Carl Honor茅 was born in Scotland, but grew up in Edmonton, Canada. After studying history and Italian at Edinburgh University, he worked with street children in Brazil. This later inspired him to take up journalism and, since 1991, he has written from all over Europe and South America, spending three years in Buenos Aires along the way. His work has appeared in publications on both sides of the Atlantic, including the Economist, Observer, American Way, National Post, Globe and Mail, Houston Chronicle, and Miami Herald. His first book, In Praise of Slowness, was an international bestseller. He is also the author of Under Pressure: Rescuing Our Children from the Culture of Hyper-Parenting.
I read this book quickly. It dealt with the most important issues very efficiently. It was a good use of my time.
Therein lies the issue, or more precisely why I can only give it four, not five, stars.
The book originated in a series of articles Carl Honore wrote for the 鈥淣ational Post鈥�.
It鈥檚 well-researched, well thought out, well structured, tells a good story, makes good use of relevant quotations, it鈥檚 never boring (though once I鈥檇 worked all of this out, I was glad when the end was in sight).
Ultimately, it is a consummate work of journalism, but it is not the work of deeper philosophical analysis I was hoping for.
This is a product of my expectations, rather than the author鈥檚 delivery.
I suspect that the book achieved everything the author, the publisher and the National Post expected of it.
The Bad News
For the last two or three centuries (since the Industrial Revolution), something has been happening without us thinking about it:
鈥淲e have developed an inner psychology of speed, of saving time and maximizing efficiency.鈥�
鈥溾€e have lost the art of doing nothing, of shutting out the background noise and distractions, of slowing down and simply being alone with our thoughts鈥︹€�
We view 鈥渟peed as a sign of control and efficiency鈥�.
Milan Kundera uses the language of narcotics to describe the 鈥渆cstasy of speed鈥he sense of rush it gives鈥�.
In the words of Carrie Fisher, once an imbiber of alcohol, even 鈥渋nstant gratification takes too long.鈥�
When it comes to food, we 鈥済obble, gulp and go鈥�.
We have joined "the cult of speed", we've been worshipping 鈥渢he false god of speed鈥�. We鈥檙e suffering from acceleration and 鈥渢ime-sickness鈥�.
A few decades ago, the same problem was defined as 鈥渟tress鈥�, and that probably sold a lot of books for a lot of authors and publishers.
Back then, the cure was supposed to be 鈥淪tress Management鈥�.
It probably made a lot of money for counselors and management consultants.
Did the cure work? I don鈥檛 think so. The problem only seems to have gotten worse.
Time Wars
Honore describes the two different approaches (Fast and Slow) in the following manner:
鈥淪low is the opposite: calm, careful, receptive, still, intuitive, unhurried, patient, reflective, quality-over-quantity.鈥�
鈥淔ast Thinking is rational, analytical, linear, logical鈥low Thinking is intuitive, woolly and creative.鈥�
The Good News
The good news is that there is a Slow Movement that is trying to address the problem now.
The Movement addresses the problem of Speed in a number of aspects of society (life generally, food, cities, health, medicine, love and sex, work, leisure, child-rearing and education), the common thread being its desire to slow things down.
What it is seeking is a balance, the ability to do things at the 鈥渢empo giusto鈥� (the right speed), the right to do things in our 鈥淓igenzeit鈥� (our own time):
鈥淲hat we are fighting for is the right to determine our own tempos.鈥�
The new tempos sound great. Honore describes 鈥渁 little oasis of slowness,鈥� 鈥渟low pleasure鈥�, 鈥渜uiet material pleasure鈥�, 鈥渆rotic deceleration鈥� (yeah, baby).
These quotations might make it sound like the book is all about sex, but that鈥檚 not the case.
If anything, it鈥檚 about approaching all aspects of life with a fresh intensity, vivaciousness and sensuality.
For all our speed, we have lost our vividness, we鈥檝e been worn out and worn down, we鈥檝e lost our touch.
Some argue that we should 鈥渄o fewer things in order to do them better鈥�.
Honore even remarks with some hint of envy that Albert Einstein was "famous for spending ages staring into space" (ironically, discovering that the speed of light is a constant, very fast, perhaps the fastest).
Others argue that we should just do things more slowly, more sensuously.
It鈥檚 not a race (to the death).
It's just that if it鈥檚 worth doing, it鈥檚 worth doing slowly.
Time as an Abstract
Early in the book, even though there is a discussion of clocks and time-keeping (鈥渢he clock gives us our bearings鈥�), I started to wonder about the nature of time.
Does time exist? Is it a thing? Does it pass? Can we ever have enough of it? Can we ever run out of it?
We only have a sense of time, because we measure it against something else, the movement of the sun, the ticking of a clock, the distance travelled by a moving object.
It鈥檚 these other things that move and measure time, not time itself.
Yet we seem to have created such a rod for our own backs.
What would happen if we slowed down? We wouldn鈥檛 explode. We wouldn鈥檛 implode.
What would happen is that we wouldn鈥檛 achieve as much of this other stuff as we wanted to.
We wouldn鈥檛 do as much in the allotted 鈥渢ime鈥�. We wouldn鈥檛 make or acquire as much of the other stuff in the allotted 鈥渢ime鈥�.
Greed, Not Speed
I started to wonder whether time and speed aren鈥檛 the problem, it鈥檚 actually our expectations of these other things, the stuff we鈥檙e trying to stuff into time.
Time is the bag and these other things are the measure of our greed.
Why don鈥檛 we need less in our bag? Why don鈥檛 we know when enough is enough?
Is the perceived problem of time actually a problem determining priorities?
Honore comes close when he cites the following comment by an academic:
鈥淵ou need to take time to think about what is really important, rather than trying to figure out how to pack as much as you can into the shortest possible schedule.鈥�
For a long time, we have wanted to have everything, and now we want to do everything...ironically, for a long time.
Money restrains the first aspiration, 鈥渢ime鈥� restrains the second.
But I started to feel that it鈥檚 not time that is the problem, it鈥檚 our aspirations, our ambition, our greed.
In a way, we waste our time on what we don鈥檛 have or haven鈥檛 done yet.
We don鈥檛 give what we already have (or have already done) enough time or, more importantly, enough respect.
We don鈥檛 respect time.
You can see it in the way we eat. We race to the end of a meal so we can continue whatever else we were doing (or continued to do while we ate).
We don鈥檛 respect our meal or the passion or love that went into its creation.
We don鈥檛 respect our time together and what we could achieve with this time.
To paraphrase Saul Bellow (who Honore quotes), we don鈥檛 respect and value 鈥渢he achievement of stillness in the midst of chaos.鈥�
Stop
The message of the book is to slow down or to modulate your speed or to find the right speed for you in the moment.
Nowhere does it suggest that we should actually stop, except to the extent it discusses meditation.
The Slow Movement must still be a movement of some kind. It must move. It cannot come to a grinding halt. It cannot go the whole hog and slow to a stop. It cannot slow to a stop and then 鈥渟tay the whole hog鈥�.
If there is a flaw in the Slow Movement, it is this, that it is not radical enough.
As much as the message of the Movement and the book appeals to me, ultimately it preaches moderation.
Everybody is different. There are different strokes (of the clock) for different folks.
Everything is relative. Nothing is wrong. Perhaps, then, nothing will change.
I stopped reading this one because if I have to hear the story of "Slow Food" one more time I may scream.
Sure, slow food is a great concept, but I hoped for more out of this book. I'm not interested in reading about 'movements' in a way that's trying to get me involved in them. I'm interested in reading about concepts that make me think harder about life.
I thought this book was going to be lots of the latter with little of the former, but it was just the opposite. So, about 1/4 of the way through, it went back to the library. Maybe the rest was genius...but I stopped because I was pretty sure it was just more of the same.
This is a book about someone else smart ideas about fighting the crazy pace of life.When I started reading this book I was really excited since I have been pondering on this topic for a while. The book is a set of articles, written as a classic school essays: introduction, them development, conclusion. And just as empty. By the end of the first chapter(almost 40 pages) I learned nothing new. By the end of the second chapter I was mostly bored and the only thing I learned was that I am not the only one tired of constantly speeding up when I want to slow down. Chapter three, which judging by the title was supposed to tell you how to get a grip on your own time, and start living at the pace which is natural for you, mostly repeated what was said in chapter two: its cool to live at your own pace, deadlines and stress -bad. This book would probably make a good narration for a documentary,probably, where the majority of information comes from the video. Save yourself time and listen to
I enjoyed this book a lot, although ironically, I did get slightly impatient towards the end. Some chapters had a few too many examples of the main point. Otherwise, it is certainly a worthy read! It is about how time-obsessed our culture has become and how we choose quality for quantity in far too many activities.
One question I felt was left unanswered is this: What do we sacrifice when we slow down? It is abundantly clear what we gain. But what are the opportunity costs? Obviously the trade-off is worth it but I would have liked some discussion about what we give up when we slow down.
This book won't encourage you to be a lazy sloth. It will encourage you to find a balance. As for me, I have been trying to "Just Say No" to my iPhone and laptop a lot more since traveling in Italy earlier this year. I don't want to miss out on my life because my eyes were glued to OS X. This book validates that effort. Honore says that the Italians know the value of slow and purposeful living more than anyone else. They don't sit around all day drinking wine in the sun. They have a balance.
Honore concludes, "What the world needs, and what the Slow movement offers, is a middle path, a recipe for marrying la dolce vita with the dynamism of the information age. The secret is balance: instead of doing everything faster, do everything at the right speed. Sometimes fast. Sometimes slow. Sometimes somewhere in between."
Ironically this book was way too fast. Ideas and thoughts and examples sped across the page, the author barely touched on one facet before he sped off to the next. There was no meat to the discussion.
I was about a third of the way through the book and still felt like I was reading the introduction. You know the part where ideas are presented to be expounded on as the book progresses, except I was a third of the way through the book and it was clear that this was how the book was going to continue.
Lots of interesting ideas proven with only an anecdote or two, not enough depth. Some of the anecdotes I recognised as untruthful. I mean I believe the anecdote, but not that it fully represents the broad sample of population, or proves the point, as is implied.
In the final chapter of the book I realised the big problem with this book. It sounds like it is written for another medium. As a documentary it would work really well, the anecdotes would be interesting and I would not be expecting every statement to be backed by strong proof and logical arguments. As a speech for a bunch of slow-movement followers it would also work well, I could imagine them nodding along but not needing the additional evidence, information, or conclusions that this book is lacking.
I agree with the premise, we need to slow down. However this book does not make any contributions, it has no new ideas, and fails to properly explain the issues with being so overwhelmingly busy.
I learned about this book from the goodreads Green Group, and Bill McKibben gave it this blurb: "Try reading this book one chapter a day--it is worth allowing this subversive message to sink slowly in so it has a chance of changing your life."
I've learned that the Slow Movement has its own website:
And the author of the book, Carl Honor茅, has a TED talk from 2005:
And his own website:
The book is an important look at the addiction to "fastness" in the developed world. Honor茅 discusses "slowness" in relation to food, cities, mind/body, medicine, sex, work, leisure, and children. Each chapter reiterates that slowness enriches and deepens our lives.
The opening citation is from Gandhi: "There is more to life than increasing its speed." Some other quotations that stayed with me are:
p. 33 "It's hard to think about the fact that we're going to die; it's unpleasant, so we constantly seek ways to distract ourselves from the awareness of our own mortality. Speed, with the sensory rush it gives, is one strategy for distraction." (Mark Kingwell, professor of philosophy at the University of Toronto)
I had to smile at these words from Plautus, the Roman playwright, in 200 BCE: "The God confound the man who first found out How to distinguish the hours--confound him, too, Who in this place set up a sundial To cut and hack my days so wretchedly Into small pieces!... I can't even sit down to eat unless the sun gives leave, The town's so full of these confounded dials..."
I really liked his discussion of how clocks and watches make us their slaves. He makes excellent points in each of the sections, moving into areas such as alternative medicine, yoga, and meditation. He himself sees them as valuable tools for slowing us down, but does not attach a spiritual component, which I appreciated.
The most touching chapter was the one on children, titled "Raising an Unhurried Child." The segment on reading bedtime stories to his son was such a great personal example of what can happen when we stop all the hurrying.
I was glad to find this book, which I probably would not have chosen on my own.
despite the subject matter, this book feels weirdly corporate, like your boss sending out a mass email to all employees about the benefits of the new company gym. no thanks, carl
It definitely lives up to its subject. It is slow going, and often repeats the same ideas over and over again. Ironically, despite reading about slowing down, I found myself skipping entire paragraphs or pages. The author is a journalist at heart, and it shows. The book has an investigative tint, almost like trying to prove it's point. And it doesn't really have to. After all, hardly anyone needs to be convinced slowing down is a good idea. We're aware that health, family, relationships, finances and society stand to benefit from a slower, deeper pace of life. Still, the book has plenty to offer to anyone looking for ideas about how to slow down in different aspects of life (which are helpfully separated in large chapters).