I am feeling rather brain dead at the moment. So this will very likely be short.
I mentioned being interested in reading Against Happiness by Eric Wilson the other day. But a couple of reader comments and a review by Jessa Crispin aka Bookslut, has made me change my mind. In her review Crispin writes:
Against Happiness is not a cultural critique, it’s a love letter to Wilson’s own emotional state. As the book progresses, the potential audience gets smaller and smaller. It opens talking to all Americans, but by the second chapters he has narrowed his focus to “we melancholics,” and later to “melancholic intellectuals.” By the end he’s just curled up with his aloneness, and we somehow stumbled into his interior monologue.
Blech. Who needs to get stuck in that?
And here’s a little something I found through the American Library Association newsletter. If you are an introvert like me, you will enjoy Networking for Introverts. I’ve been to a couple of tech-related conferences for work, and oh, good gracious were they painful experiences. But this article offers good advice that will be useful for the next conference (hopefully a library one!) that I find myself at.
That’s all I’ve got. Told you I was brain dead. I am taking the day off from work tomorrow and it’s supposed to snow, starting tonight, about 3-6 inches. Seems like good reading ahead to me. Happy Spring!
Hmm, I had this one on my wishlist but won’t be rushing to get it anytime soon I think.
Enjoy your free day! By the way, did you get any Half Price coupons? We got some so I know where I’ll be this weekend
Oddly, the passage you quote from Crispin’s review actually makes me want to read the book. Her review struck me as perhaps missing the point, though that’s just a sense I get from her own provided quotations, since I haven’t read the book… (see seems to approach it as if it’s a book of science, which, maybe I’m wrong, it doesn’t seem to be…)
I’m still curious about the happiness book — and it’s short, so if I didn’t like it, it wouldn’t be a huge waste of time. Crispin’s review is funny, but I’m not entirely sure I’d react the same way …
I will think of you curled up with some good books while the snow falls outside – sounds like a perfect way to recover full brain functioning to me! Have a lovely, lovely weekend.
Iliana, I did indeed get the HPB coupons. We still have the pile of books we brought home from our last outing there sitting on the floor next to the book shelves so we are having some struggles over whether we can justify using the coupons
Richard, hmm, yes I see what you mean. It’s a topic on which everyone can have an opinion, isn’t it? Makes it harder to decide whose opinion is more interesting. Must rethink whether I will read the book…
Dorothy, you are right. Between your comment and Richard’s I’m thinking I might read the book after all. It is rather short.
Litlove, thanks! brain functioning on the upswing already