A good place to start in order to kindle interest and get the big picture right from the start is still
- Robert Heilbroner (1999). The Worldly Philosophers: The Lives, Times And Ideas Of The Great Economic Thinkers.
Thomas originally went to Zurich to study Astrophysics, but the student counselling service at ETH Zurich advised him to major in computer science instead, which he studied for two semesters (it was the late 1980s). One day while doing matrix calculations in the library, however, he noticed the above book by Heilbroner, which he couldn’t put down anymore and subsequently switched to economics. Later, when he once presented a paper at a conference in which Heilbroner also participated, Thomas went up to Robert Heilbroner and told him that he had studied economics because of his book. Heilbroner’s answer: “I’m very sorry to hear that.” Economics is not called the dismal science for nothing.