Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Yuval Noah Harari, 2015
HarperCollins
464 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062316097
Summary
One hundred thousand years ago, at least six human species inhabited the earth. Today there is just one. Us. Homo sapiens.
How did our species succeed in the battle for dominance? Why did our foraging ancestors come together to create cities and kingdoms? How did we come to believe in gods, nations, and human rights; to trust money, books, and laws; and to be enslaved by bureaucracy, timetables, and consumerism? And what will our world be like in the millennia to come?
In Sapiens, Professor Yuval Noah Harari spans the whole of human history, from the very first humans to walk the earth to the radical—and sometimes devastating—breakthroughs of the Cognitive, Agricultural, and Scientific Revolutions. Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, paleontology, and economics, and incorporating full-color illustrations throughout the text, he explores how the currents of history have shaped our human societies, the animals and plants around us, and even our personalities.
Have we become happier as history has unfolded? Can we ever free our behavior from the legacy of our ancestors? And what, if anything, can we do to influence the course of the centuries to come?
Bold, wide-ranging, and provocative, Sapiens integrates history and science to challenge everything we thought we knew about being human: our thoughts, our actions, our heritage...and our future. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—February 24, 1976
• Where—Israel
• Education—Ph.D., Oxford University
• Awards—Polonsky Prize for Creativity and Originality (twice);
Moncado Award for Military History
• Currently—lives near Jerusalem, Israel
Yuval Noah Harari is the author of the international bestseller Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. He lectures at the Department of History, Faculty of Humanities in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Harari originally specialized in medieval history and military history, completing his doctorate at the University of Oxford (Jesus College) in 2002 and publishing numerous books and articles, including Special Operations in the Age of Chivalry, 1100-1550; The Ultimate Experience: Battlefield Revelations and the Making of Modern War Culture, 1450-2000; "The Concept of 'Decisive Battles' in World History"; and "Armchairs, Coffee and Authority: Eye-witnesses and Flesh-witnesses Speak about War, 1100-2000."
He now specializes in World History and macro-historical processes. His research focuses on macro-historical questions such as:
—What is the relation between history and biology?
—What is the essential difference between Homo sapiens and other animals?
—Is there justice in history?
—Does history have a direction?
—Did people become happier as history unfolded?
His most recent book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind surveys the entire length of human history, from the evolution of Homo sapiens in the Stone Age up to the political and technological revolutions of the 21st century. It has generated much interest both in the academic community and among the general public and has turned Harari into an instant celebrity. YouTube Video clips of Harari’s Hebrew lectures on the history of the world have been viewed by tens of thousands of Israelis. He is also offers a free online course in English entitled A Brief History of Humankind. More than 100,000 people throughout the world have already taken this course.
Harari twice won the Polonsky Prize for Creativity and Originality, in 2009 and 2012. In 2011 he won the Society for Military History’s Moncado Award for outstanding articles in military history. In 2012 he was elected to the Young Israeli Academy of Sciences.
He lives with his husband in moshav Mesilat Zion near Jerusalem. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 2/11/2015.)
Book Reviews
The sort of book that sweeps the cobwebs out of your brain…. Harari…is an intellectual acrobat whose logical leaps will have you gasping with admiration.
John Carey - Sunday Times (UK)
Harari’s account of how we conquered the Earth astonishes with its scope and imagination…. One of those rare books that lives up to the publisher’s blurb...brilliantly clear, witty and erudite
Ben Shepard - Observer (UK)
An absorbing, provocative history of civilization…packed with heretical thinking and surprising facts. This riveting, myth-busting book cannot be summarised…you will simply have to read it.
John Gray - Financial Times (UK)
Full of…high-perspective, shocking and wondrous stories, as well as strange theories and startling insights.
Bryan Appleyard - Sunday Times (UK)
Not only is Harari eloquent and humane, he is often wonderfully, mordantly funny
Independent (UK)
Engaging and informative…. Extremely interesting.
Guardian (UK)
Harari can write…really, really write, with wit, clarity, elegance, and a wonderful eye for metaphor.
Times (Ireland)
Writing with wit and verve, Harari…attempts to explain how Homo sapiens came to be the dominant species on Earth as well as the sole representative of the human genus.… Provocative and entertaining.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) This title is one of the exceptional works of nonfiction that is both highly intellectual and compulsively readable… a fascinating, hearty read.
Library Journal
(Starred review.) It’s not often that a book offers readers the possibility to reconsider, well, everything. But that’s what Harari does in this sweeping look at the history of humans.… Readers of every stripe should put this at the top of their reading lists. Thinking has never been so enjoyable.
Booklist
(Starred review.) An encyclopedic approach from a well-versed scholar who is concise but eloquent, both skeptical and opinionated, and open enough to entertain competing points of view.…The great debates of history aired out with satisfying vigor.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher.)