A Dozen Noteworthy Books on Co-Existence from 2023
These twelve books, old and new, capture something essential about the art of living with others.
As a researcher dedicated to public spaces and Convivencia (a Spanish term representing co-existence amidst diversity), my work revolves around analyzing, comprehending, and formulating concepts for public life. Hence, distinguishing between professional and leisure reading often seems contrived. These titles, in no particular order, stood out from the 30-some books I read on the theme.
Juhani Karila: Pienen hauen metsästys (Fishing for the Little Pike)
This Finnish novel is a fantastical amalgamation of Lapland’s nature and life, replete with mythical creatures, woven into a suspenseful detective narrative. Karila’s imaginative use of the language is both humorous and profoundly moving. Karila integrates mythical creatures into everyday life without sensationalizing them. I am happy to see that the novel has already been translated into multiple languages, including English.
Setha Low: Why Public Space Matters
Amidst a spectrum of recent literature on public spaces, ranging from highly idealistic to nostalgically pessimistic, Professor Setha Low strikes the perfect balance, blending theory and ethnographic research. Her book presents a compelling and accessible argument for the significance of public spaces, grounded in decades of research. A useful read for any public space professional.
Annie Ernaux: The Years
The French Nobel Laureate distills life from 1940 to 2007 into sharp societal and personal observations. She examines evolving dinner conversations, the rise of consumerism as a form of freedom, and the political disillusionment of her generation through a series of photos and videos as captures of a moment in time.
Some sentiments fell out of use, ones we no longer felt and found absurd, such as patriotism and honor, reserved for inferior times and abused populations.
Jonathan Rosen: The Best Minds
I understand why Rosen’s book was listed by The New York Times as one of the best books of 2023. It is a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction where a skilled journalist ventures on a painful and personal journey to understand the schizophrenia of his childhood friend and the tragic consequences of a broken mental health system.
Ann Patchett: These Precious Days
Patchett’s novel Tom Lake was one of the big bestsellers of 2023. While I loved it, I found her previous book on an acquaintance who comes to stay for a bit for medical treatment and ends up staying with the Patchetts through the pandemic more moving as a story of co-existence, love, friendship, and eventually grief.
Michiko Aoyama: What You Are Looking for Is in the Library
Next to Susan Orlean’s fabulous The Library Book, this Japanese collection of short stories offers a glimpse into the everyday wonders of libraries in a way that I can recognize as a library researcher. Aoyama’s characters, emblematic of contemporary society, search for meaning in an era of uncertainty.
“This didn’t just come to you. It happened because you did something for yourself. You took action and that caused things to change around you.”
Sarah Bakewell: Humanly Possible
Bakewell guides us through humanistic thinking from the 1300s to the present, elucidating how thinkers from Petrarch to Bertrand Russell grappled with morality, religion, cruelty, physicality, and science in their quest to comprehend the human condition. She encapsulates humanism into three principles: freethinking, inquiry, and hope.
For Humboldt, principles such as love or justice harmonize “sweetly and naturally” with our very humanity, but for this harmony to have any effect, there must be a free firld of operation.”
Antti Hurskainen: Suntio (The Verger, available only in Finnish)
Hurskainen’s novel offers a stark, even gloomy depiction of life in a Lutheran parish through the eyes of a disillusioned middle-aged layperson, revealing the often grim reality of organizations with noble missions, like parishes or cultural institutions. It made me think of Jenny Offill´s Weather where we see life through the eyes of an underappreciated library worker.
Sergio Buarque de Holanda: The Roots of Brazil
During my research in Fortaleza, Brazil, I was recommended this seminal 1936 book on Brazilian history. The Roots of Brazil covers the colonial principles of the Portuguese (extraction of resources as opposed to the organized rule and cultural enforcement of the Spanish) and many of the fundamental cultural beliefs that have shaped the country in the 20th century.
Kim Stanley Robinson: The Ministry for the Future
This unique governance sci-fi explores a fictional, under-resourced UN agency charged with the enforcement of the Paris Agreement in the aftermath of a catastrophic climate-induced heatwave in India. The book asks what actions are justified in a world where the international order based on regulation and law is not leading to the scale of change needed to ensure sufficient living conditions for future generations and all other life on Earth. What is the role of science, finance, activism, and even violence in ensuring that the planet has a future and what do responsibility and duty mean in practice? Despite its heavy subject, the book is a suspenseful thriller to read.
Rebecca Solnit: Wanderlust
Solnit, an exceptional essayist, explores walking as a multifaceted act — philosophical, cultural, societal, and physical. Her essays are profound yet occasionally humorous, best enjoyed while walking.
“Walking shares with making and working that crucial element of engagement of the body and the mind with the world, of knowing the world through the body and the body through the world.”
Richard Reeves: Of Boys and Men
Combining an incredible amount of data, personal reflections, and bold policy suggestions, Reeves makes a convincing case for how we should be able to care for women’s rights as well as tackle some of the clear inequities experienced by many men and boys in the worlds of education, criminal justice, and public health. Reeves for instance suggests that boys would start school a year later than girls and the need for stronger efforts to attract men into the education and care fields.
“Progressives resist the idea that fathers have a distinct role to play, afraid that this will somehow undermine mothers or belittle same-sex couples. So they recoil from any proposal that might smack of “fathers’ rights.” Conservatives meanwhile lament an epidemic of fatherlessness but simply want to restore traditional marriage, with clear and separate roles for men and women.”
