Buy, Hold, Sell

by William Dalrymple

Pick up the cello; renounce the Aitken Bible.

The Anarchy (Bloomsbury, 2019) is a fascinating look at how, essentially, merchants from Great Britain took over India centuries ago by extracting South Asian riches, adding value in England and then exporting those goods as their own. But they did it while joined at the hip with interests in India.

Growing up in Pakistan, it was ingrained in me that the sun never set on the British Empire, so this story is close to me. Sun Tzu’s The Art of War is great and has stood the test of time, but that’s a clichéd answer for a favorite book. The Anarchy is a study on early capitalism and very well written.