Old books that are newly relevant

IN AN EPISODE of our podcast “The Intelligence” recorded at the end of 2023, some of our journalists talked about books of the past that are strikingly relevant to the present. The themes that inspired our choices include artificial intelligence, climate change, war and threats to democracy. The prescient books include a science-fiction novel, works by William Shakespeare, Winston Churchill and John McPhee and a history of the Yom Kippur war of 1973. On the podcast listeners offered their own suggestions. One proposed “Player Piano”, Kurt Vonnegut’s first novel, published in 1952, which imagines a world in which machines do almost every job. Another suggested “It Can’t Happen Here” from 1935, by Sinclair Lewis, about a populist who becomes president of the United States and overthrows democracy. Here are five books, all published more than a decade ago, that offer portents and lessons.