the pleasures and sorrows of work by alain de botton

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 isnt 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. Alain de Bottons The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work examines where individuals find and lose meaning in the modern workplace. With a philosophical eye and his signature combination of wit and wisdom, Alain de Botton leads us on a journey around an eclectic. With his signature élan and expansive curiosity, de Botton explores a diversity of occupationsfrom accountant to aircraft salesman, painter to power-station designer, career counselor to cookie manufacturerand the vast diversity of locations where these occupations are undertaken. Alain De Botton is the author of three works of fiction and six works of nonfiction, including How Proust Can Change Your Life, The Consolations of Philosophy. The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work is an exploration of the joys and perils of the modern workplace, beautifully exploring what other people wake up to do each dayand nightto make our frenzied world function. In this tantalizing new book, Alain de Botton takes on an activity common to us allthe 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.

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.

The pleasures and sorrows of work by alain de botton