In Praise of Idleness is a fantastic essay published in 1935 that won the Nobel Prize in Literature which was written by the brilliant polymath Bertrand Russell. This edition of his essay includes an introduction and further notes by Bradley Trevor Greive, a very successful author. In Praise of Idleness and Greive’s additional words are true delights to read and understand, making the book entirely worthwhile to enjoy.
Greive writes in the preface of Bertrand Russell’s intelligence: he was one of the most impactful philosophers of the 20th century and was fantastic at various things. In his own words, “Bertrand Russell was … arguably the leading public intellectual of the ‘Era of Public Intellectuals’ - whose influence, even today, extends far beyond the academic foundations of his fame. Immortalised in a poem by T. S. Eliot and stories by D. H. Lawrence and Aldous Huxley, Russell mentored Ludwig Wittgenstein, directly influenced Alan Turing and The Beatles and received fan mail from Albert Einstein. In short: Russell was a genius who inspired other geniuses.” (6). Greive mentions that in his edition of Russell’s essay he added some lighthearted imagery of animals on some pages with Russell’s quotes from other works as a bonus to Russell’s content. The introduction of the book includes a quote from Albert Einstein that referenced Bertrand Russell’s erudition: “Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding the man who refuses to bow blindly to conventional prejudices and chooses instead to express his opinions courageously and honestly.” Albert Einstein wrote this in a letter to his friend who was a professor in New York after Russell was prevented from teaching there due to religious fanatics (to be more specific, Catholics and Episcopalians) who believed that Russell would “corrupt” young people (sound familiar? Remember Socrates?). This clearly demonstrated that Russell was far ahead of his time and wasn’t afraid to have controversial opinions, which is a virtue in of itself, seeing the importance of intellectual honesty (for instance, Russell said that people should think for themselves and not blindly believe politicians or religious figures—even today some people have trouble grasping this concept). Although Russell was undoubtedly vastly intelligent, his physical appearance, interestingly, was akin to the Mad Hatter or a ferret. Russell’s achievements included winning the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1950, focusing and advancing math, protesting the social ills of humanity (nuclear weapons, the subjection of women, imperialism, racism, classism, and slavery - he also respected and urged for democracy despite belonging to an aristocratic family from Britain), visiting a variety of areas (from China to Russia), and pursuing other subjects that interested him. “Surprisingly, for someone who wrote over seventy books, penned thousands of papers and articles and delivered countless lectures and interviews, Russell was, in person, a man of few words, none of them wasted.” (15-6). Russell, as stated before, wasn’t afraid to have unpopular opinions (he wrote a book, Unpopular Essays, about this): he was fired from his professorship at Cambridge and was sent to jail due to his pacifism in WWI, “which he felt was a tragic venture born of nationalist folly goaded by foam-mouthed militarist fools. However, while still opposed to violence, he argued there was every reason to obliterate the designs of Adolf Hitler, and publicly condemned Lenin and Stalin as well. One of the very earliest critics of the Vietnam War, Russell ensured those nations and individuals responsible for atrocities committed in this Cold War proxy-conflict were called to account, resulting in the International War Crimes Tribunal which he organised with Jean-Paul Sartre in 1967 … His international activism resulted in his joining with Albert Einstein to produce The Russell-Einstein Manifesto in 1955; this powerful document, in turn, led to the creation of the famous Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, which began in 1957, and also drove him to establish the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation in 1963.” (17-8).
Greive takes care to show that Russell did have his problems. That is, despite being brilliant in the highest degree and pursuing social activism, he was less savory in his romantic relationships, seeing how he was romantically volatile and unpredictable. Greive then provides an overview of the essay: it can “be divided into four basic sections: the illusion of wealth, the nature and history of work, the ethics of work and the importance of leisure.” (22). Russell’s progressiveness is demonstrated for the umpteenth time in his essay, seeing how he states that traditional economies should be drastically revised by creating a society that allows for people to have genuine breaks, as well as making the pay given to workers more equitable. Russell as a person has the credibility to speak of these issues, seeing how he had much real-world experience (he campaigned for free trade and open markets in 1903 and was against communism and nationalism after witnessing their destructive effects in areas where they were given massive control) regarding them. All in all, Russell believed in compassionate capitalism, not socialism, seeing how he recognized the merits of capitalism (ex. innovation, though such strengths would come at obvious costs like worker burnout, a potentially high unemployment rate, and boom and bust cycles). Russell includes in his essay that the present condition of work (which remains very true today) is very harmful to the person, seeing that it is frequently present in large quantities, thereby exhausting the individual and leaving them with little energy to pursue intellectual pursuits or to engage in active, rather than passive, leisure (think of how many people watch Youtube or Netflix to relax at the end of the day due to their tiredness). Greive elaborates, “Russell believes that excessive work … degrades a person’s mind—assertions that neuroscientists have recently proven to be accurate. For example multi-tasking, often a point of pride for modern professionals, has been shown to lower our mental efficiency and result in impaired cognitive function that is worse than from smoking marijuana. Likewise the constant deluge of digital information to which we are exposed can result in a debilitating form of neural addiction that gradually narrows our scope of meaningful achievement while creating the illusion that we are actually accomplishing more with our time.” (26-7). This is a clear contrast, as while technology is improving at a potentially exponential rate, the quality and depth of people’s thoughts and pursuits are going on a downward trend, to the detriment of humanity, as people are having more and more on their plate and less and less time to reflect and perform introspection and soul-searching. Russell writes near the end of his essay on ideal leisure. In his opinion, leisure, when utilized correctly, is empowering and life-affirming, as people can pursue things that are demanding yet enjoyable, making them feel engaged and alive: “It is the wellspring from which the arts and sciences are drawn, the fount of almost all earth-shattering original ideas. Idleness gives us the opportunity to explore, taste and try new things. Such unfettered curiosity creates new interests, these become passions, and these passions set fire to the hearts and minds of those around us.” (29). This is seen quite well in how many of the masterpieces of thought (ex. literature, science, philosophy, art) were created by those who were able to give themselves much time to practice their creativity (Francisco Goya painted many of his drawings in solitude and Immanuel Kant wrote his Critique of Pure Reason after years of structured and quiet living). Greive affirms the importance of leisure, stating that if people are condemned to live a life of empty sensory pleasure and workaholism, they might as well die on the spot, seeing how the life they’re living isn’t worth living at all. All in all, “This is an inspiring and sobering wake-up call to make the most of our lives by doing a lot less: almost nothing in fact. Russell’s argument is a call to action for every citizen of our age of ideas and, if applied, heralds the next wave of enlightened entrepreneurs.” (31).
Russell begins his book by stating that the quote “Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do” is erroneous, seeing that working furiously can do much damage to individuals and countries. He discusses that people shouldn’t criticize others for spending the money they earn, even if the things they buy do seem to be nonsensical, seeing that they’re returning the money to the economy and providing continuous employment to those who create the products. Russell states that investing one’s money to the government is morally abhorrent in certain ways, seeing how countries frequently use a vast amount of money to pay reprieves for past wars and to plot future ones (although wars have drastically decreased in frequency today due to the existential threat of nuclear bombs, they still, unfortunately, exist in certain areas). “The net result of the man’s economical habits is to increase the armed forces of the State to which he lends his savings. Obviously it would be better if he spent the money, even if he spent it on drink or gambling.” (36). Russell provides two definitions for work. When it comes to physics, work involves “altering the position of matter at or near the earth’s surface relatively to other such matter” (39). Adding to Russell’s words, in Physics work is defined as the product of force and distance. The second definition that most people are used to is when people are the ones moving parts of the earth around (the manner of moving things doesn’t even have to be physical: think of the transportation of ideas and business contracts from one part of the planet to the other). Russell writes that in Europe, there is a class of landowners that pursue idleness. However, Russell makes it clear that he has no appreciation nor respect for them, seeing how they don’t work to begin with (owning property and charging people to use it doesn’t produce anything of value, unlike unskilled laborers and certain skilled professionals like teachers) and rely on the labor of many other people in order to remain idle, seeing how their lifestyles will be unsustainable if everyone acts like them. Russell writes scathingly of economic exploitation: “From the beginning of civilisation until the Industrial Revolution, a man could, as a rule, produce by hard work little more than was required for the subsistence of himself and his family, although his wife worked at least as hard as he did, and his children added their labour as soon as they were old enough to do so. The small surplus above bare necessaries was not left to those who produced it, but was appropriated by warriors and priests. In times of famine there was no surplus; the warriors and priests, however, still secured as much as at other times, with the result that many of the workers died of hunger … In America, the system came to an end with the Revolution, except in the South, where it persisted until the Civil War. A system which lasted so long and ended so recently has naturally left a profound impress upon men’s thoughts and opinions.” (41-2). Russell maintains that in the industrial world, technology is advanced enough to provide leisure for everyone. Russell denounces a culture of work as one of slavery, seeing how many people are indoctrinated from an early age by the rich to believe that working hard is their duty—“The conception of duty, speaking historically, has been a means used by the holders of power to induce others to live for the interests of their masters rather than for their own. Of course, the holders of power conceal this fact from themselves by managing to believe that their interests are identical with the larger interests of humanity. Sometimes this is true; Athenian slaveowners, for instance, employed part of their leisure in making a permanent contribution to civilisation” (44). Following this train of thought, modern civilization will benefit the humanities by giving people the ability to spend time in idleness without harming others.
Russell then provides a striking example of the insanity of modern-day work: if a certain number of people work in a pin factory, and technology is invented that will make pins easier to produce, in an ideal world the same number of workers should be employed, and they’ll be given leisure time. However, in the modern era, people will be laid off, forcing them to undergo forced idleness, which will only harm them, while those who still have their jobs will continue to be overworked for no good reason. Russell states that the rich are extremely hypocritical. That is, they think of themselves as having a right to enjoy free time while they view the common person as a cog in the machine that enables them to live luxuriously and in decadence. Russell states that people should continue to work, but only insofar as they offset by their labor all the products that are needed to keep them alive. He makes it clear that many people in highly unequal societies don’t have to work due to being born into wealth and marrying those who are wealthy. When it comes to this, Russell does not “think the fact that these people are allowed to be idle is nearly so harmful as the fact that wage-earners are expected to overwork or starve. If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be enough for everybody, and no unemployment—assuming a certain very moderate amount of sensible organisation.” (51). Russell continues to speak accurately of the aristocracy, seeing how many rich want their male family members to work hard and are perfectly fine with the females doing nothing but wasting resources: “Oddly enough while they wish their sons to work so hard as to have no time to be civilised, they do not mind their wives and daughters having no work at all. The snobbish admiration of uselessness, which, in an aristocratic society, extends to both sexes, is, under a plutocracy, confined to women; this, however, does not make it any more in agreement with common sense.” (52). Russell states that even in the Soviet Union, which is supposedly a “worker’s paradise” (it isn’t - Stalin had tens of millions of Russians tortured, sent to Gulags, and executed), glorifies working hard (seen best in Five-Year Plans), demonstrating the sheer scope and frequency of the issue. Russell discusses more of idleness, writing that women, who have been oppressed for most of humanity’s sedentary history, have been repeatedly deceived into thinking that their utter submissiveness is some kind of privilege. Russell alleges that countries, in an attempt to keep the barbaric tradition of overwork and labor alive, have gone so far as to declare war on each other to drain what would be a surplus of resources (this concept is seen very well in Orwell’s 1984). He makes it clear that people can find many things to fill their leisure hours with if they only do some soul-searching (remarkably rare in a culture that mentally exhausts people), and speaks of the utter absurdity of the glorification of production and the demonization of consumption, which is likewise paralleled in obsession with profit and underrepresentation of happiness and genuine contentment. “When I suggest that working hours should be reduced to four, I am not meaning to imply that all the remaining time should necessarily be spent in pure frivolity. I mean that four hours’ work a day should entitle a man to the necessities and elementary comforts of life, and that the rest of his time should be his to use as he might see fit. It is an essential part of any such social system that education should be carried further than it usually is at present, and should aim, in part, at providing tastes which would enable a man to use leisure intelligently.” (64 and 66). Russell states that almost every aristocracy and financial elite in history has been corrupt, cruel, and inefficient, seeing how they produce nothing of value while exploiting others and defending their right to negatively impact others. As Russell brilliantly put it, “The leisure class enjoyed advantages for which there was no basis in social justice; this necessarily made it oppressive, limited its sympathies, and caused it to invent theories by which to justify its privileges.” (66-7). Despite this, it is true that the rich have produced a vast amount of intellectual gifts that have benefited many due to their idleness (though only a few aristocrats and rich people, including Bertrand Russell, have undergone such takings, seeing how easy it is to indulge in nonsensical sensory pleasures instead)—that is, the rich “contributed nearly the whole of what we call civilisation. It cultivated the arts and discovered the sciences; it wrote the books, invented the philosophies, and refined social relations. Even the liberation of the oppressed has usually been inaugurated from above.” (66-7).
Russell hilariously and pointedly adds that aristocrats “might produce one Darwin, but against him had to be set tens of thousands of country gentlemen who never thought of anything more intelligent than fox-hunting and punishing poachers.” (67 and 69). Russell states that while universities have the potential to provide a desirable education, they are problematic in how those who live inside it are frequently sheltered from the outside world, making them clueless to the problems that the common people feel and suffer from. Furthermore, thought in universities is sometimes controlled. Other times, being original and controversial (in a reasonable way, of course) is heavily discouraged. If Russell’s four-hour work day is established, people will be given financial stability and the time to express themselves creatively, which will benefit the vast majority of people. Russell ends his fantastic essay with the following sentences: “Above all, there will be happiness and joy of life, instead of frayed nerves, weariness, and dyspepsia. The work exacted will be enough to make leisure delightful, but not enough to produce exhaustion. Since men will not be tired in their spare time, they will not demand only such amusements as are passive and vapid. At least one per cent will probably devote the time not spent in professional work to pursuits of some public importance, and, since they will not depend upon these pursuits for their livelihood, their originality will be unhampered … But it is not only in these exceptional cases that the advantages of leisure will appear. Ordinary men and women, having the opportunity of a happy life, will become more kindly and less persecuting and less inclined to view others with suspicion. The taste for war will die out, partly for this reason, and partly because it will involve long and severe work for all. Good nature is … the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for the others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish forever.” (71-2).
Greive adds a section “In Praise of Doubt’” that discusses the life of Bertrand Russell and his character traits. Russell was born on May 18, 1872 at Monmouthshire of England. He had an older brother, Frank (almost seven years older than him) and an older sister named Rachel (four years older than him and died young). Russell’s parents were the Viscount (Lord John) and Viscountess (Lady Kate) of Amberley who were very progressive (causing some people to hate them) and died young. To elaborate, both of them believed in women’s education, women’s rights, contraception, and sexual freedom. In one instance, “Russell’s mother took pity on her children’s sexually frustrated biology tutor, Douglas Alexander Spalding, who, having contracted tuberculosis, was unable to woo or marry. Lady Kate, with the blessing of her husband, entered into a sexual relationship with Spalding so that he might not die a virgin.” (78). Incidents like these caused them to be hated (they were criticized even by Queen Victoria, who also spoke against women’s suffrage). While Russell was very progressive himself, he wasn’t influenced to a large degree by his parents, seeing how they died while he was young, along with his famous godfather (who was an atheist) John Stuart Mill and Spalding (also an atheist, who was Russell’s co-guardian). Consequently, Bertrand Russell got to know those who he was supposed to be well-acquainted with through books. While T.J. Cobden-Sanderson (a bookbinder and another atheist!) wanted to care for Russell, Russell’s Victorian grandparents forbade him from doing so. Russell was only three-and-a-half when he was sent to live with his grandparents at Pembroke Lodge, a mansion in London’s Richmond Park. Not long after Russell was six, his grandfather died (he was prime minister of Britain twice and gave advice to Napoleon himself, and is remembered by Russell as a warm human being who didn't do much in the house given his advanced age). Russell’s grandmother, on the other hand, was a strict Puritan who was capable of much insensitivity and coldness, showing what religion could do to a person’s character: “Lady Fanny … could sweep the joy from the room with a glance and once told Bertie, as a teary six-year-old mourning the loss of his mother and father, that he was quite fortunate his wayward parents had died … Lady Fanny … pious, sotto-voiced spectre, constantly advocating prayer, study, chastity and good posture, and wholly forbidding sloth, blasphemy and the consumption of fresh fruit.” (83). Russell, due to his isolated and strict upbringing and the tragedy that surrounded his early life, turned towards academics for solace and would frequently leave the house for the surrounding greenery in productive idleness (Bertrand Russell stated that times like those were the most impactful periods of his childhood). Russell was fifteen when he came across the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, who praised skepticism, an open spirit, social progress, and a love of science. Russell took pains to make sure that Fanny wouldn’t discover his heretical thoughts. One method in which he did so was by writing in his journal “Greek Exercises” of his personal thoughts, including going good without the motivation of some external award. Although Russell proved himself to be massively intelligent, he also suffered from loneliness and sadness, as he wrote in The Conquest of Happiness that when he was a teenager he was almost constantly on the verge of committing suicide. Fortunately, he refrained from ending himself due to being in love with mathematics and other subjects. Russell went to Cambridge for university and bursted in intellectual vigor. After graduating, he became a lecturer at Cambridge and a prolific author. While he struggled with writer’s block for a while, he was able to overcome it by taking some time off. Russell himself writes of the process of creating works as follows: “‘Every one who has done any creative work has experienced, in a greater or less degree, the state of mind in which, after long labour, truth or beauty appears, or seems to appear in a sudden glory—it may be only about some small matter, or it may be about the universe … to write a book on some subject, I must first soak myself in detail, until all the separate parts of the subject-matter are familiar; then, some day, if I am fortunate, I perceive the whole, with all its parts duly interrelated. After that, I only have to write down what I had seen.’” (98-9). Greive provides a helpful summary of Russell’s process of research and writing: (1) conduct research to a vast depth in the desired subject, (2) utilize active idleness to give oneself time to rest and reflect, (3) view the subject as a whole, and (4) a willingness to be open-minded and to rigorously examine one’s work in order to ensure there are as few blunders and mistakes as possible. Overall, “This combination of study, escape, contemplation, inspiration and critical evaluation makes perfect sense and served the prolific Russell well; to wit, without escape from the cerebral churn Russell could not find the freedom to think creatively, and without the intensely disciplined study he had nothing of substance to think about in the first place.” (101).
As the title of the section suggested, Russell was the embodiment of skepticism and doubt, and wasn’t afraid to go against the widely accepted opinion of the multitude, given the necessary evidence. Greive writes, “The word ‘philosophy’, derived from Ancient Greek and given to us by Pythagoras, means ‘Love of Wisdom’, and it was to this noble passion that Bertrand Russell dedicated his life. In order to move towards knowledge and understanding Russell first accepted that he knew and understood little, and could not trust prevailing views without rigorous proof. Ultimately what made Russell a more gifted than … virtually everybody who has ever lived … is that he was happy to be unsure or indeed proved wrong. As importantly, Russell never believed he alone had all the answers, or that meaningful answers could always in fact be found. Doubt and uncertainty were central elements to Russell’s genius and thus are worthy of consideration for us all … ‘In all affairs it’s a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.’” (103). One common theme among Russell’s works is his massive focus on doubt and a burning desire to satisfy his curiosity, as one cannot learn something one mistakenly believes one already knows. While Russell began criticizing certainty by focusing on religion, he was in fact interested in its application to every field, seen in his great Celestial Teapot analogy. That is, his Celestial Teapot analogy says that if a person says that there is a very small teapot moving around Earth and Mars, people will believe they are insane. The person will then counter that their claim can’t be disproven, but the grounds for its ridiculousness still exist. However, echoing to Schopenhauer’s quote that no idea is so ridiculous that it won’t be believed by people if solemnly spoken to them at a young age, the flying teapot can in fact be erroneously believed by most of humanity if its belief is made an essential part of social conversation and disbelief is punished with ostracism, torture, and execution. Russell was potentially inspired by René Descartes, who was the founder of modern philosophy. Overall, if one wants to emulate Russell’s example, they should be willing to be extremely open-minded and flexible, which is best seen in their questioning everything, even their most deeply held beliefs. Greive writes that Russell occasionally had moments of intellectual error: “During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, Russell dashed off impassioned cables to US President John F. Kennedy and Soviet supremo Nikita Khrushchev, strongly urging them to resolve the conflict with words not weapons—and later had the nerve to take some credit for the peaceful resolution of this tense stand-off, despite JFK rebuffing him in no uncertain terms.” (112). Russell possessed a good sense of pleasure (he liked drinking scotch so much he drank seven double-glasses a day in the last years of his life) and humor (“‘That I, a funny little gesticulating animal on two legs, should stand beneath the stars and declaim in a passion about my rights—it seems so laughable, so out of all proportion’”) (112). Greive hilariously adds that although Russell was indeed a gesticulating animal, he was a great one, seeing his compassion, empathy, open-mindedness, and brilliance - “Russell possessed the mind of a scientist and the heart of a poet. We may never see his like again.” (113). Russell wrote on July 25th, 1956, in his autobiography What I Have Lived For, the following passage: “Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair. I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy—ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness—that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold, unfathomable lifeless abyss … With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux. A little of this, but not much, I have achieved. Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer. This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.” (115-6 and 118). Russell died at 8 pm on February 2nd, 1970, in a country house in a valley that allowed one to see the poet Shelley’s house. Russell’s wishes for the disposal of his body were followed: his remains were cremated without formal proceedings and his ashes were dispersed over the Snowdonia Mountains. Russell lived for ninety-seven years, and it is safe to say that his ninety-seven years saw a huge benefit to the world and people around him, seeing all his contributions.
Personal thoughts:
In Praise of Idleness: A Timeless Essay by Bertrand Russell by Bradley Trevor Greive is a fascinating, enlightening, and powerful book for all to read. Russell’s language, simple yet detailed, concise yet commanding, descriptive yet clear, is a treat to behold. While his message of drastic reforms concerning the work day of countries has not been adopted, it still does make sense, considering his arguments. Indeed, when it comes to the future of work, everything can change, seeing the ever-increasing abilities of artificial intelligence, as many scientists have spoken of the vast importance of universal basic income, as robots will eventually be able to do everything humans can do, rendering us quite obsolete. While Russell wouldn’t be alive to see this (if it does occur, of course), I believe he is very likely to encourage people to pursue meaningful leisure and their passions if (or more appropriately, when) this happens. Greive’s biography of Russell is greatly appreciated, as he is able to capture his intelligence as well as his passion and humanity. I highly recommend In Praise of Idleness to anyone interested in the nature of work, economics, humanism, and Russell as a person.
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