Ways to Start the New Year | 5Y's New Year Book & Film Recommendations
On intellect, wonder, and imagination.
2021 is drawing to a close. Year-end is a time for reflection and review, and amid the vast ocean of information, good works can help us build understanding at a larger scale.
The following books and films come recommended by 5Y Capital colleagues. They are not a systematic collection, but rather a gathering and collision of individual intellectual particles — perhaps offering you some inspiration. The list includes rigorous professional analysis, social reflection and summary, and wild flights of imagination. The works themselves are vessels that embrace difference and diversity, giving us knowledge, wonder, and imagination.
Also, there's a special surprise for you at the end. Don't miss it. Happy New Year :)
(Listed alphabetically by title)
- 01 -
The Beauty of Opposition: 500 Years of Western Art
Author: Yan Bojun CITIC Press
Recommended by: Yuan Ye, Partner at 5Y Capital
Whatever art may be, one thing is beyond doubt: human life can never do without it, under any circumstances. No matter how backward material conditions may be, humans need art — this is essential evidence of what makes us human, powerful proof of how we differ from animals. Art is the medium through which people exchange and communicate with nature and society. By abstracting representative figures, events, and styles through binary opposition, we can better understand humanity's enduring pursuits through the lens of art history. Art is the true path toward spiritual freedom.
- 02 -
Hackers & Painters
Author: [US] Paul Graham Posts & Telecom Press
Recommended by: He Kaiyan, Investment Manager at 5Y Capital
The author, Paul Graham, is known as the godfather of Silicon Valley startups, and this book was published in 2011. Ten years later, many of its ideas and reflections on the nature of entrepreneurship remain remarkably fresh.
- 03 -
Succession
Directors: Mark Mylod, Adam Arkin, Adam McKay, Andrij Parekh
June 2018 (US)
Recommended by: Hu Haichuan, Executive Director at 5Y Capital
If you're looking for a show over the New Year holiday, this HBO business drama — now three seasons in — deserves a five-star recommendation. The series revolves around the governance and succession of an international media conglomerate, with palace intrigue among the founder's family over inheritance. Against a sweeping historical backdrop, multiple forces — the aging founder, his children, external capital, rival companies — battle for corporate control. The complexity is extraordinary: good and evil overlap and interweave in every character. The script, acting, music, and attention to detail are all top-tier. Beyond the business warfare, the show explores deeper questions: how to identify and manipulate human nature, how to treat family and partners, how to confront one's desires and weaknesses, how to make choices. Everyone will find different angles of inspiration.
- 04 -
The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
Author: [UK] Ben Macintyre
Social Sciences Academic Press
Recommended by: Shi Yunfeng, Senior Investment Manager at 5Y Capital
A work of narrative nonfiction based on the true story of a KGB colonel — highly readable.
There are many kinds of spies, and many motivations that drive them: longing for a glamorous world, or the collapse and formation of deep political conviction. Based on my limited and biased sample, the spies who truly changed the world were mostly driven by belief — and belief shapes the critical decisions of heroes who change history. US-Soviet confrontation was the narrative backdrop of the last era; this era's narrative is dominated by technological progress. What is the belief of our time?
- 05 -
Structural Reform: China's Economic Problems and Countermeasures
Author: Huang Qifan CITIC Press
Recommended by: Zhou Xiao, Vice President at 5Y Capital
Amid once-in-a-century transformations, this book offers a structural exposition of our country's fundamental strategies in facing formidable challenges and complex games. Author Huang Qifan is a scholar-official with both practical experience and theoretical depth. The book systematically explains the logic and principles behind many grand concepts we hear often, allowing us to more truly feel the pulse of reform in a major power.
- 06 -
The Computing Universe: A Journey through a Revolution
Authors: [UK] Tony Hey / [UK] Gyuri Pápay
Translators: Wu Chuanhai / Chen Shaoyun
Posts & Telecom Press
Recommended by: Liu Kai, Partner at 5Y Capital
We live in an era of explosive technological innovation. Technology plays a central role in every aspect of human life, changing how each of us lives and subtly transforming our planet. Yet most people know nothing about the underlying forces that shaped all of this. Starting from mathematics and early computing theory, this book offers a systematic introduction to the evolution of important scientific theories and key figures in human history, centered on computer technology as the core technology. The authors have a unique perspective — blending storytelling with theory and reflection — making this a rare and excellent work.
- 07 -
Liu Qin's Lectures on Modern Western Thought
Author: Liu Qin
CITIC Publishing Group
Recommended by: Ji Mengqi, Vice President at 5Y Capital
Though titled "lectures," this book discusses the core ideas of 19 thinkers without focusing on pure theory. Instead, it examines the internal connections between thought and reality, exploring the spiritual crisis of modern people and the socio-political dilemmas of the modern world. Liu Qin provides new perspectives for understanding real-world problems through philosophical viewpoints.
Limited by length, the book makes compromises — it cannot lead to fair judgments or sudden clarity on every issue. But it at least lights a small lamp along the journey of exploration, exciting travelers pondering different questions and encouraging further exploration. Reading thick and then thin, then conveying information to more readers through accessible language and examples rather than leaving it on a high shelf — shallow but not distorted. This is what I admire most about Liu Qin.
- 08 -
6G Wireless Communications: A New Era of Connected Intelligence
Authors: [CA] Tong Wen, [CA] Zhu Peiying
Translator: Huawei Translation Center
China Machine Press
Recommended by: Wang Liqiang, Investment Partner at 5Y Capital
The metaverse? Robots? Web3? The development of underlying hardware technology determines the pace of upper-layer software applications. Wireless communication technology evolves roughly once per decade — a collective creation of the entire industry, and one of the better lenses for viewing forward-looking technology development. My vision for the next decade is "Every Being Converged Intelligence" — just as complex numbers consist of real and imaginary parts, future "Every Being" will include both physical matter and living things in the real world and virtual existence in the digital world. Intelligence will be everywhere, distributed yet converged — for example, lightweight human-computer interaction devices connected and fused with computing devices through high-throughput, low-latency wireless buses. One possible entry point is Full-Stack Fusion: finding the key people and points from application-layer software services down to underlying hardware, and trying to connect them to discover fusion opportunities.
- 09 -
Rashomon
Director: Akira Kurosawa
Release date: August 26, 1950 (Japan)
Recommended by: Qin Liu, Founding Partner at 5Y Capital
Kurosawa's rough-hewn black-and-white film uses a brief murder story to expose the weakness of human nature. In the story, the samurai, the woman, the bandit, the woodcutter — everyone narrates their version of the truth of the same event (no one denies the murder), yet everyone is simultaneously embellishing and lying to varying degrees. "Where there is weakness, there are lies." And behind weakness lies the desire in every person's heart.
Rashomon exists in each of our hearts. It is a weakness of human nature that no one can avoid, yet it is also a weakness that can be redeemed through self-reflection. Remembering this can help us stay clear-headed and gain the courage to face truth.
- 10 -
Life Is Like the Sea
Author: Mai Jia Beijing October Literature and Art Publishing House
Recommended by: Sun Yi, Senior Investment Manager at 5Y Capital
A highly readable good story. It centers on a man born in the Republican era, known as "the Colonel," who carries many labels: good man, chivalrous, free-spirited, cocky, enduring, capable, once glorious; also ill-fated, wronged, paranoid, declining in old age, barely dying in peace. The Colonel's life is a microcosm of modern Chinese history, and also the life of a simple folk heroism in the torrent of great history. Looking back at where I've come from, through bleakness — neither storm nor shine.
- 11 -
If Our Language Were Whiskey
Author: [JP] Haruki Murakami
Translator: Lin Shaohua Shanghai Translation Publishing House
Recommended by: Wu Daiwei, Vice President at 5Y Capital
Beyond high-intensity work, one can also have some worldly pleasures. After reading this book, even without actually drinking, you may experience something like meditation or tipsiness — followed by some inexplicable inspiration.
- 12 -
Competing Against Luck
Authors: [US] Clayton Christensen / [US] Karen Dillon / [US] Taddy Hall
Translator: Jin Tingting
CITIC Press
Recommended by: Peter, Vice President at 5Y Capital
The book's subtitle is "The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice." Author Christensen is a Harvard Business School professor and originator of "disruptive innovation" theory.
The core of innovation is not the product, but the job the user needs to get done. Users "hire" products to accomplish tasks in their lives. Understanding the job users truly want done — rather than simply satisfying surface-level expressed needs — this is the key to innovation. This book provides an excellent framework for rethinking innovation from the user perspective.
Giveaway Time
Thank you for reading. We've prepared 12 gifts, each containing one randomly selected book from the above recommendations and a 5Y Capital custom New Year gift box.
How to participate: Leave a comment below sharing the book or film that left the deepest impression on you in 2021, and what inspiration it gave you. We will select 12 readers to receive New Year gifts.
Comment deadline: 24:00, January 5, 2022
Winners will be announced in the comments section of this post on January 7.
Copyright 5Y Capital. No reproduction without authorization.
Release date: August 26, 1950 (Japan)
Recommended by: Wei Yunhong, Investment Manager at 5Y Capital
In a rapidly changing and competitive modern society, how can our pursuit of opportunities preserve sincerity and clarity? Try regularly asking yourself: What do users actually use our product for? What progress, emotional value, and social value do they hope to gain? Then try to find the most likely or most universal answers. Continuously integrating observation into product development is how we stop "relying on" luck for success.
- 13 -
Regenesis: How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves
Authors: [US] George Church / [US] Ed Regis
Translator: Zhou Dong Publishing House of Electronics Industry
Recommended by: Kang Jian, Investment Manager at 5Y Capital
Synthetic biology research expands the boundaries of human capability — for instance, the qualitative leap from "reading" to "writing" the biological code, and the transformation from traditional "investigating things to extend knowledge" to "building things to extend knowledge." I look forward to seeing more biotechnology drive industrial transformation across industry, agriculture, medicine, food, and more — reassembling Joules (energy) + atoms (stuff) + bits (knowledge). Demand determines function; function encompasses all things.
- 14 -
The Selfish Gene
Author: [UK] Richard Dawkins
Translators: Lu Yunzhong, Zhang Daiyun, et al.
CITIC Publishing Group
Recommended by: Fang Qi, Vice President at 5Y Capital
A classic published 40 years ago, using accessible and engaging language to discuss life, genes, evolution. Even with the rapid advances in life sciences today, the author's ideas remain imaginative and stirring. Is the individual a "survival machine" for life, or "a colony of genes, a cooperative ensemble of selfish genes"? Reading this book may help us better contemplate life's three questions: "Who am I?" "Where do I come from?" "Where am I going?" Perhaps we can glimpse the macroscopic world from tiny genes.
Interactive Giveaway :)
Which works influenced you in the past year? Welcome to share in the comments section books and films you've read or watched in the past year. We will give a "book blind box" (books sourced from this article's recommendations) to the three friends whose selected comments receive the most likes.
Note: The deadline is 18:00, January 9, 2022. Please reply with shipping information within 24 hours of receiving notification.
5Y Capital (formerly Morningside Venture Capital), currently manages approximately RMB 32 billion in dual-currency USD and RMB funds. 5Y Capital seeks out, supports, and inspires solitary entrepreneurs, providing support from the spiritual to all operational aspects. We believe that if the "crazy you" in others' eyes begins to be believed in, the world will become a different place.
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