Carl Honore, "In Praise of Slow"

The Slow movement is gathering steam, with more and more people around the world finding ways to put on the brakes. That word "slow" is popping up everywhere as shorthand for a new approach to time and pace. Think slow money, slow football, slow travel, slow art, slow leadership, slow research.

Biography
I was born in Scotland but grew up in Canada. My hometown is Edmonton, Alberta, whose chief claim to fame is, er, having the largest shopping mall in the world.

After studying history and Italian at Edinburgh University, I worked with street children in Brazil. This inspired me to take up journalism. Since 1991, I have written from all over Europe and South America, spending three years in Buenos Aires along the way. My work has appeared in publications on both sides of the Atlantic, including the Economist, Observer, National Post, Globe and Mail, Houston Chronicle and Miami Herald.

I now live in London with my wife and our two children. Our neighbourhood is such a magnet for young families that it has earned the nickname “Nappy Valley.” On Saturday morning, it’s pram gridlock in the market.

I’m still dashing around telling everyone how marvelous it is to slow down. But I am also working on my next book. It is about childhood and what happened to it.

About In Praise of Slow
Are you always in a hurry?

Does life feel like a never-ending race against the clock?

These days, many of us live in fast forward – and pay a heavy price for it. Our work, health and relationships suffer. Over-stimulated, over-scheduled and overwrought, we struggle to relax, to enjoy things properly, to spend time with family and friends. The Slow movement offers a lifeline. It is not a Luddite plot to abolish all things modern. You don’t have to shun technology, live in the wilderness or do everything at a snail’s pace. Being “Slow” means living better in the hectic modern world by striking a balance between fast and slow. In Praise of Slow is the first handbook for the emerging Slow movement. Through a blend of anecdote, reportage, first-hand experience, history and intellectual inquiry, it explains how the world got so fast and why slowing down can pay dividends in every walk of life. To illustrate the benefits of deceleration, the book travels from a Tantric sex workshop in London to a meditation room for executives in Tokyo, from a Chi Kung squash class in Edinburgh to a SuperSlow exercise studio in New York City, from a TV-free household in Toronto to Italy, the home of Slow Food, Slow Cities and Slow Sex movements. Wherever you go, whatever you do, the message is the same: slower is often better.

In the United States, the book is called In Praise of Slowness.

In the rest of the English-speaking world, it is called In Praise of Slow.