Could your office make a good book?

A recent post on the Guardian’s books blog asked why, given that we spent so many of our waking hours in the workplace, there aren’t more books set in the office. Of reasonably recent titles, it rightly mentioned Allegra Goodman’s Intuition. And, of course, Joshua Ferris’s acerbic, moving and dazzling debut, Then We Came to the End.Perhaps because it was dealing merely with novels, it didn’t mention The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, the just-published book of narrative non-fiction from Alain de Botton, the man the Observer calls “Britain’s most popular philosopher”.

Botton’s seems to be a remarkable work, and this interview gives you an idea of the sort of research he did for it – and the sort of writer he is. Here is an essay Botton wrote for the New Statesman last week on the new book.

The workplace is a fascinating subject (as anyone who has seen The Office will know), and its something most people can identify with. I wonder why it isn’t at the heart of more contemporary novels.

Is it because a) some full-time writers don’t work in an office; and/or b) the ones who do would rather not and want to only write – presumably about subjects other than the office?

It hasn’t – as the comments on the Guardian blog were very quick to point out – always been like that. There is a sterling roll call of writers, from Charles Dickens to Evelyn Waugh, who have books (at least sort of) based on the workplace.

Why do you think we don’t have as many office novels nowadays? Which ones can you think of that you enjoyed?
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Posted by Soumya Bhattacharya on Monday, April 6, 2009 at 7:14 pm
Filed under Books · Tagged Alain de Botton, Allegra Goodman’s Intuition, Joshua Ferris’s acerbic, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, Then We Came to the End
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