Ahh, These 19th Century Working Conditions (Edmundson)

At the top of the New York Times "most e-mailed" list this morning is a short op-ed piece by Tom Lutz (English, Iowa),"The Summer Next Time."  Lutz argues that the chief attraction of the academic's worklife is something it shares with that of the 19th century manufacturing laborer.  He doesn't mean the pay scale: he means the freedom to work at your own speed, a freedom that nonacademic laborers now seldom enjoy.  Lutz is the author of Doing Nothing: A History of Loafers, Loungers, Slackers and Bums in America (2006).