In each of these 10 essays, London-based writer Alain de Botton
enters a different world of work, travelling locally and globally in
pursuit of an answer to a commonly asked question: What makes us happy
and sad about/at our work? In short, the occupation that keeps a person
“appropriately alive to some of the most astonishing aspects of our
time” leads to fulfillment, while those careers that keep us
“ignorant…surrounded by machines and processes of which we only have
the loosest grasp” cause discord. Those quoted phrases come from the
first piece, “Cargo Ship Spotting,” which details the activities of
people who watch work being done. Besides theme, the essay
orients readers to the point of view: observational rather than
interactive (in that the author is not doing the work directly
himself). Most of the essays work, especially “Biscuit Manufacture,”
which references Slough, the site of the original British series The
Office, and “Career Counselling” (a lesson in futility). But
overall, de Botton lacks the appropriate sense of humour required to
complete such a project: you gotta be able to—to want to,
perhaps—point and laugh at all this, the absurdities, the realities
and even the victories. The author’s humour is genteel to the point of
distraction.
This article appears in Jun 18-24, 2009.