Matthew Crawford – författare

It's time to rethink our attitudes to work.For too long we have convinced ourselves that the only jobs worth doing involve sitting at a desk. Generations of school-leavers head for university lacking the skills to fix or even understand the most basic technology. And yet many of us are not suited to office life, while skilled manual work provides one of the few and most rewarding paths to a secure 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, Matthew Crawford's irreverent and inspiring manifesto will change the way you think about work forever.

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.

From 'one of the most influential thinkers of our time' (Sunday Times): how to respond to today's demands on our attentionIn 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.

From Matthew Crawford, 'one of the most influential thinkers of our time' (Sunday Times), comes The World Beyond Your Head - a hugely ambitious manifesto on flourishing in the modern world.In this brilliant follow-up to The Case for Working with Your Hands, Crawford investigates the challenge of mastering one's own mind. With ever-increasing demands on our attention, how do we focus on what's really important in our lives?Exploring the intense focus of ice-hockey players, the zoned-out behaviour of gambling addicts, and the inherited craft of building pipe organs, Crawford argues that our current crisis of attention is the result of long-held assumptions in Western culture and that in order to flourish, we need to establish meaningful connections with the world, the people around us and the historical moment we live in.Praise for The Case for Working With Your Hands:'The best book I have read for ages . . . a profound exploration of modern education, work and capitalism' Telegraph'Full of interesting stories and thought-provoking aperçus enlivened with humour . . . Important, memorable and enjoyable' The Times'Masterly' EconomistMatthew Crawford is a philosopher and mechanic. He has a Ph.D. in political philosophy from the University of Chicago and served as a postdoctoral fellow on its Committee on Social Thought. Currently a senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia, he also runs Shockoe Moto, a motorcycle repair shop.

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.Once we were drivers on the open road.Today we are more often in the back seat of an Uber.As we hurtle toward a 'self-driving' future, are we destined to become passengers in our own lives too?In Why We Drive, the philosopher and mechanic Matthew Crawford celebrates the risk, skill and freedom of driving. He reveals what we are losing to technology and government control in the modern world, and speaks up for play, dissent and occasionally being scared witless.'Fascinating... A pleasure to read' Sunday Times'Persuasive and thought-provoking... A vivid and heartfelt manifesto' Observer

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.Once we were drivers on the open road.Today we are more often in the back seat of an Uber.As we hurtle toward a 'self-driving' future, are we destined to become passengers in our own lives too?In Why We Drive, the philosopher and mechanic Matthew Crawford celebrates the risk, skill and freedom of driving. He reveals what we are losing to technology and government control in the modern world, and speaks up for play, dissent and occasionally being scared witless.'Fascinating... A pleasure to read' Sunday Times'Persuasive and thought-provoking... A vivid and heartfelt manifesto' Observer