’t go well, Cyrus loses a hand and a head, and the Greeks are forced to retreat to their country of origin. These events, take place between 401 - 399BC. Anabasis means a movement upwards, but can also refer both...

I love experiencing a book for the first time. There’s the rush of discovering a new story, an intoxicating idea, or a memorable character. By the time I’ve finished the book, I’m ready to get that hit again with a new book. I actually fear the high won’t be as good if I go back and read a book for a second time, even if it’s a book I really enjoyed. But that’s not how books work. Re-reading a boo...

It took me 5 comedy plays by Aristophanes to begin to enjoy them. This was the 5th. It wasn’t as crude or banal as the first four I read ( Clouds , Birds , Lysistrata , Women of the Assembly ). I really enjoyed this one. Dionysus journeys to Hades to meet Euripides. A verbal contest ensues between the great tragedians Aeschylus and Euripides to determine who is the Best Tragic Poet. On the way to...

A father seeks to get out of debt, not in the traditional way of paying it off, but in the new way of winning an argument over his creditors. It doesn’t matter whether the argument is true or not, only if it gets him out of debt. This quest drives the father, Strepsiades, into the school of Socrates (likely in attendance at the play in 423BC) to learn the “wrong argument.” What ensues is a hilario...

I just finished reading all of the Greek Tragedies that survive from Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. That was not the plan, I only expected to read 2 or 3 by each playwright, but I got hooked. In this episode, I share about my experience, cover the major themes throughout those plays, and talk about my favorites. These stories will be with me for the rest of my life. They cover ideas we hear...

Homer (Simpson, not the epic poet) once said that alcohol is the “cause of... and solution to... all of life's problems.” I think of that quote when I think of the god Dionysus (also known as Bacchus). Dionysus is the god of joy and celebration, but also madness and violence. The god of inspiration and intoxication. He’s the god the indwells through wine, which can both bring happiness and cause d...

What if everything you knew of Helen of Troy wasn’t true? That she didn’t go with Paris to Troy. That instead, she was whisked away to Egypt while the Greeks and Trojans battled it out over her phantom. That’s the storyline of Helen by Euripides. It brings into question perception vs reality. It provides Helen a way to redeem her name. And it makes for an absolutely brilliant and entertaining trag...

Homer doesn’t mention her but she permeates the Iliad . Without her, Aeschylus’ Oresteia doesn’t pack the same punch. Her story is so tragic that Euripides doesn’t let this play end as it should. He has her whisked away so she is not sacrificed. Her name is Iphigenia. She’s the daughter of Agamemnon, the King of the Greeks. This play takes place before the Iliad , before the Trojan War. The Greeks...

That’s such a brutal painting. Orestes has stabbed his own mother and the furies are immediately there to torment him. The story of Orestes was explored by each of the three main Greek tragedy playwrights, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. Aeschylus set the standard with The Oresteia , Sophocles approached it through Electra , and Euripides through both Orestes & Electra . Orestes if a fascinat...

“In fact, free speech may well be the most powerful engine of equality ever devised by human kind.” Free Speech by Jacob Mchangama presents a thorough and fascinating look at the history of free speech through the ages. What’s amazing is that free speech is a rather recent phenomenon, is quite fragile, and most of the people I consider to be the bulwarks of free speech were not as principled as I...

A few years ago, I read a book about a coffee entrepreneur. It was really good. I immediately thought about a new friend of mine who worked at a coffee shop. I bought the book for him and met up a few weeks later to hear what he thought. His comments shocked me. He thanked me for the book and said it was the first full book he had read since college. This was a man in his early 30s, which means he...

Euripides’ Phoenician Women mimics the Aeschylus tragedy Seven Against Thebes with some key differences. One of those is the composition of the members of the chorus. Aeschylus chose Theban women as the members of his chorus but Euripides selected foreign slave women from Tyre en route to Delphi. They don’t have skin in the game like the Theban women do as they watch their royal line destroy thems...

Most of the sayings of Confucius consist of three parts: * The Saying * The Person * The Time/Location If you just read The Analects , you get all of the sayings and if you’re very diligent (or use a commentary), you can get to know the people Confucius addresses in his responses. What’s difficult to gather from The Analects is the historical context (time/location) in which each statement was mad...

The life of Confucius (551 - 479 BC) overlaps the life of Greek playwright Aeschylus (525 - 455 BC). Confucius makes it clear that he is a transmitter, not an originator. He’s transmitting wisdom from the past, specifically from an ancient era of perfect rulers. The Analects is a set of collected sayings of Confucius compiled by his disciples. I was expecting a religious text but this read more li...

I started off 2025 reading straight through the King James Version of the Bible. As I was doing so, I kept wondering how that translation came about. It’s now over 400 years old. What English translation will people be reading 400 years from now? And I had other questions. Did people really speak like this? Is this the first English translation? Why is it called the King James Bible? Who translate...

I start each year reading straight through a different version of the Bible during January & February. This year, I selected the King James Version designed & illustrated by Barry Moser. This version contains 232 beautiful illustrations. This was my first time reading the full King James Version. I liked it very much. I divide this podcast episode up into three sections: * The things that stuck ou...

In 2021, I dedicated my reading year to series of books . I read through Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, all books by Russ Roberts , and the Narnia series. I also read every single book written by Robert Caro. His The Years of Lyndon B. Johnson four-book set are some of the best books I’ve ever read and I think about them often. I also read The Power Broker about Robert Moses of New York City...

I’m digging into the podcast vault and taking us back to December 2019 when I first released this episode. In the past 5 years, I’ve thought about The Gulag Archipelago often. I’ve seen it referenced in other books and think its ideas can heal our current divides. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.booksoftitans...

I’m digging into the podcast vault to share this episode from exactly 5 years ago (really, Feb 7, 2020 to today, Feb 7, 2025)! This episode covers The Book of Proverbs attributed to King Solomon. I had an epiphany of sorts about a key idea in this wisdom literature - The Fear of the Lord. I had always been baffled by that statement. Is that a trembling fear? A sense of awe? What am I supposed to m...

I’m digging into the podcast vault to share this episode from two years ago about some of the most important ideas I’ve come across from this reading project. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.booksoftitans.com/subscribe

And so he did not resist in the small ways that a man might, and in time the accumulation of such daily choices of acquiescence hardened into a kind of moral muscle memory, such that resistance was no longer even a possible option. For almost nine years the man had been rehearsing his surrender. ~ The Places Beyond the Maps, Douglas McKelvey If I were required to pick the single most important ide...

I received this set of questions from Brenda Slomka late in 2024. I couldn’t immediately answer them on Twitter X, so I decided to ponder them a bit and give a thoughtful response in this podcast episode. I’m glad I did it as it gave me a chance to take a step back and look at how the past 8 years of this reading project have impacted me. Here are the four questions: * What are you learning about...

READING YEAR THEME: GREEK TRAGEDIES, COMEDIES, HISTORY, AND PHILOSOPHY 2025 is the year I shift from the Greek playwrights into the philosophers. It’s year 3 of my 15-year Immortal Books reading project, where I read the greatest books ever written in chronological order. In this episode, I share my plan for the year, give a brief history of this reading project, and highlight the books I’m most e...