I have studied Griffiths' book and am looking for another textbook to review/deepen my understanding of electrodynamics. I happened to read Susskind's 'Special Relativity and Classical Field Theory' and got really impressed. I am wondering is there any textbook for physics majors which motivates electromagnetism from special relativity?
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There is an extensive book recommendation in https://physics.stackexchange.com/q/12175/ You might want to check it out – Woe Dec 19 '22 at 18:30
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You might care to read reviews of Purcell and Morin's book: Electricity and Magnetism. – Philip Wood Dec 19 '22 at 22:26
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Thank you for the recommendation! – Pebble Dec 21 '22 at 15:24
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Classical Electrodynamics by Ohanian and Principles of electrodynamics by Schwartz derive Maxwells equations just from SR and Coloumb's law – GedankenExperimentalist Jan 27 '23 at 18:54
1 Answers
The first book that comes to mind with an approach starting from special relativity is the second volume of the series by Landau and Lifshitz titled The Classical Theory of Fields.
However, there exist more modern presentations of the subject which I believe would be a better primary reference for a second course in electromagnetic theory, which also serve as a decent starting point for further generalities in areas such as quantum field theory and general relativity. One such book that comes to mind is Scheck's Classical Field Theory, which is a follow-up to his previous book titled Mechanics which introduces the appropriate mathematical machinery and also special relativity.
Another rather illuminating albeit relatively short introduction to the subject in this manner can be found in Part 2 of the magnum opus by Misner, Wheeler and Thorne titled Gravitation.
Lastly, if you're interested in a more axiomatic exposition which naturally follows the same approach, you can have a look at Hehl and Obukhov's Foundations of Classical Electrodynamics.
Hope you find these references useful :)

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