Front cover image for Boredom : a lively history

Boredom : a lively history

In the first book to argue for the benefits of boredom, Peter Toohey dispels the myth that it's simply a childish emotion or an existential malaise like Jean-Paul Sartre's nausea. He shows how boredom is, in fact, one of our most common and constructive emotions and is an essential part of the human experience. This informative and entertaining investigation of boredom--what it is and what it isn't, its uses and its dangers--spans more than 3,000 years of history and takes readers through fascinating neurological and psychological theories of emotion, as well as recent scientific investigations, to illustrate its role in our lives. Toohey shows that boredom is a universal emotion experienced by humans throughout history and he explains its place, and value, in today's world.--From publisher description
Print Book, English, 2011
Yale University Press, New Haven, 2011
History
viii, 211 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm
9780300141108, 9780300181845, 9783001411082, 0300141106, 0300181841, 3001411082
667990354
Putting boredom in its place
Chronic boredom and the company it keeps
Humans, animals and incarceration
The disease that wasteth at noonday
Does boredom have a history?
The long march back to boredom