The Simple Life: Plain Living and High Thinking in American Culture

by David Emory Shi

From Thomas Jefferson to Lewis Mumford, from Henry David Thoreau to the hippies of the 1960s, advocates of the simple life have formed a diverse tradition in America's cultural history. Here, for the first time, David Shi presents an intriguing and comprehensive study of the many different ways in which Americans have pursued the elusive ideal of plain living and high thinking. Beginning with the colonial period and the Puritan and Quaker ethic of hard work, temperate living and spiritual devotion, Shi ends with a discussion of Jimmy Carter's and Ronald Reagan's contrasting views of what constitutes the good life. In between we encounter a compelling cast of characters, including Jonathan Edwards, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Scott and Helen Nearing. In treating the simple life both as a sentimental ideal and as a guide for individual conduct, Shi reveals the intellectual and cultural life of this country and illuminates the persistent desire of select individuals and groups to elevate American life above the material and the mundane.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Self Help, Sociology, American History

352 pages, Hardcover

First published January 3, 1985

Reviews

[Kerith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this book was fascinating. A totally different take on the practice of voluntary simplicity -- where most books promote it and tell you how to do it, Mr. Shi endeavored to tell the history of such a lifestyle, in all it's different forms. From Puritans to Quakers, the early Presidents and their republican visions (NOT the same as today's Republican party) to this century's gurus like Lewis Mumford and Wendell Berry.
It was a long read. He writes about the arrogance of simplicity (the upper class imposing sumptuary laws on the lower to keep them "in their place"), of the selfishness (again, the upper class; and also the fancifulness of the hippies), and of laziness (Fruitlands) -- but all throughout he discussed people who truly saw its benefits and practiced simplicity as much as they could.
This is also just a great read about American history.

[Melanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really interesting history of the ideal of the simple life in America. I found it fascinating that so many ideas of simple living that I hear about currently are actually the same ideas that have been talked about since the Puritans. But as the author says in the Epilogue, "Yet the simple life as an enduring societal norm has never been realized...Again and again, Americans have espoused the merits of simple living, only to become enmeshed in its opposite." I liked his conclusion, "Simplicity in its essence demands neither a vow of poverty nor a life of rural homesteading...but a deliberate ordering of priorities so as to distinguish between the necessary and superfluous, useful and wasteful, beautiful and vulgar."

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

From Puritans and Quakers to Boy Scouts and hippies, our quest for the simple life is an enduring, complex tradition in American culture. This book offers a fascinating and very intricate of the yearning for the Simple Life from the beginning of our nation. We tend to think of materialism as a new problem of the last few decades, yet even the Puritans worried about the excess wealth and the decline of morality associated with it. It explores the religious movement, Jeffersonians, Transcendentalism and Progressivism and a few more. I would recommend it to my friends who like history. This book was very interesting and I feel so much more informed for reading it. However, it is very dense and has to be read slowly. Not an easy read but well worth it.

[Max Healy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loooved this book. It presents an intellectual history of the concept of "simple living" in American culture, from the Puritans and Quakers to hippies. Written in 1985, it obviously misses the massive changes that have happened in American life in the last three decades, but it compellingly asserts the tug-of-war between "plain living and high thinking" and increasingly unhinged production and consumption.

I got a bit pessimistic reading this book, particularly the chapters about the Transcendentalists and the Gilded Age. Having spent too much time as a young leftist on the internet, I thought that the modern soul-struggle and capitalist hellscape essentially crystallized with Reagan's presidency, but those chapters show that 1) capitalism has been an insane death march for much longer than that and 2) people have been talking about this shit for an extremely long time, and their warnings have seemingly gone unheeded. The Transcendentalists could never conceive of how far we've slipped into making their worst fears for American culture real. I think that they would all commit suicide, or maybe just move to another country, or deep into the woods.

But it's also inspiring to find historical examples of something that I see on the daily. It's like reading my high school diaries, the strange mixture of joy and desolation at how much I sound just like myself, and how little certain core issues have changed over time. These people may not have "succeeded" in the sense of turning the tides of history, but their stalwart conviction to fight against the overwhelming trends of mainstream culture is an inspiration. It made me realize that it's foolish to feel naive about being a dreamer, because regardless of "the way things are," I have but one life to live, and there is nothing to do but fight and struggle for the things that I believe in.

Thinking about the ideas of this book, it really seems like "the simple life," or more particularly "high thinking" has taken a massive hit. I blame smartphones, mostly, the way they sap our attention and make us fractured and dependent on smaller and smaller hits of dopamine to make it through, how every moment of potential boredom (see; reflection, introspection, wonder, looking around and seeing what's up) is stolen by the endless onslaught of information, which in such an undifferentiated mass has the opposite effect of enlightening or educating us. But apart from that, I see a lot of people yearning for something different, as we talk more and more about how *this is not the way*.

There is optimism and pessimism mixed up in that, because ultimately it seems that nothing has ever changed. People have always been talking about it, but the market forces have proven too strong. Troublingly, it seems that the success of the market forces, vis a vis the attention economy and widespread theft of interiority and private space, creates an atmosphere where they are less likely to be dethroned, where people on the whole will be more likely to remain in their thrall. It seems a sad vicious cycle, but being able to witness it as though from the outside is the first step of trying to build a better life for myself and the people around me.

[Devin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Simple Life by David E. Shi is an overview of the impulse for simplicity in American culture. Shi leaves out certain individuals and strains of thought which would require too much attention (or have been adequately investigated elsewhere - including the Amish and Benjamin Franklin) and instead breezes through America's history from pre-revolutionary war times to the beginning of the 1980s. Since I'm fascinated by this mode of living myself, I found a lot to interest me. Shi quotes many people I had only vaguely heard of before and quite a few who are completely new to me. There are several books I'd like to read now after discovering them here.

While Shi does draw a few conclusions, the wide range of time periods and authors covered in only a few hundred pages means that Shi can only discuss the topic rather superficially. However, the point is to provide a historical perspective on the simple life, not to write a treatise on the subject. With this book Shi promotes critical thinking about the desire for simplicity and highlights notable proponents of it in American history. Recommended for anyone new to the subject, but likely to be boring for those who are more familiar with the topic.

A few of his conclusions:

1. "From colonial days, the image of America as a spiritual commonwealth and a republic of virtue has survived alongside the more tantalizing vision of America as a cornucopia of economic opportunities and consumer delights."

2."What meaningful simple living does require is a person willing it for himself. Attempts to impose simple living have been notoriously ephemeral in their effects. For simplicity to be both fulfilling and sustaining, one must choose it, or, as the Puritans might have said, one must be chosen for it."

3. "...simplicity has provided an emergency reservoir of moral purpose during times of crisis."

4. "Money or possessions or activities themselves do not corrupt simplicity, but the love of money, the craving for possessions, and the prison of activities do. Knowing the difference between personal trappings and personal traps, therefore, is the key to mastering the fine art of simple living."

5. "...it is our dreams that energize us more than our abilities. In the quest for the good life the possible is as valid as the probable."

[Jeni Enjaian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the kind of books that history lovers adore, at least the ones trained in historiography and those who love the dense precision that Shi imparts in all of his works. Several of my history classes in under grad and graduate school used books written by Shi as textbooks. This one could function well in that role too.
It took me longer to get through than I expected but I still loved it.

[Pablo Rodriguez · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has a lot of good information on a valuable topic. It is rather a tedious read, however. Some nonfiction is fascinating and other nonfiction seems like a collection of facts. This book impressed me as the latter. It would have been better condensed to about a third of its current size. Not a bad book, but I won't recommend it to anyone.

[Luke S · Rating 3 out of 5]

Didn’t finish. Some interesting history of the Protestant work ethic and the republican movement in the US, but it became a slog when it got into the 20th century.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A history of the simplicity movements in the US since before it was the US--beginning with the first settlers and ending in the early 1980s (the book was written in 1985). It was readable, accessible and interesting. Didn't dwell too long on any one person or event but was clear. I enjoyed it and learned quite a bit. One thing I learned in particular is that since the 17th century there has been a struggle between those who want to accrue wealth and "consume" and those who want to put limits on the consumption and high living. The book ends with contrasting President Jimmy Carter and President Ronald Reagan--a very relevant contrast at this point in time.
It seems apparent that voluntary simplicity "for all" is unlikely. Still, there is a place for those who want to follow that path. Of course the book barely touches on the environmental aspect of massive consumption and that is something that may block the path for many.

[Charlie Kester · Rating 4 out of 5]

A history of Voluntary Simplicity in America: Puritans, Quakers, Shakers, Emerson & Thoreau, ..., Scott Nearing, and as you might expect in a book published in 1985, the hippies.

People made fun of Jimmy Carter for telling us to turn down the thermostat and put on a sweater, but it was advice reflecting a recurrent theme in American history.

[Juli Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful overview of the history of a very important concept in a American culture: the ideal of the "simple life." Shi's book is historically complete, well-researched, and has an academic, yet engaging tone. A joy to read.

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

The appeal of the simple life must affect one's attitude before it changes a lifestyle. The people Shi tells about say as much. Including Thoreau. There is a nice 10 page discussion of Henry David Thoreau. I liked that.

[Heather G · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really terrific reference, but dense (encyclopedic). A comprehensive account of the evolution of trends in simple living in America since colonial times. Shi's historical perspective lends balance to the more self-help-centered books that seek to promote simple lifestyles.

[Primordial Offering · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was primarily really happy to read the chapter(s) that shone light upon the Quakers of the world. I'm not a Quaker, but i wish to understand them!

[Gary · Rating 5 out of 5]

An interesting cross-section of US history