
Dreamwork
Why All Work Is Imaginary
Steven Connor(Author)
Reaktion Books (Publisher)
Published on 1. July 2023
Book
Hardback
256 pages
978-1-78914-756-8 (ISBN)
Description
Dreamwork is a book about the ideas, dreams, dreads and ideals we have regarding work. Its central argument is that, although we depend on the idea of work for our identity as humans, we feel we must disguise from ourselves the fact that we do not know what work is. There is no example of work that nobody might under some circumstances do for fun. All work is imaginary - which is not to say that it is simply illusory, but rather that, in order to count as work, it must be imagined to be work; so that a large part of what we mean by working is this work of imagining. Work is therefore essentially mystical - just the opposite of what it is taken to be. Dreamwork looks in turn at worries about whether or not work is hard; the importance of places of work; the meanings of hobbies, holidays and sabbaths; and the history of dreams of redeeming work.
Reviews / Votes
In this book, with his inimitable flair for rooting out the phenomenological intricacies of apparently ordinary things, Steven Connor leads us on a tour of the dream factory of work, labour, toil and occupation. The result is a book of typically considerable - dare I say it - detective work that opens up the quotidian reality and enabling dreamscape of work to new understanding. * Nathan Waddell, Associate Professor in Twentieth-Century Literature, University of Birmingham * This is a delight of a book. It takes the seemingly innocuous concept of "work" and shows how central our understanding of it is to our collective understanding of the world. The book is beautifully written in a cascade of illuminating paradoxes and puns. It is also a treasure trove of scholarship from philology to management theory. A must-read. * Colin MacCabe, Distinguished Professor, University of Pittsburgh, and editor of Critical Quarterly *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Product notice
sewn/stitched
Cloth over boards
Dimensions
Height: 221 mm
Width: 142 mm
Thickness: 28 mm
Weight
478 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78914-756-8 (9781789147568)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
08/2023
Reaktion Books
€35.99
Available for download
Person
Steven Connor is Professor of English and Director of Research at the Digital Futures Institute, King's College London. He is the author of eighteen books, most recently The Madness of Knowledge: On Wisdom, Ignorance and Fantasies of Knowing (2019).
Content
1 Dreamworks
2 Hard Work
3 At Work
4 Off Work
5 Working Out
References
Index
2 Hard Work
3 At Work
4 Off Work
5 Working Out
References
Index