personal
I’ve borrowed this list of questions from Norman Geras’s blog. For better answers than mine, see here.
Who are your intellectual heroes? > Robert Dahl, Timothy Garton Ash, Stephen Pinker, Jared Diamond, J.S. Mill, Paul Krugman.
What is the best novel you've ever read? > Some of my favorites are A High Wind in Jamaica, Ashes and Diamonds, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, A Man in Full, Christ Stopped at Eboli, Blood Meridian, Atonement, A Hero of Our Time, Under the Frog, Pnin, Red Plenty, and Milkman as well as a lot of stuff by Milan Kundera, Walker Percy, Philip Roth, Grace Paley, Ivan Turgenev, David Lodge, and Raymond Carver.
What is your favourite movie? > Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Lady Eve, Three Kings, Firemen’s Ball, 24 Hour Party People, Day for Night, Mr. Hulot’s Holiday, Rules of the Game, Tristram Shandy, Her, and The Stories We Tell are ones that occur to me off the bat.
What is your favourite song? > Just about anything by Stevie Wonder in the seventies. I have also been partial at various moments in my life to Jill Scott, Passion Pit, LCD Soundsystem, Janelle Monae, Rickie Lee Jones, Lily Allen, Talking Heads, Elvis Costello, Sly and the Family Stone, and Lyle Lovett.
Who are your favorite artists? > Rembrandt and Poussin among the classics. From contemporary art: Jenny Holzer, James Turrell, J.S.G. Boggs.
What are your favorite TV series? > Borgen, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Wire, Deutschland 83
Can you name a major moral, political or intellectual issue on which you've ever changed your mind? > An awful lot as I once considered myself a Marxist. Probably the whole gamut of economic and foreign policy issues.
What philosophical thesis do you think it most important to disseminate? > Most important questions are empirical ones (borrowed from Lane Kenworthy’s answers and originally from Milton Friedman I think).
Can you name a work of non-fiction which has had a major and lasting influence on how you think about the world? > Czeslaw Milosz’s Captive Mind.
Who are your political heroes? > Milada Horakova, a Czech social democrat who was put to death by the communists.
What is your favourite piece of political wisdom? > I assume this has been stated in better form somewhere: Leave partisanship for the professionals; make up your own mind on the political issues of the day.
If you could effect one major policy change in the governing of your country, what would it be? > Switch to a parliamentary form of government.
What do you consider to be the main threat to the future peace and security of the world? > Intense religious belief.
Do you think you could ever be married to, or in a long-term relationship with, someone with radically different political views from your own? > Certainly. I almost never take offence.
What would your ideal holiday be? > Lazing around on a Croatian island with a stack of good books
What commonly enjoyed activities do you regard as a waste of time? > I suppose watching sports, though I sometimes indulge myself. I can’t understand why people like to be in their cars or want to set foot in a casino.
If you were to relive your life to this point, is there anything you'd do differently? > I’d seek out more challenges, watch less TV and sports, and spend more time writing.
Where would you most like to live (other than where you do)? > A nice, mid-sized European city with a public square, lots of outdoor cafes, and weather good enough to enjoy them.
What is your most treasured possession? > I can’t think of anything I couldn’t do without.
What would be your most important piece of advice about life? > Take more risks in your life choices; you’re not going to starve. This mainly applies to the people who seek out my advice – college undergraduates.
What do you consider the most important personal quality? > Self-control and self-doubt.
What personal fault do you most dislike? > A preference for luxury, wastefulness.
What talent would you most like to have? > To be a better mathematician; to write better prose.
What would be your ideal choice of alternative profession or job? > Writing feature articles for a magazine.
Who are your sporting heroes? > As a kid they were Elvin Hayes, Buck Williams, Ron Guidry, Len Bias, and John Riggins. Today I would say none. Maybe Tim Duncan.
Which sports teams do you support? > As a teenager my list was Nets (earlier the Bullets), Redskins, Yankees, and Devils. Today I mainly root against teams and players, including some of those mentioned here.
How, if at all, would you change your life were you suddenly to win or inherit an enormously large sum of money? > I'd probably upgrade my housing situation. Other than that I can’t think of anything I want that I don’t have.
Who is your favourite comedian or humorist? > Preston Sturges, Phil Hartman, Larry David & Jerry Seinfeld, Armando Iannucci, Steve Coogan, Tina Fey, Zdenek Sverak.
Do you have any prejudices you're willing to acknowledge? > Religious sects and the rich, but I am learning to overcome both of them.
What are your pet peeves? > Auto racing, SUVs, horoscopes/astrology, gambling/Las Vegas.
What are your favourite blogs? > Marginal Revolution, Matthew Yglesias, Crooked Timber, Fistful of Euros, Org Theory.
What are the 10 books which influenced you the most? The books I own are here (link).
John Feinstein, A Season on the Brink. While I no longer worship at the altar of the basketball coach Bobby Knight (far from it), he once seemed to me a model of discipline and virtue.
Friedrich Nietzsche, Genealogy of Morals. For all the standard reasons.
Walker Percy, Lost in the Cosmos. The first book that made me think about myself, my place in the world, and the human condition. I'm not sure if any of his answers stand up to philosophical scrutiny, but I think the questions and certainly the style do.
Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. The book that made thinking and intellectual life seem fascinating, sexy, and something that I could do. It also got me interested in Eastern Europe.
Raymond Carver, Where I'm Calling From. The first literary work that I connected with on an emotional level.
Czeslaw Milosz, The Captive Mind. The book that cured me of communism and the idea that individuals should go along with the collective.
Ladislav Smoljak and Zdenek Sverak, The Jara Cimrman Plays. These were my inspiration to learn Czech and learn about Czech culture. I still think their literary qualities are underrated. I've translated some and written an interpretative essay about them.
Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry. Hard to believe, but this dry as dust book reshaped the way I think.
John Rawls, A Theory of Justice. This is the book that turned me into a liberal in the political philosophy sense of the term. Funny that it's usually criticized as too socialist.
Herbert Kitschelt, et al., Postcommunist Party Systems. Not that anyone who doesn't work on postcommunist politics should read this, but it gave me a model for the sort of empirical work that I try to do.