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Combining narrative virtuosity, a scholar's grasp of history, an intellectual intrepidness, and a dazzling ability to reveal the extraordinary in the ordinary (and vice versa), Alain de Botton has created his own ever-surprising genre into which The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work fits brilliantly.
In this tantalizing new book, Alain de Botton takes on an activity common to us all—the activity in which most of us spend the majority of our time, but which rarely gets serious attention beyond the realm of cartoons and television sitcoms. With his signature élan and expansive curiosity, de Botton explores a diversity of occupations—from accountant to aircraft salesman, painter to power-station designer, career counselor to cookie manufacturer—and the vast diversity of locations where these occupations are undertaken. Peering closely at details of the workday and workplace that we tend to overlook, and asking questions that we hesitate to ask ourselves (To what end do we exhaust ourselves on a daily basis? What makes work pleasurable? Why isn’t it pleasurable when it isn't?), de Botton gets at the whys and wherefores of routine, practice, and process, focusing a new and unexpectedly revealing light on the essential meaning of work in our lives.
"Starred Review. Work may be trivial, de Botton notes, but what's interesting is the determination and gravity we bring to it. A luminous photo-essay from a consistently fresh and noble writer." - Kirkus Reviews
"Starred Review. De Botton's sprightly mix of reportage and rumination expands beyond the workplace to investigate the broader meaning of life." - Publishers Weekly
"De Botton's essays reveal the fragile dependencies and interconnectedness that make every one of us a key component of the human network." - Booklist
"Providing provocative insights on specialization and the transitory nature of significance, this is sophisticated reading on a timely subject." - Library Journal
This information about The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Alain de Botton was born in Zurich, Switzerland in December 1969 and educated in Switzerland and England. His family originates from the Spanish peninsula, from the small Castilian town of Boton (now vanished). They left in 1492, along with the rest of the Sephardic Jewish community, and eventually settled in Alexandria, Egypt, where de Botton's father was born.
He is a writer of essayistic books that have been described as a 'philosophy of everyday life.' He's written on love, travel, architecture and literature. His books have been bestsellers in 30 countries. Alain also started and helps to run a school in London called The School of Life, dedicated to a new vision of education.
His work consists of Essays in Love (1993), Kiss and Tell (1995), How Proust Can Change Your Life (1997), The...
... Full Biography
Link to Alain De Botton's Website
Name Pronunciation
Alain De Botton: AL-on de BO-ton (the letter n at end of Alain and Botton is barely pronounced
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Any activity becomes creative when the doer cares about doing it right, or better.
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