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The Pause: Experiencing Time Interrupted
When COVID-19 spread across the globe, people experienced protection measures such as social distancing, self-isolation, and self-quarantine as a kind of shutting down or putting on hold of life. Many referred to this experience as a pause.
Calling attention to the long history of grappling with pausing in writing on plagues and pandemics, Julian Haladyn explores the pause in its social, political, and personal manifestations over the extended pandemic. The schism between the virus and its prohibitions on human engagement with the world produced a crisis, Haladyn argues, in which, for an extended time, it was impossible to imagine a future. The Pause is a cultural inquiry into a moment when human life around the globe seemed to halt, as well as the social symptoms that defined it.
The Pause captures the experience of being inside the pandemic, even as that experience continues to unfold. It regards our current situation not for what it may become in the future, but rather as a moment of mass uncertainty and existential hesitation.
Calling attention to the long history of grappling with pausing in writing on plagues and pandemics, Julian Haladyn explores the pause in its social, political, and personal manifestations over the extended pandemic. The schism between the virus and its prohibitions on human engagement with the world produced a crisis, Haladyn argues, in which, for an extended time, it was impossible to imagine a future. The Pause is a cultural inquiry into a moment when human life around the globe seemed to halt, as well as the social symptoms that defined it.
The Pause captures the experience of being inside the pandemic, even as that experience continues to unfold. It regards our current situation not for what it may become in the future, but rather as a moment of mass uncertainty and existential hesitation.
198 pages, Hardcover
Published May 1, 2024
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September 10, 2025
I think it's positively brilliant, from the Perec quotes at the start of each chapter to Julian's observation and explanation of 'the pause' on each page.
On page 53 it says, "this assumption of feeling the same - and its corollary, a fear that it is not going to be the same - speaks to a connection between the pause and a desire to define through negation a sense of normalcy within the pandemic. Because the other option is unthinkable."
This paragraph is amazing. It puts into words perfectly the pandemic felt. There's been great difficulty in describing the effects of the pandemic. It was implored that the pause we all underwent was temporary, and life would be normal again. Moreover, it promised us that the act of "pausing" was very normal, when pausing is the most absurd thing, as it is antithetical to living.
Pausing was the right choice as an attempt to stop the virus. But was the act of pausing normal? No. It's been a great difficulty to identify what that grew or changed during "pause" because it happened in such an isolated and inorganic state.
Discovering music preferences that would have otherwise happened because of friends sharing songs, happened alone and through streaming platforms. Adapting to my early 20s disappeared in a pause, and I woke up five years older, and all that changed was that I could now eat in a restaurant, except perhaps I didn't want to anymore. Both because of the fear of contracting the virus, but also because of the things that mattered to me had shifted.
The Pause described the way in which living while pausing can be so backwards, and I greatly enjoyed reading it.
On page 53 it says, "this assumption of feeling the same - and its corollary, a fear that it is not going to be the same - speaks to a connection between the pause and a desire to define through negation a sense of normalcy within the pandemic. Because the other option is unthinkable."
This paragraph is amazing. It puts into words perfectly the pandemic felt. There's been great difficulty in describing the effects of the pandemic. It was implored that the pause we all underwent was temporary, and life would be normal again. Moreover, it promised us that the act of "pausing" was very normal, when pausing is the most absurd thing, as it is antithetical to living.
Pausing was the right choice as an attempt to stop the virus. But was the act of pausing normal? No. It's been a great difficulty to identify what that grew or changed during "pause" because it happened in such an isolated and inorganic state.
Discovering music preferences that would have otherwise happened because of friends sharing songs, happened alone and through streaming platforms. Adapting to my early 20s disappeared in a pause, and I woke up five years older, and all that changed was that I could now eat in a restaurant, except perhaps I didn't want to anymore. Both because of the fear of contracting the virus, but also because of the things that mattered to me had shifted.
The Pause described the way in which living while pausing can be so backwards, and I greatly enjoyed reading it.
Displaying 1 of 1 review