In Praise of Slow
Carl Honoré, 2004
One day, journalist Carl Honoré caught himself wanting to read his son a bedtime story in one minute. Alarmed by the thought, he went looking for people who had already learned to live more slowly: in how they eat, build cities, work, and raise children. This book shows that slow does not mean lazy and helps you find the right speed for each activity.
Who it is for
For anyone who eats on the run, reads on the go, and even rests as though running late. And for anyone who feels life is rushing past while they work through their to-do list.
The philosophy of slow living can be expressed in one word: balance. Act quickly when it makes sense, and slowly when slowness is needed.
The story he wanted to read in a minute
Imagine an evening after a long day. Your child asks for a story, but you read it skipping lines, already sorting through your email in your mind. This was roughly how Canadian journalist Carl Honoré lived. His young son loved long bedtime stories, while his father wanted to finish them as quickly as possible.
One day, Honoré was waiting to board a flight at Rome airport, leafing through a newspaper. An item about a collection of “one-minute bedtime stories” caught his eye: familiar children’s tales condensed so that each could be read in a minute. His first thought was delighted: brilliant, I must order it. Then came a second thought, and it frightened him. Was he really in such a hurry that he was prepared to economize even on evening minutes with his own child?
The book began with that question. Honoré frankly describes himself in it as a Scrooge with a stopwatch, a man who guards every second he saves. He set out to find people already trying to live differently, and found them all over the world. They cook, build towns, work, and raise children by seeking their own measure rather than pursuing speed. The result was a book about a movement challenging the cult of speed. Published in 2004, it became an international bestseller and was translated into more than thirty languages.
At its heart is a simple question: what is life actually for? Without an answer, acceleration becomes an end in itself. Six chapters lie ahead: on why slow does not mean lazy, a long Italian dinner, towns that chose a snail as their symbol, mind and body, work, and childhood. We begin with how speed became a deity we serve without question.
Slow does not always mean slow
Honoré notices hurry in small things that have long become normal. In restaurants, people ask for the bill and call a taxi before finishing dessert. Dinner becomes another item to tick off the schedule. While gathering material for a book about slow living, the author himself received a speeding ticket and had to attend a course in England for drivers who go too fast. Even someone writing about slowness failed to notice how hard he was pressing the accelerator.
Honoré calls our attachment to speed an addiction, almost a form of idol worship. It seems we serve speed not because it always gives us something, but because we no longer remember any other way. Acceleration has become a habit rather than a decision.
Yet the book does not call for doing everything slowly. Its central paradox is that slow does not always mean slow. For Honoré, fast and slow describe not just speed but two ways of living. The fast approach is hectic and impatient. It seeks control over everything and values quantity above quality. The slow approach is calm and attentive. It is patient and thoughtful, putting quality above quantity.
This leads to the book’s central image, borrowed from music. Musicians speak of tempo giusto, the right tempo. A good pianist does not play every piece at the same speed: some music races along, while other music needs silence between the notes. The mistake is not speed itself, but using one tempo for everything.
In Honoré’s view, the Slow movement is not at war with technology and does not demand that you throw your phone into a river. Getting to hospital quickly is right. Rushing a conversation with a loved one who has come to you in distress is wrong. The point is to choose your own speed rather than live at a single pace set by the world around you.
A common mistake is to hear “slow” and assume it means laziness, or life in a village without internet access. Honoré explains it differently: a slow approach means doing things as well as possible, rather than as quickly as possible. You can work hard and enthusiastically without living in a perpetual race.
Before your next activity, try asking a short question: what speed does it actually require? The answer is often unexpected. An email can be sent quickly. But a family dinner, a walk, or a conversation loses its meaning if you rush it.
About the author
Carl Honoré is a Canadian journalist who lives in London. He wrote for The Economist, The Observer, and other publications, and after this book became one of the best-known voices of the Slow movement.
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