Bøker av Carl Cederstrom

The question of how to lead a happy and meaningful life has been at the heart of philosophical debate since time immemorial. This book tackles the question of 'how to live' by forcing us to explore our troubling relationship with death. It provides an introduction to the thought of Simon Critchley.

Happiness has meant different things in different times: according to Aristotle, only the gods could be truly happy, but if you lived ethically, you might come close; for medieval Christians, the best way to be happy was to suffer pain and for Romantic philosophers like Rousseau, society made happiness impossible.

Not exercising as much as you should? Counting your calories in your sleep? Feeling ashamed for not being happier? You may be a victim of the wellness syndrome.

Capitalism has become strange. Ironically, while the ';age of work' seems to have come to an end, working has assumed a total presence a ';worker's society' in the worst sense of the term where everyone finds themselves obsessed with it. So what does the worker tell us today? I feel drained, empty dead. This book tells the story of the dead man working. It follows this figure through the daily tedium of the office, to the humiliating mandatory team building exercise, to awkward encounters with the funky boss who pretends to hate capitalism and tells you to be authentic. In this society, the experience of work is not of dying...but neither of living. It is one of a living death. And yet, the dead man working is nevertheless compelled to wear the exterior signs of life, to throw a pretty smile, feign enthusiasm and make a half-baked joke. When the corporation has colonized life itself, even our dreams, the question of escape becomes ever more pressing, ever more desperate