Matthew Crawford

From 'one of the most influential thinkers of our time' (Sunday Times): how to respond to today's demands on our attention In this brilliant follow-up to The Case for Working with Your Hands, Matthew Crawford investigates the challenge of mastering one's own mind. With ever-increasing demands on our attention, and with capitalism increasingly invading every space, how do we focus on what's really important in our lives? Exploring the intense focus of ice-hockey players, the flow of a cook in their element, and the inherited craft of building pipe organs, Crawford argues that in order to flourish, we need to return to lives where we establish meaningful connections with objects and the people around us.

How to Flourish in an Age of Distraction

The World Beyond Your Head

Why do some jobs offer fulfilment while others leave us frustrated? Why do we so often think of our working selves as separate from our �true� selves? Over the course of the twentieth century, we have separated mental work from manual labour, replacing the workshop with either the office cubicle or the factory line. In this inspiring and persuasive book, Matthew Crawford explores the dangers of this false distinction and presents instead the case for working with your hands. He brings to life the immense psychological and intellectual satisfactions of making and fixing things, explores the moral benefits of a technical education and, at a time when jobs are increasingly being outsourced over the internet, argues that the skilled manual trades may be one of the few sure paths to a good living. Drawing on the work of our greatest thinkers, from Aristotle to Heidegger, from Karl Marx to Iris Murdoch, as well as on his own experiences as an electrician and motorcycle mechanic, Crawford delivers a radical, timely and extremely enjoyable re-evaluation of our attitudes to work.

Or Why Office Work is Bad for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good

The Case for Working with Your Hands

Why We Drive is a rebellious and daring celebration of the human spirit and the competence of ordinary people by the bestselling author of The Case for Working with Your Hands, 'one of the most influential thinkers of our time' (Sunday Times). Once we were drivers, the open road alive with autonomy and adventure. Today we are as likely to be in the back seat of an Uber as behind the wheel. As we hurtle toward a shiny, happy ‘self-driving’ future, are we destined to become passengers in our own lives too? Driving, it turns out, offers a near-perfect embodiment of the broader changes being wrought by government and technology throughout our lives. In Why We Drive, the philosopher and mechanic Matthew Crawford shows the driver’s seat to be one of the few remaining places where we still regularly take risk, exercise skill and enjoy freedom. But it is here too that we discover what we are losing to automation and the technocrats, and who will profit from the vision of progress they press upon us. Blending philosophy with hands-on storytelling and drawing on his own experience in the garage and behind the wheel, Crawford leads us on an irreverent but deeply considered inquiry into the power of faceless bureaucracies, the importance of questioning mindless rules and the battle for democratic self-determination against the surveillance capitalists. In turn he speaks up for rivalry and play, solidarity and dissent – and the existential value of occasionally being scared shitless. Wry, humane and occasionally hilarious, Why We Drive takes us to the heart of one of the defining questions of our times: who is really in control?

On Freedom, Risk and Taking Back Control

Why We Drive

DigiCat Publishing presents to you this special edition of "The Gladiolus: A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus" by Matthew Crawford. DigiCat Publishing considers every written word to be a legacy of humankind. Every DigiCat book has been carefully reproduced for republishing in a new modern format. The books are available in print, as well as ebooks. DigiCat hopes you will treat this work with the acknowledgment and passion it deserves as a classic of world literature.

The Gladiolus: A Practical Treatise on the Culture of the Gladiolus

Excerpt from Crawford's Catalogue, 1893 The strawberry seems to be peculiarly suitable for old people to spend their time and strength upon, with a reasonable certainty of being well paid for their efforts. Mr. Little, of Canada, commenced to grow this fruit after he was sixty years of age, and somewhat broken in health. He is now seventy-seven, hale and hearty, and full of enthusiasm. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Crawford's Catalogue, 1893 (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Crawford's Catalogue, 1894 Soil. - Gravel, sand, clay or muck, so long as it con tains a good supply of available plant food, will suf fice. It should not be shaded by trees or buildings nor should there be trees near enough to sap the ground. While the strawberry needs plenty of mois ture, it will never ﬂourish with the roots in stagnant water in the growing season, and the ground should have good natural or artificial drainage. High land is generally preferable to low land, as blossoms are more likely to be killed by frost in depressions than on elevations. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Matthew Crawford

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