xperiment in Leisure continues Marion Milner’s unique and compelling investigation into how we lead our lives, complementing the account she began in A Life of One’s Own.
Attempting to understand the gap between what she memorably describes as ‘the poverty of words and the reality of living’, she draws on memory images – in books, mythology, religious experience, travel, and even going to the theatre – that seem to point to a suspension of ordinary, everyday awareness. From this state of emptiness springs an increasing imaginative appreciation of being alive and, as Milner concludes, of being a woman.
With a new Foreword by Akshi Singh, An Experiment in Leisure remains a striking and captivating adventure in thinking and living with uncertainty, whose insights remain fresh and relevant today.
Softcover, 216pp
Routledge, 2024 (first published 1937)
