Work: A History of How We Spend Our Time

A revolutionary new history of humankind through the prism of work, from the origins of life on Earth to our ever-more automated present

'A fascinating exploration that challenges our basic assumptions of what work means' Yuval Noah Harari

The work we do brings us meaning, moulds our values, determines our social status and dictates how we spend most of our time. But this wasn't always the case: for 95% of our species' history, work held a radically different importance.

How, then, did work become the central organisational principle of our societies? How did it transform our bodies, our environments, our views on equality and our sense of time? And why, in a time of material abundance, are we working more than ever before?

'For too long, our notions of work have been dominated by economists obsessed with scarcity and productivity. As an anthropologist, James Suzman is here to change that . . . This book is a tour de force' Adam Grant

'Groundbreaking . . . Exposes the productivity-at-all-costs mindset to strike a blow at the myth of the economic problem. I learned something new on every page' Grace Blakeley

'Brilliant . . . I thought I had read enough by now to know what work is and why we so often feel compelled to work – but I was wrong' Danny Dorling **