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3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
A friend recommended this title after I confessed my aspirations to befriend crows, given that birds are mentioned at one point.
This was a quick weekend listen, perfect for putzing around the house and biking to the farmer’s market.
The author stresses that the goal of doing nothing “isn’t to return to work refreshed and ready to be more productive, but rather to question what we currently perceive as productive.” It pushes against the capitalist mentality and encourages folks to become content taking up space to just be, without guilt.
I particularly appreciated the examples of artists that the author would highlight throughout.
THIS DOES NOT TELL YOU HOW TO DO NOTHING. basically just a literature review and opinion pieces about how social media is rotting our brain (duh) and we can't focus on what matters but no actual advice and no actual ways to not do things. But a call to action that's vague and pointless that we really should do something. I'm so fucking sick of every book's answer being like we need to change the laws and vote and create community BUT NO ONE ACTUALLY HAS ANY REAL ADVICE ON LITERALLY WHAT TO DO. okay rant over
challenging
informative
medium-paced
This is a very well researched and written book, and I learned quite a bit about topics I hadn’t previously explored. However, I also found it quite disjointed and (somewhat ironically given the title) frantically jumps from philosophy to history to art to biology, etc, without landing on a coherent conclusion.
Ok, I really wanted to like this book, and it starts off really strong, but some fundamental issues hold it back.
1. Jenny Odell is an artist in the San Fransisco Bay Area
2. Jenny Odell is a woman
3. I feel like the book really loses focus. It starts with the attention economy and why it's bad for people. She then goes into why online spaces are exploitative and why tangible public spaces are better, and I wholly agree with that! But, I feel like she misses the mark by not going in-depth on why and how public spaces can restore humanity. Instead, she spends most of the book talking about bird watching and how important art is. This is fine, but I think she loses focus at some point on what she wants this book to be about. The book ends with talking about "Manifest Dismantling" (Degrowth) and I really can't get behind that. In the conclusion she goes full NIMBY, so she really does fit the bill of a Bay Area progressive who is anti-housing, so that's good.
I get her point with bioregionalism and how we need to appreciate the Earth by doing nothing, but I can't help but agree with some of the other reviews here that say Odell comes off as a bit stuck up in her approach to the attention economy and modern protest. At least she acknowledges her privilege.
4. This work was put on Obama's favorite books of 2019 and that shows that it is no longer anti-institutional or anti-meta.
1. Jenny Odell is an artist in the San Fransisco Bay Area
2. Jenny Odell is a woman
3. I feel like the book really loses focus. It starts with the attention economy and why it's bad for people. She then goes into why online spaces are exploitative and why tangible public spaces are better, and I wholly agree with that! But, I feel like she misses the mark by not going in-depth on why and how public spaces can restore humanity. Instead, she spends most of the book talking about bird watching and how important art is. This is fine, but I think she loses focus at some point on what she wants this book to be about. The book ends with talking about "Manifest Dismantling" (Degrowth) and I really can't get behind that. In the conclusion she goes full NIMBY, so she really does fit the bill of a Bay Area progressive who is anti-housing, so that's good.
I get her point with bioregionalism and how we need to appreciate the Earth by doing nothing, but I can't help but agree with some of the other reviews here that say Odell comes off as a bit stuck up in her approach to the attention economy and modern protest. At least she acknowledges her privilege.
4. This work was put on Obama's favorite books of 2019 and that shows that it is no longer anti-institutional or anti-meta.
kinda interesting, kinda boring, interesting research, boring ideas
informative
reflective
slow-paced
Really liked this. Appreciated the chapter about hippie communes, the "impossibility of retreat," and "refusal-in-place" - Odell is not advocating for dropping out of society, and in fact very much for staying but refusing its rules, becoming an obstacle, being resistant. I like this kind of writing that goes to lots of different places and don't mind that it's meandering. Being able to pay attention and think for yourself are really important always and right now when those skills are being eroded by our everyday conditions. Would like to re-read and maybe buy so I can loan it out to people!
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced