21 Lessons for the 21st Century

Last updated

21 Lessons for the 21st Century
21 Lessons for the 21st Century.jpg
Author Yuval Noah Harari
Country Israel
LanguageEnglish
Subject Social philosophy
Publisher Spiegel & Grau, Jonathan Cape
Publication date
2018
Published in English
30 August 2018
Pages372
ISBN 978-198-480-149-4
Preceded by Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow  

21 Lessons for the 21st Century is a book written by Israeli author Yuval Noah Harari and published in August 2018 by Spiegel & Grau [1] in the US and by Jonathan Cape [2] in the UK. It is dedicated to the author's husband, Itzik.

Contents

The book consists of five parts, each containing four or five essays. The book focuses on present-day issues and societal questions. [3]

Critical response

The review aggregator website Book Marks reported that 44% of critics gave the book a "rave" review, whilst 11% of the critics "panned" the book. The rest of the critics expressed either "positive" (22%) or "mixed" (22%) impressions, based on a sample of nine reviews. [4] The book had articles and reviews published by The New York Times, The Economist , [5] Financial Times, The Guardian, New Statesman, and The Times.

In The New York Times , Bill Gates calls the book "fascinating" and his author "such a stimulating writer that even when I disagreed, I wanted to keep reading and thinking." For Gates, Harari "has teed up a crucial global conversation about how to take on the problems of the 21st century." [6]

John Thornhill in Financial Times said that "[a]lthough 21 Lessons is lit up by flashes of intellectual adventure and literary verve, it is probably the least illuminating of the three books" written by Harari, and that many of the observations in it feel recycled from the two others. [7] Helen Lewis review in The Guardian is not as glowing but admires "the ambition and breadth of his work, smashing together unexpected ideas into dazzling observations." [3]

The book has also received negative reviews. Gavin Jacobson in the New Statesman sees it as "a study thick with promise and thin in import" with advice "either too vague or too hollow to provide any meaningful guidance." [8] In The Times , Gerard DeGroot writes: "The author of Sapiens is good at identifying the crises to come but his syrupy platitudes are no answer." [9]

Russian translation

A Russian translation of Harari's book was published in June 2019. However, the Russian media noticed that several passages about Russia and its President Putin were excluded from the translation. In particular, the chapter about post-truth begins in the Russian edition with referring to Donald Trump's speeches instead of Putin's false statements during Russian annexation of Crimea. [10] [11] [12] The representatives of Harari admitted that this change was authorized. [13]

Leonid Bershidsky in Moscow Times called it "caution — or, to call it by its proper name, cowardice", [14] and Nettanel Slyomovics in Haaretz claimed that Harari "is sacrificing those same liberal ideas that he presumes to represent". [15] In a response, Harari stated that he "was warned that due to these few examples Russian censorship will not allow distribution of a Russian translation of the book" and that he "therefore faced a dilemma", namely to "replace these few examples with other examples, and publish the book in Russia," or "change nothing, and publish nothing", and that he "preferred publishing, because Russia is a leading global power and it seemed important that the book's ideas should reach readers in Russia, especially as the book is still very critical of the Putin regime – just without naming names." [16]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anne Applebaum</span> American historian (born 1964)

Anne Elizabeth Applebaum is an American and naturalized-Polish journalist and historian. She has written extensively about the history of Communism and the development of civil society in Central and Eastern Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Self-coup</span> Elected leader illegally maintaining or increasing power

A self-coup, also called an autocoup or coup from the top, is a form of coup d'état in which a nation's head, having come to power through legal means, tries to stay in power through illegal means. The leader may dissolve or render powerless the national legislature and unlawfully assume extraordinary powers not granted under normal circumstances. Other measures may include annulling the nation's constitution, suspending civil courts, and having the head of government assume dictatorial powers.

A Jewish Buddhist is a person with a Jewish background who believes in the tenets of a form of Buddhism.

Amotz Asa-El is a bestselling Israeli author, The Jerusalem Post's senior commentator and former executive editor, and a fellow at the Hartman Institute.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timothy Snyder</span> American historian

Timothy David Snyder is an American historian specializing in the history of Central and Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, and the Holocaust. He is the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shmuel Rosner</span>

Shmuel Rosner is a Tel Aviv based columnist, editor and think tank fellow. He is currently a Senior Fellow at The Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) in Jerusalem, as well as an analyst for Kan News TV. He is the founder and editor of the data-journalism initiative themadad.com, the founder and editor of the nonfiction imprint "The Hedgehog and the Fox", and writer of a weekly column for The Jewish Journal in L.A. and for Maariv in Israel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Israel–Russia relations</span> Bilateral relations

The State of Israel is represented in the Russian Federation through an embassy in Moscow and a consulate-general in Yekaterinburg. Russia is represented in Israel through an embassy in Tel Aviv and a consulate in Haifa. Russia is a member of the Quartet on the Middle East. For many years, Israel was a haven for Russian Jews. This was especially the case during the aliyah from the Soviet Union in the 1970s and 1990s. Israel and the Soviet Union, Russia's predecessor state, were on opposing sides during the Cold War. However, the relationship between Israel and Russia has improved significantly since the early 2000s, with the election of the more pro-Israel Russian leader Vladimir Putin, and the election of the more pro-Russia Israeli leader Ariel Sharon. Putin has had a close relationship with long-serving Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Masha Gessen</span> Russian-American journalist and activist

Masha Gessen is a Russian-American journalist, author, translator, and activist who has been an outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yuval Noah Harari</span> Israeli historian, philosopher, and author (born 1976)

Yuval Noah Harari is an Israeli author, public intellectual, historian and professor in the Department of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the author of the popular science bestsellers Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (2014), Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (2016), and 21 Lessons for the 21st Century (2018). His writings examine free will, consciousness, intelligence, happiness, and suffering.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eliot Higgins</span> British citizen journalist

Eliot Ward Higgins, who previously wrote under the pseudonym Brown Moses, is a British citizen journalist and former blogger, known for using open sources and social media for investigations. He is the founder of Bellingcat, an investigative journalism website that specialises in fact-checking and open-source intelligence. He has investigated incidents including the Syrian Civil War, the Russo-Ukrainian War, the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 and the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal. He first gained mainstream media attention by identifying weapons in uploaded videos from the Syrian conflict.

<i>Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind</i> 2014 book by Yuval Harari

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind is a book by Yuval Noah Harari, first published in Hebrew in Israel in 2011 based on a series of lectures Harari taught at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and in English in 2014. The book, focusing on Homo sapiens, surveys the history of humankind, starting from the Stone Age and going up to the twenty-first century. The account is situated within a framework that intersects the natural sciences with the social sciences.

<i>Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow</i> 2015 book by Yuval Noah Harari

Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow is a book written by Israeli author Yuval Noah Harari, professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. The book was first published in Hebrew in 2015 by Dvir publishing; the English-language version was published in September 2016 in the United Kingdom and in February 2017 in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mikhail Zygar</span> Russian journalist (born 1981)

Mikhail Viktorovich Zygar is a Russian born journalist, writer and filmmaker, and the founding editor-in-chief of Russian news channel TV Rain (2010–2015). Under Zygar's leadership, TV Rain provided an alternative to Kremlin-controlled federal TV channels by focusing on news content and giving a platform to opposition voices. The channel's coverage of politically sensitive issues, like the Moscow street protests in 2011 and 2012 as well as the conflict in Ukraine, has been dramatically different from the official coverage by Russia's national television stations. Zygar is also the author of the book All the Kremlin's Men (2017), the history of Putin's Russia, based on interviews with Russian politicians from Putin's inner circle.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leonid Bershidsky</span> Russian journalist and commentator

Leonid Davidovich Bershidsky is a Russian journalist, publisher and columnist for Bloomberg View, the editorial division of Bloomberg News. He is currently based in Berlin, Germany.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vera Polozkova</span> Russian poet, actress and singer (born 1986)

Vera Nikolayevna Polozkova is a Russian poet, actress, and singer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Russian Institute for Strategic Studies</span> Russian state-controlled organisation

The Russian Institute for Strategic Studies (RISS) or (RISI) or (RISY) (Russian: Российский институт стратегических исследований (РИСИ)) is a Russian research and analytical center formed by decree by former Russian Federation President Boris Yeltsin in 1992.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dataism</span> Ideology created by big data

Dataism is a term that has been used to describe the mindset or philosophy created by the emerging significance of big data. It was first used by David Brooks in The New York Times in 2013. The term has been expanded to describe what historian Yuval Noah Harari, in his book Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow from 2015, calls an emerging ideology or even a new form of religion, in which "information flow" is the "supreme value".

The Pushkin House Book Prize is an annual book prize, awarded to the best non-fiction writing on Russia in the English language. The prize was inaugurated in 2013. The prize amount as of 2020 has been £10,000. The advisory board for the prize is made up of Russia experts including Rodric Braithwaite, Andrew Jack, Bridget Kendall, Andrew Nurnberg, Marc Polonsky, and Douglas Smith.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rebecca Wragg Sykes</span> Archaeologist

Rebecca Wragg Sykes is a British paleolithic archaeologist, broadcaster, popular science writer and author who lives in Wales. She is interested in the Middle Palaeolithic, specifically in the lives of Neanderthals; and she is one of the founders of TrowelBlazers, a website set up to celebrate the lives of women in archaeology, palaeontology and geology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lex Fridman</span> Russian-American scientist and podcast host (born 1983)

Lex Fridman is a Russian-American computer scientist and podcaster. He hosts the Lex Fridman Podcast.

References

  1. ↑ Harari, Yuval Noah; Spiegel & Grau (2018). 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. ISBN   978-0-52551217-2.
  2. ↑ Harari, Yuval Noah; Jonathan Cape (2018). 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. ISBN   978-1-78733067-2.
  3. 1 2 Lewis, Helen (15 August 2018). "21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari review – a guru for our times?". The Guardian. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  4. ↑ "21 Lessons for the 21st Century". Book Marks . Retrieved 28 December 2018.
  5. ↑ "Big data is reshaping humanity, says Yuval Noah Harari". The Economist. 30 August 2018. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  6. ↑ Gates, Bill (4 September 2018). "What Are the Biggest Problems Facing Us in the 21st Century?". The New York Times. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  7. ↑ Thornhill, John (10 August 2018). "Are humans too flawed to survive the 21st century?". Financial Times. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  8. ↑ Jacobson, Gavin (22 August 2018). "Yuval Noah Harari's 21 Lessons for the 21st Century is a banal and risible self-help book". The New Statesman. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  9. ↑ DeGroot, Gerard (11 August 2018). "Review: 21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari — nuclear war? Let's meditate instead". The Times. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  10. ↑ Plotkin, Yuval (23 July 2019). "Russia edition of book by famed Israeli author skips Putin criticism but slams Trump". Ynet . Retrieved 23 July 2019.
  11. ↑ Цой, Ива (22 July 2019). "В российском переводе книги о постправде поменяли Путина на Трампа, а оккупацию Крыма — на присоединение". The Insider (Russia). Retrieved 22 July 2019.
  12. ↑ "Историк Харари объяснил изменение фрагмента про Крым в российском переводе его книги". Ведомости (Russia). 22 July 2019. Retrieved 22 July 2019.
  13. ↑ "Изменения в российском издании книги Юваля Харари. Комментарии автора". NEWSru (Israel). 22 July 2019. Retrieved 22 July 2019.
  14. ↑ Bershidsky, Leonid (24 July 2019). "Putin Gets Stronger When Creators Censor Themselves". Moscow Times . Retrieved 28 July 2019.
  15. ↑ Slyomovics, Nettanel (24 July 2019). "Yuval Noah Harari's Problem Is Much More Serious Than Self-censorship". Haaretz . Retrieved 28 July 2019.
  16. ↑ "Prof. Yuval Noah Harari Responds to Censoring Russian Translation of His Book". Haaretz.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.