The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work
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Narrated by:
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David Colacci
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By:
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Alain de Botton
About this listen
The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work is an exploration of the joys and perils of the modern workplace, beautifully evoking what other people wake up to do each day - and night - to make the frenzied contemporary world function.
With a philosophical eye and his signature combination of wit and wisdom, Alain de Botton leads us on a journey around a deliberately eclectic range of occupations, from rocket science to biscuit manufacture, accountancy to art - in search of what makes jobs either fulfilling or soul-destroying.
Along the way, he tries to answer some of the most urgent questions we can ask about work: Why do we do it? What makes it pleasurable? What is its meaning? And why do we daily exhaust not only ourselves but also the planet?
Characteristically lucid, clever, and inventive, de Botton's "song for occupations" is a celebration and exploration of an aspect of life that is all too often ignored and a book that shines a revealing light on the essential meaning of work in our lives.
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Story
Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the country’s most important structures, including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C. The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his “World’s Fair Hotel” just west of the fairgrounds.
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A Rich Read!
- By D on 09-18-03
By: Erik Larson
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Surviving Ireland
- By: Colm Tobin
- Narrated by: Colm Tobin
- Length: 4 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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It's exhausting being Irish. The constant self-flagellation is enough to put anybody off their breakfast. Why are we so hard on ourselves? Is it the postcolonial overhang following centuries of oppression at the hands of a litany of foreign invaders? Or is it collective guilt for sending Westlife out into the wider world? In Surviving Ireland, acclaimed comedy writer Colm Tobin takes the listener by the hand for a satirical romp through modern Irish life.
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very fun
- By Rick on 06-12-19
By: Colm Tobin
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Almost French
- By: Sarah Turnbull
- Narrated by: Caroline Lee
- Length: 11 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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After backpacking her way around Europe journalist Sarah Turnbull is ready to embark on one last adventure before heading home to Sydney. A chance meeting with a charming Frenchman in Bucharest changes her travel plans forever. Acting on impulse, she agrees to visit Fredric in Paris for a week. Put a very French Frenchman together with a strong-willed Australian girl and the result is some spectacular - and often hilarious - cultural clashes.
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Almost Terrific
- By Elizabeth on 02-05-13
By: Sarah Turnbull
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Essays of E. B. White
- By: E. B. White
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 12 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Legendary author and essayist E. B. White writes, "The essayist is a self-liberated man, sustained by the childish belief that everything he thinks about, everything that happens to him, is of general interest." Covering a large number of subjects, this classic collection features 31 of White's most memorable essays.
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E.B. White writes honestly, fearlessly and clearly
- By Bonny on 09-03-17
By: E. B. White
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Time Pieces
- A Dublin Memoir
- By: John Banville
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 4 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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As much about the life of the city as it is about a life lived, sometimes, in the city, John Banville's "quasi-memoir" is as layered, emotionally rich, witty, and unexpected as any of his novels. Born and bred in a small town a train ride away from Dublin, Banville saw the city as a place of enchantment when he was a child, a birthday treat, the place where his beloved, eccentric aunt lived.
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‘loved it!
- By SandyK on 02-24-24
By: John Banville
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Hong Kong
- By: Jan Morris
- Narrated by: Wanda McCaddon
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Hong Kong is the world’s most exciting city, at once fascinating and exasperating, a tangle of contradictions. It is a dazzling amalgam of conspicuous consumption and primitive poverty, the most architecturally incongruous yet undeniably beautiful urban panorama of all. Through firsthand reportage, world-renowned travel writer Jan Morris takes us through the crowded streets of this enigmatic city, offering the most insightful and comprehensive study of Hong Kong thus far. She reviews Hong Kong’s early days as a British opium port controlled by pirates, cutthroats, and scoundrel tycoons, and looks ahead to the city’s future.
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An interesting but mild disappointment
- By Jeanette Finan on 06-11-14
By: Jan Morris
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Chinese Rules
- Mao's Dog, Deng's Cat, and Five Timeless Lessons from the Front Lines in China
- By: Tim Clissold
- Narrated by: Stephen Critchlow
- Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Exploring key episodes in that nation's long political, military, and cultural history, Clissold outlines five Chinese Rules, which anyone can deploy in on-the-ground situations with modern Chinese counterparts. These Chinese rules will enable foreigners not only to cooperate with China but also to compete with it on its own terms.
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Two books in one, one excellent one boring
- By Ed Sander on 09-08-17
By: Tim Clissold
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The Man Who Loved China
- By: Simon Winchester
- Narrated by: Simon Winchester
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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No cloistered don, this tall, married Englishman was a freethinking intellectual, who practiced nudism and was devoted to a quirky brand of folk dancing. In 1937, while working as a biochemist at Cambridge University, he instantly fell in love with a visiting Chinese student, with whom he began a lifelong affair. He soon became fascinated with China, and his mistress swiftly persuaded the ever-enthusiastic Needham to travel to her home country, where he embarked on a series of extraordinary expeditions to the farthest frontiers of this ancient empire.
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turn your watch back 70 years
- By Andy on 05-22-08
By: Simon Winchester
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Land Rover
- The Story of the Car That Conquered the World
- By: Ben Fogle
- Narrated by: Rupert Farley
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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As quintessentially British as a plate of fish and chips or a British bulldog, the boxy, utilitarian Land Rover Defender has become an iconic part of what it is to be British. It is said that for more than half the world's population, the first car they ever saw was a Land Rover Defender. It mirrors many of our national traits, stiff upper-lipped and slightly eccentric.
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Amazing! Great sub-stories
- By Daniel Caballero on 04-30-24
By: Ben Fogle
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American Eclipse
- A Nation's Epic Race to Catch the Shadow of the Moon and Win the Glory of the World
- By: David Baron
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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In the scorching summer of 1878, with the Gilded Age in its infancy, three tenacious and brilliant scientists raced to Wyoming and Colorado to observe a rare total solar eclipse. One sought to discover a new planet. Another - an adventuresome female astronomer - fought to prove that science was not anathema to femininity. And a young megalomaniacal inventor, with the tabloid press fast on his heels, sought to test his scientific bona fides and light the world through his revelations.
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Just OK.
- By Melanie A Hwalek on 09-18-17
By: David Baron
What listeners say about The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Greg
- 09-01-09
Good, but not my favorite
I love this author, but wasn't wild about this book. He presents some interesting perspectives but without some of the flare I have come to expect. Maybe it was the narrator (not his usual guy) while not bad, also nothing special. Worth the credits... just not awesome.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 08-09-22
Loose Story about the Work we Overlook with a Great Narrator
Alain de Botton implemented a very interesting and unique way of writing this book. Though perhaps he does this with all of his written works. I’m unsure as this is my first exposure to de Botton’s work. Across the 10 chapters within this book, Botton dives deep into the work that goes into producing the commodities we consume and explores careers that we often don’t think of that much. The story (in reality, stories) itself is very interesting and it is written in a way that implies it was unedited, containing the author’s most immediate thoughts drafted on to paper.
The narrator did an extremely good job as well, making this book perfect for moments such as when you’re taking a relaxing car ride and you want something informative and interesting to listen to while you’re traveling to your destination.
I would definitely recommend having a listen.
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Overall
- Scott
- 11-25-09
Interesting, but sterile
Botton is eloquent to the point of mastery, but fails to grip the audience by highlighting the human element of the 21st century workforce. Exploring the underrated corners of the global economy, we are treated to interesting anecdotes, but no central thesis. The book provides great fuel for cocktail party chatter, but not a call-to-action I can bring with me back to the office on a day-to-day level.
Could be more aptly entitled "The Hidden Economy", leaving human emotions out entirely.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall
- John Needham
- 08-23-09
The private work life of a biscuit brand manager
Now I know why I'm mostly bored by the celebrated personalities of film, music and art, much less TV culture, but am inexplicably fascinated by what's found in gargantuan container ships, the private work life of a biscuit brand manager, the origins of the pylons that stretch power lines across our urban and rural landscapes, and on down the list of obscure objects and professions that Alain de Botton contemplates in this essay collection. The reason I get bored -- and I imagine others -- is that celebrity culture sucks way more attention than it merits. As this writer-philosopher demonstrates, our civilization creates and transacts and consumes many splendid things that don't happen to make into a museum or get digitized for posterity, but they and the work required to bring them to life have consequences -- both corrupting our souls and giving life meaning. De Botton's style can be dense and his arguments spiral, but this book is studded with humorous accounts and consistently entertains.
As a riposte to the preceding reviewer, I've also been listening to Audible audiobooks for 10 years and this is the first time that I remember giving five stars.
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5 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Andy
- 07-18-09
very disappointing
While the narration of this book was a delight, I was totally unable to follow what and where De Botton was going...throughout the book.
This is the only book I've listened to at Audible in ten years that I've rated one star.
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2 people found this helpful
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- sandiegomom
- 07-30-21
Disappointing
I love allain de botton, but this was extremely boring. I do not recommend this
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