Since the beginning of this video series about the development of quantum mechanics, one request I have

received many times is for a few books on quantum mechanics that I would recommend. This is my list, in case you're considering getting

any of these books. My personal recommendation is to check your public library; they may have some of them, and

you can save some money. If you cannot find the book there and you are considering spending some money, I

encourage you to support your local bookstore. If your only option is buying the book online, you can support the channel

by using the affiliated links in the description below. There is a spectrum of books that one could recommend. On one

end, we find textbooks, books whose content is designed for a systematic study of the topic and commonly used in

university-level quantum mechanics courses. These are great, but not very friendly if you do not have formal physics training. On the other hand, we

encounter popular science books whose content is intended for science enthusiasts searching for fun facts and

interesting stories without diving into the mathematics. Right in between is the balance between stories, historical context, and calculations; this is where

most of the content of this channel lives—not as structured as a lecture, but also not as basic as popular science. I

have prepared a list of all three types. For those searching for a good textbook, the standard for an undergraduate course

is *Introduction to Quantum Mechanics* by David Griffiths. This book gets extra points for having a cat on the cover. The

content is nicely presented, although there is no historical context nor a presentation of old quantum physics. The first page of chapter one goes straight

to the Schrödinger equation and how to solve it for simple systems. Another nice textbook that I used during

My first undergraduate course on quantum mechanics used the book *Quantum Physics* by Stephen Gorovits. It has a style similar

to Griffiths, but it feels way more paced. Chapter one includes some relevant, although quite superficial, review of old

quantum physics. I like this book because it fills several gaps in the calculations for a transitional book

between undergraduate and graduate-level students. A standard option is *Principles of Quantum Mechanics* by Ramamurti Shankar.

It levels the mathematical field with a chapter reviewing the most important math needed in quantum mechanics, as well

as a review of classical mechanics before diving into quantum calculations, which only appear after page 100. The classic graduate-level textbook, at least

in the US, is *Modern Quantum Mechanics* by J.J. Sakurai. This is what I used in grad school. I find this one a bit too dry, but

it is a great textbook if you're a physics student. Even when I was working on my dissertation, I kept going back to

this book to check things. But what if you're not a physics student, but an enthusiast searching for a good popular

physics book for yourself or as a gift to a nerd friend? *In Search of Schrödinger's Cat* by John Gribbin is a classic and

fantastic overview of the main ideas of quantum physics, including an introduction to many of the scientists

who developed it. One of my favorite educators of quantum mechanics is Sean Carroll, and I really enjoyed his book

*Something Deeply Hidden*, in which Carroll presents his favorite way of understanding quantum physics—the so-called many-worlds interpretation—in

a way that is clear, scientifically sound, and without the nonsense found elsewhere. The first third of the book is only

dedicated to the development of quantum mechanics and to clarifying many of the misunderstandings that people likely

Have about quantum physics, even if you have studied quantum mechanics in university, you will find this presentation very illuminating, Carol.

Also has a fantastic podcast that I highly recommend. Sean Carroll also has an amazing series called The Biggest Ideas

in the universe, and part two is dedicated to quanta and fields. This book provides an overview of quantum

physics and then moves to an even more advanced topic: quantum field theory. This is probably a book that every physics

student should read before graduate school. Carroll provides some historical context, but mostly excellent ways of understanding advanced topics, but even

if you're not going to grad school but you have felt puzzled about topics like field quantization, field excitations, and

the quantum fields associated with each particle, this is the book for you. Finally, in this level, there is a book that I read after

an interview of its author by Sean Carroll in his podcast.  What is Real? The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of

quantum physics by Adam Becker is a remarkable presentation of the early stages of quantum mechanics when

physicists were still trying to make sense of it. Becker shows how in the 1920s most of the physics community

moved from questioning the underlying physics behind electrons and photons to the standard 'shut up and calculate' approach that every physicist

is taught in university. Becker includes stories of a few insurgents that tried to dig deeper into the fundamentals of

quantum mechanics, leading to the discovery of quantum entanglement and the groundbreaking work by John Bell. As

the title suggests, this is a book that shows that when it comes to quantum physics, we're not done. I finally move to

my favorite category: books that are not textbooks but that do not shy away from the math behind the physics. I start with

A book that I recommend to everybody, and I wish I had read when I was a student: *Quantum Mechanics: The Theoretical Minimum* by Leonard Susskind. These are the lecture notes from an evening course that Susskind gave at Stanford for his community.

It contains a lot of math, but explained in one of the best possible ways. Leonard Susskind is one of my favorite educators, together with Sean Carroll, and this book is a great extension of his course, which is fully available on YouTube.

This is part of a series, and they're all remarkable. One of the things that I really like about Sean Carroll and Leonard Susskind is that they explain what is known, but also what is not known about quantum mechanics.

The next book is commonly called a biography of Einstein; however, *Subtle is the Lord: The Science and the Life of Albert Einstein* by Abraham Pais is way more than that. I would call it a biography of Einstein's work, because it presents, with fantastic detail, the different fields developed by Einstein and their context, including plenty of relevant equations and a very complete list of references.

It is important to note that Pais was not just another biographer; as a physicist at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, he was a colleague and close friend to Einstein, so most of the content comes directly from the source.

The book includes a complete presentation of Einstein's works on relativity and quantum physics. You have noticed that many of the main papers on quantum mechanics were published in German, which can make them less accessible. For this, there is a combo of two books that come to the rescue.

*Collected Papers on Wave Mechanics* is the English translation of all the papers written by Erwin Schrödinger on the development of his famous equation. The other book is *Sources of Quantum Mechanics*.

Mechanics by BL Fer Verden. This is a collection of some of the key papers on quantum mechanics, translated into

English, starting with Einstein's work on radiation in 1916 all the way to 1926,

including papers by Bohr, Born, Heisenberg, Pauli, and Dirac. This book also includes an introduction and context to

each paper. Only shorter girl's papers are missing in this book, so these two complement each other. The last book on my list takes a

special place: *Quantum Theory at the Crossroads: Reconsidering the 1927 Solvay Conference*.  Guglielmo  (sic) Lupi and

Anthony Valentini deconstruct the famous fifth Solvay Conference. They include three main essays about the work presented at the conference by Louis de

Broglie, Max Born, Werner Heisenberg, and Erwin Schrödinger. These essays include

advanced equations and plenty of great explanations, but the core of the book is the English translation of the full

conference proceedings, including the transcript of all the presentations and the follow-up discussions that took place. If you ever wanted to read the

back-and-forths between Einstein and Bohr, in addition to all the extra commentary by the other giants of

quantum physics in the room, you will find it here. This is a remarkable book. These are my picks. I hope you enjoy

the selection and let me know in the comments if you have read any of these books or if you have other

recommendations to share. As a bonus, I highly recommend *Infinite Powers: The Story of Calculus and the Language of the*

Universe by Steve Strogatz to everyone. I wish I had read this book before I learned calculus because it provides a

level of intuition that would have been very useful. If you don't know any calculus, you are in for a treat, and if

You do know calculus. I can guarantee that you will enjoy it too because Strogatz shares great stories in a

charming way that led Nassim Taleb to write, "Warning: This book is dangerous. It will make you love mathematics."

Quantum Mechanics: book recommendations

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