The Longing for Less

Living with Minimalism

De: Kyle Chayka

Narrado por: Christopher Ragland

Bloomsbury presents The Longing for Less by Kyle Chayka, read by Christopher Ragland.

New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice

"More than just a story of an abiding cultural preoccupation, The Longing For Less peels back the commodified husk of minimalism to reveal something surprising and thoroughly alive." —Jenny Odell, author of How to Do Nothing

“Less is more”: Everywhere we hear the mantra. Marie Kondo and other decluttering gurus promise that shedding our stuff will solve our problems. We commit to cleanse diets and strive for inbox zero. Amid the frantic pace and distraction of everyday life, we covet silence—and airy, Instagrammable spaces in which to enjoy it. The popular term for this brand of upscale austerity, “minimalism,” has mostly come to stand for things to buy and consume. But minimalism has richer, deeper, and altogether more valuable gifts to offer.

Kyle Chayka is one of our sharpest cultural observers. After spending years covering minimalist trends for leading publications, he now delves beneath this lifestyle’s glossy surface, seeking better ways to claim the time and space we crave. He shows that our longing for less goes back further than we realize. His search leads him to the philosophical and spiritual origins of minimalism, and to the stories of artists such as Agnes Martin and Donald Judd; composers such as John Cage and Julius Eastman; architects and designers; visionaries and misfits. As Chayka looks anew at their extraordinary lives and explores the places where they worked—from Manhattan lofts to the Texas high desert and the back alleys of Kyoto—he reminds us that what we most require is presence, not absence. The result is an elegant new synthesis of our minimalist desires and our profound emotional needs.©2020 Kyle Chayka (P)2020 Bloomsbury Publishing PLC

Reseñas de la Crítica

Delving into art, architecture, music and philosophy, [Chayka] wants to learn why the idea of ‘less is more’ keeps resurfacing … For Chayka, Kondo’s method clearly doesn’t spark joy. More generative for him are the examples of artists who became known as Minimalists even as they disavowed the term. Experiencing their work sharpens his senses; in place of the dull hum of overstimulation, Chayka gains a heightened existential awareness . . . The minimalism that Chayka seeks encourages not an escape from the world but a deeper engagement with it.

The Longing for Less arrives not as an addition to the minimalist canon but as a corrective to it … Writing in search of the things that popular minimalism sweeps out of the frame—the void, transience, messiness, uncertainty—[Chayka] surveys minimalist figures in art, music, and philosophy … Along the way, he offers sharp critiques of thing-oriented minimalism … Underneath the vision of ‘less’ as an optimized life style lies the path to something stranger and more profound: a mode of living that strips away protective barriers and heightens the miracle of human presence, and the urgency, today, of what that miracle entails.

Chayka suspects, astutely, that minimalism can be used not just to make complex experiences simpler, but the other way around. Whether it is deployed as an ethical practice or as an aesthetic device (or as both at once), the minimalist mode can unlock truths lying dormant in one’s own mind . . . Chayka’s odyssey through the modern minimalist tradition is worthy of a stand-alone text. His study of the ‘blank spaces’ explored by the painter Agnes Martin, the architect Philip Johnson, the composer Julius Eastman, and many others is an exercise in grace and fidelity.

Kyle Chayka's fascinating new book explores not only how one might live in a minimalist fashion, but in fact where the idea comes from and how it's changed and adapted over the ages.

The Longing for Less tries to understand the current obsession with minimalism in all its complexity: the influence of Silicon Valley, yes, but also capitalism, the economy in the early 2000s, Stoic philosophy, Marie Kondo . . . Chayka takes the reader through history and around the world, giving equal consideration to minimalists like Steve Jobs (who lived in a giant house that remained entirely empty) as he does to Cicero.

[A] wide-ranging synthesis of a fascinating and perplexing impulse … Persuasively argues for the power of works associated with the minimalism movement.

[A] sharp debut . . . Chayka is in tune with the spirit of the movement.

With impressive breadth and depth of knowledge, Mr Chayka deftly skewers the shallowest, consumerist form of minimalism while being sensitive to the impulse for a simpler life, historically a response to decadence or chaos, and how the truest expression strips away artifice, challenging us to see things as they really are.

Interesting take on Minimalism

It seems what the author is trying to get across is that minimalism is an individual concept for each person. This is more of a history of the movement/word/lifestyle. Minimalism is what you make of it. One person may think it’s a way to organize, where another looks at it as a way to forget. Should you do it? That’s on you. For me minimalism is a means to determine what you think is important to you and help you focus on that. Things are often a distraction to really understanding what is truly important. Sounds drastic and maybe confining but actually it’s freeing.

An enlightening and provocative perspective.

Chayka gives a thorough analysis on minimalism in its many forms. He takes us on a delightfully nostalgic journey around the world and through time to make his point.

Not what I expected

The book felt less on a subject of minimalism, and more like Frasier Crane explaining art to his brother Niles. If you seek knowledge and perspective on minimalism as a lifestyle it’s stretched very thin and does only a quick and shallow dive - if you want the artists opinion on different art, architecture, litterature, culture and musical pieces, then it’s probably right up your alley. Considering half the description of the book mentions modern day lifestyle minimalists, I had expected a very different focus. It seems plastered on to draw readers.