In a digital age designed to fracture attention, Razib Khan offers a counter-intuitive prescription: the most efficient way to understand the present is to inhabit the specific, messy lives of the past. Rather than skimming broad surveys of history, Khan argues that deep immersion into historical biography provides the only true access to the "tenor" of human experience, transforming dry bureaucratic records into living narratives of agency and passion.
The Humanizing Power of Biography
Khan begins by challenging his own lifelong preference for "densely delivered facts and overarching trends," admitting that he has historically given biography "a wide berth." He pivots, however, to argue that to truly grasp a civilization, one must "ride along with a single figure who lived it." He illustrates this with Suetonius' Lives of the Twelve Caesars, noting that while archaeology reveals mechanics, it cannot capture the "full flower" of human emotion found in narrative texts like The Iliad. The distinction is crucial: Khan suggests that without these stories, historical figures remain mere "entries in a ledger-book" rather than complex beings with interests we share.
This approach is particularly effective when applied to Johannes Fried's biography of Charlemagne. Khan praises the work for its "conversational style" that cuts through the potential turgidity of the subject matter. He notes that Fried candidly admits to using imagination to fill gaps, as "Charlemagne was no Marcus Aurelius and we do not have access to the diaries of the king of the Franks." Instead of pretending to omniscience, the author constructs a "composite character" from available materials. Khan finds this honest reconstruction vital for understanding a "liminal figure" who was neither fully Late Antique nor fully medieval, but rather the architect of the medieval world itself.
"To truly understand who the lords of Mycenae, Sparta and Pylos might have been, we require recourse to narrative texts... which render characters in the full flower of their passions."
Khan's analysis of Charlemagne highlights the tension between the "coarser and bloodier" martial values of the Germanic elite and the king's deep, albeit sometimes contradictory, faith. He points out that while the Frankish court was brutal, it also preserved the learning of antiquity through a cadre of scholars. This duality sets the stage for centuries of European history, influencing rulers from the Holy Roman Empire to the Habsburgs. The argument holds weight because it refuses to sanitize the past; Khan acknowledges that the era was defined by violence, yet insists that the cultural preservation was equally real.
Violence, Revolution, and the Cost of Change
Shifting from the slow burn of empire-building to the explosive impact of radical abolitionism, Khan examines David Reynolds' biography of John Brown. Here, the stakes are immediate and the human cost of conflict is central. Khan describes Brown not as a sanitized hero, but as a "terrorist of his age whose violence was vindicated by the course of the Civil War." He quotes Brown's pre-execution assertion that "the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood," and notes the grim accuracy of that prophecy.
Khan's commentary is striking in its refusal to shy away from the moral ambiguity of Brown's actions. He observes that while Brown was a "stark figure," his raid on Harper's Ferry was also a "counter-cultural movement" involving freethinkers, not just religious zealots. This framing challenges the modern tendency to view historical violence solely through the lens of contemporary morality. Khan argues that Brown's impact was compressed into "a handful of momentous years," contrasting sharply with Charlemagne's centuries-long legacy. The tragedy of the Civil War is not glossed over; the narrative centers on the inevitability of bloodshed that Brown predicted.
Critics might argue that labeling Brown a "terrorist" risks equating his anti-slavery insurgency with modern political violence, potentially obscuring the unique moral imperative of his cause. However, Khan's point seems to be that understanding the method of his violence is essential to understanding the scale of the war that followed. The biography serves as a reminder that social revolutions often demand a price that history books frequently try to minimize.
"Brown was a stark figure, a terrorist of his age whose violence was vindicated by the course of the Civil War."
The Paradox of Refined Militarism
The commentary then turns to Tim Blanning's Frederick the Great, exploring a ruler who embodied the 18th-century paradox of being both an "aesthete" and the head of a "militaristic" state. Khan notes that Frederick, a homosexual with a "disdain for religion," presided over a court "suffused with the arts and music" while simultaneously battling Austria, France, Russia, and Sweden in the Seven Years' War. This "equipoise between culture and martial valor" is presented as a unique historical moment that was shattered by the Napoleonic Wars.
Khan suggests that Frederick's Prussia was a forerunner to modern Germany, yet its specific blend of refinement and military might was lost in the subsequent "Iron Kingdom" of Bismarck. The analysis is compelling because it treats culture and warfare not as opposites, but as intertwined forces that defined the era. However, the focus on the "refinement" of the court risks overshadowing the human suffering caused by the wars Frederick initiated. While Khan mentions the mobilization of society, the narrative remains focused on the intellectual and political legacy of the ruler rather than the civilian toll of his campaigns.
A similar dynamic is explored in Andre Clot's biography of Suleiman the Magnificent. Khan describes the Ottoman Empire under Suleiman as a "colossus astride three continents," yet also marks his reign as the "beginning of the end." The empire's success relied on the adoption of new military technologies, but by the end of Suleiman's rule, the state's "nimbleness was just a memory." Khan uses the metaphor of a "black hole" to describe the Ottoman Empire's gravitational pull on history, arguing that we often fail to appreciate it as a "cultural, social and political reality that shaped life in western Islam for five centuries."
"Like a black hole at the center of the galaxy, the Ottoman Empire's existence is something that we all know of, but far too often fail to appreciate on its own terms."
The Rise of Science and the Decline of Institutions
Beyond biography, Khan touches on the shifting landscape of modern institutions and scientific discovery. He critiques the current state of American higher education, arguing that it has become a "consumer product" where the pursuit of amenities and easy courses devalues degrees in the long term. He warns that faculty who accept this stewardship risk losing their ability to "focus on their research" entirely. This is a sharp critique of the marketization of academia, suggesting that the pursuit of short-term enrollment numbers is eroding the very mission of the university.
Simultaneously, Khan highlights the transformative power of ancient DNA research. He discusses findings that confirm the patrilineal transmission of priestly lineages (Cohanim) and reveals the persistence of high-status lineages in Bronze Age Europe. He notes that while we have made progress, understanding the full trajectory of human evolution is a "numbers game" requiring tens of thousands of genomes. The contrast is stark: while universities struggle with their purpose, science is uncovering the deep, often violent, history of human migration and social stratification.
Khan also addresses the demographic catastrophe in South Korea, where hyper-meritocracy has led to a situation where "two is already too many." He argues that the intense competition for positional goods leaves no time for family life, resulting in a population collapse. This is not just a Korean problem but a warning for the rest of the world: a society that focuses so much on "winning in life" may disqualify itself from the future. The argument is sobering, linking economic pressure directly to the biological imperative of reproduction.
"South Koreans focus so much on winning in life that they disqualify themselves from even having time to perpetuate it."
Bottom Line
Razib Khan's curation is strongest in its insistence that history is not a collection of abstract trends, but a tapestry woven from the specific, often contradictory, choices of individuals. By anchoring broad historical shifts in the lives of figures like Charlemagne, John Brown, and Frederick the Great, he makes the past feel immediate and urgent. However, the piece occasionally risks romanticizing the "refinement" of ruling elites, potentially softening the edges of the violence that underpinned their empires. The reader is left with a powerful reminder: to understand the world we live in, we must be willing to confront the blood, the faith, and the ambition of those who came before us.