The qualities of human nature described in “Thinking, fast and slow” are already known to all of us at some level. We are all taught in society to believe in the rational, thinking human being as distinct from his animal peers, yet at this book excellently details, there are plenty of ways in which our seemingly rational decisions can be bent and perverted by various forms of bias. Daniel Kahneman details these two seemingly incongruous facets of our nature as two ‘distinct’ halves: System 1 represents our autonomous, unthinking, reflex and subconscious reactions, whereas System 2 is that logical, calculating being we consider ourselves to be. Much of the relevant research covered in this volume was pioneered and conducted by Kahneman and his late colleague Amos Tversky, to whom this volume is dedicated.

In ähnlicher Weise zu Dava Sobels Buch „Longitude “ dreht sich im „Nathaniel’s Nutmeg“ alles um die Erfahrungen eines der unsichtbarsten Protagonisten der Geschichte. Obwohl es sich um die Geschichte eines kleineren Maßstabes handelt, stimmt das Ziel des Werks überragend mit einem Zitat des Historikers E. P. Thompson überein, geschichtliche Figuren „from the enormous condescension of posterity“ zu retten. Die Hauptakteure dieses Buches werden den meisten Lesern unbekannt, sowie viele der Ereignisse, dennoch bleibt deren Auswirkung für die Gegenwart für jeden ersichtlich.

In a similar vein to Dava Sobel’s Longitude , Nathaniel’s Nutmeg revolves around the story of one of history’s largely invisible protagonists. Whilst this isn’t history on the same scale, it sits very nicely with something E. P. Thompson said, about rescuing characters “from the enormous condescension of posterity.” The major characters in this book will be unknown to most people, as will most of the events, but their importance for the modern world will be clear to everyman.

Not normally one for autobiographies, I picked this book up on a whim as it was standing proudly on the local library shelf. It’s a pretty short, easy read with some interesting ideas and amusing anecdotes, essentially snippets hewn from Branson’s life and career with some generic advice strewn about. The autobiographical sections are probably the most interesting, though given the book’s format are often repeated or presented in a strange order.

At heart, the book deals with one couple’s private campaign of resistance to the Nazi regime. As Fallada wrote in an article about the novel, “Über den doch vorhandenen Widerstand der Deutschen gegen den Hitlerterror”, his writings were dedicated to their sacrifice that it not be in vain. The core of the book centres on the Quangels, a couple who lose their son during Hitler’s invasion of France, and who strive to offer a token of resistance, by way of writing postcards and letters denouncing the Nazi acts. These political flyers almost unswervingly end in the arms of the Gestapo, who catalogue this defiance and use their ruthless methods in pursuit of the perpetrators, destroying lives as they do so. This, in my opinion, is one of the book’s greatest strengths, its depth of living characters, almost reminiscent to me of a Dickensian world, each role played by a figure of flesh and blood, and not merely props for the main actors to play up against. Thus the novel details episodes in the lives of thieves and prostitutes, Jews and Gestapo inspectors, youth and the permanently unemployed.