Books Charlie Munger has recommended
The books Charlie Munger recommended in Poor Charlie's Almanack and at Berkshire Hathaway and Daily Journal meetings, with sources.
Charlie Munger has no affiliation with this site and does not endorse it. Recommendations are quoted from public sources listed at the bottom. Background: Wikipedia.
Munger's reading list is the original 'latticework of mental models': psychology, biology, history, physics and a few business biographies, chosen because each gives you a model that transfers. The core list is printed in Poor Charlie's Almanack; the rest come from shareholder meetings where he answered the 'what are you reading' question for fifty years.
He rewarded authors he admired: Robert Cialdini received a Berkshire A share after Munger read Influence. That is the standard the list below was held to.
The list
Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion
Robert B. Cialdini · 1984
Munger's most frequent recommendation; he sent Cialdini a Berkshire A share in thanks and said every lawyer and businessperson should read it.
Deep Simplicity
John Gribbin · 2004
Recommended for understanding complex adaptive systems; Munger was scathing about simplistic models of markets and economies.
Guns, Germs, and Steel
Jared Diamond · 1997
On the Almanack list: the multidisciplinary big-history explanation of why some societies dominated others, exactly the kind of cross-field thinking he preached.
The Selfish Gene
Richard Dawkins · 1976
The biology lens in his latticework; he cited evolutionary incentives constantly when explaining human behavior.
Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
Ron Chernow · 1998
A business biography he recommended at a Berkshire meeting; he favored biographies as the way to 'make friends among the eminent dead.'
Only the Paranoid Survive
Andrew S. Grove · 1996
Recommended for its strategic-inflection-point thinking: how businesses recognise and survive the moment the rules change.
Getting to Yes
Roger Fisher & William Ury · 1981
On his short negotiation list, along with Fisher's Getting It Done; principled negotiation as a repeatable method.
Models of My Life
Herbert A. Simon · 1991
The autobiography of the polymath behind bounded rationality: the exemplar of the multidisciplinary mind Munger admired.
Fiasco: Blood in the Water on Wall Street
Frank Partnoy · 1997
Recommended as a cautionary tale about derivatives, years before 2008 proved his point.
The Wealth and Poverty of Nations
David S. Landes · 1998
Economic history on the Almanack list: why some nations got rich and others did not, told through culture and institutions.
Questions people ask
What was Charlie Munger's most recommended book?
Influence by Robert Cialdini. Munger credited it with filling gaps in his understanding of psychology and famously sent the author a share of Berkshire Hathaway A stock.
Where is the full Munger reading list?
The recommended-reading appendix of Poor Charlie's Almanack (now published by Stripe Press) lists about twenty titles. Other recommendations come from transcripts of Berkshire Hathaway and Daily Journal annual meetings.
Sources
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