#8 in Philosophy
The Antidote
- 256
- Pages
- about 4.5 h
- Reading time
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About the book
Exploring the dark side of the theories put forth by such icons as Norman Vincent Peale and Eckhart Tolle by looking to both ancient philosophy and current business theory, Burkeman--a feature writer for British newspaper The Guardian--offers up the counterintuitive idea that only by embracing and examining failure and loss and unhappiness will we become free of it.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 8.1 across 111 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 42% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Philosophy average of 8.0. That is how 8.0 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.3 | 6 | 5% |
| Hardcover | 8.1 | 105 | 95% |
Reader voices
The most-liked reviews on Hardcover (credited to their authors).
“The Antidote starts off by talking about the positive thinking movement, moves on to Seneca and the Stoics then dips into Buddhist meditation, pauses to to criticize goal setting then stops in for a visit with Eckhart Tolle. Burkeman then writes about how we overvalue…”
“2.5 of 5. I find this book quite difficult to rate. First, reading it, you get the sense there is quite some wisdom in it. Second, Oliver Burkeman writes wittily, often delivering punchlines as matter of fact. However, the book, in my opinion, falls short…”
Frequently asked
How long is The Antidote?
It has 256 pages — shorter than 93% of the ranked books in Philosophy.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Philosophy — with scores between 7.7 and 8.4, closest to this book.
