Books Recommended by Peter Thiel
Originals
How Non-Conformists Move the World
Adam Grant
Source: "It can sometimes seem as if one must learn everything old before one can try anything new. [The author] does a masterful job showing that is not the case; we are lucky to have him as a guide." - Peter Thiel
7 Powers
The Foundations of Business Strategy
Hamilton Helmer
Source: "[The author] understands that strategy starts with invention. He can't tell you what to invent, but he can and does show what it takes for a new invention to become a valuable business." - Peter Thiel
100 Plus
Sonia Arrison
Source: "Its message is evergreen: how scientists are directly attacking the problem of aging and death and why we should fight for life instead of accepting decay as inevitable." - Peter Thiel
The Lord of the Rings (4 books)
J.R.R. Tolkien
Source: "The classic [series] I always give." - Peter Thiel
Atlas Shrugged
Ayn Rand
Source: "When I first read [Ayn Rand's books] in the late 80s, it felt pretty crazy. And in the last decades, it's in many ways felt much more correct." - Peter Thiel
Bloodlands
Europe Between Hitler and Stalin
Timothy Snyder
Source: "Tells how the Nazis and the Soviets drove each other to ever more murderous atrocities as they fought to dominate Eastern Europe." - Peter Thiel
Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World
Rene Girard
Source: "We [followers of Girard], had sort of a sense that we had figured out the truth about the world in a way that nobody else did." - Peter Thiel
Psychopolitics
Conversations with Trevor Cribben Merrill
Jean-Michel Oughourlian
Source: "For a fresh application of Mr. Girard’s insights into power politics, that great international theater of irrationality." - Peter Thiel
The Reasonableness of Christianity
John Locke
Source: "Said that Christ obviously had to mislead people, since if he had not done so, the authorities might have tried to kill him." - Peter Thiel
Paradise Lost
John Milton
Source: "The mind is its own place and of itself can make a hell of heaven, and a heaven of hell." - Peter Thiel
The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World
From Marathon to Waterloo
Edward Shepherd Creasy
Source: "Peter [Thiel] would, at one point, pass me a copy of [this book], the book he had read as he’d mulled his options over." - Ryan Holiday
Discourses on Livy
Niccolò Machiavelli
Source: "Something in these pages planted itself deep into [Peter Thiel]’s mind when he first read it long ago." - Ryan Holiday
The Master and Margarita
Mikhail Bulgakov
Source: "The devil shows up in Stalinist Russia, [...] and gives everybody what they want, and everything goes haywire." - Peter Thiel
Anna Karenina
Leo Tolstoy
Source: "All happy families are alike, and all unhappy families are unhappy in their own special way." - Peter Thiel
Dangerous
Milo Yiannopoulos
Source: "If you don't use your freedom of speech, one day you might find that it's gone. Buy this book while it's legal." - Peter Thiel
Capital in the Twenty-First Century
Thomas Piketty
Source: "Accurately describes inequality in the past and present of countries like the United States." - Peter Thiel
The Hard Thing About Hard Things
Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers
Ben Horowitz
Source: "[The author] has written the first true guide for protecting a startup from self-sabotage." - Peter Thiel
The Decadent Society
How We Became the Victims of Our Own Success
Ross Gregory Douthat
Source: "Sets the stakes for the most urgent public debate of the 2020s: How do we get back to the future?" - Peter Thiel
Holy Bible
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Source: Peter Thiel says The New Testament has influenced him more than The Old Testament.
The Sovereign Individual
Mastering the Transition to the Information Age
James Dale Davidson
Source: "One of the books that tremendously influenced me when I started PayPal." - Peter Thiel
FAQ
Did Peter Thiel recommend all these books?
Not necessarily. This book list has Peter Thiel must-read recommendations, but it also has a mix of mentions and suggestions.
How do you know Peter Thiel mentioned these books?
Every suggestion made by Peter Thiel is validated by our editors. You can find the sources to the recommendations linked next to the books.
Did Peter Thiel actually create this list?
No. This reading list was curated by our editors based on confirmed mentions from Peter Thiel, the sources are made available under each recommendation.
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