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Mental Efficiency
Mental Efficiency And Other Hints to Men and Women by Arnold Bennett Excerpt he above lines from Matthew Arnold are quoted by one of my very numerous correspondents to support a certain optimism in this matter of a systematic attempt to improve the mind. They form part of a beautiful and inspiring poem, but I gravely fear that they run counter to the vast mass of earthly experience. More often than not I have found that a task willed in some hour of insight can not be fulfilled through hours of gloom. No, no, and no! To will is easy: it needs but the momentary bright contagion of a stronger spirit than one's own. To fulfil, morning after morning, or evening after evening, through months and years--this is the very dickens, and there is not one of my readers that will not agree with me. We are delighted to publish this classic book as part of our extensive Classic Library collection. Many of the books in our collection have been out of print for decades, and therefore have not been accessible to the general public. The aim of our publishing program is to facilitate rapid access to this vast reservoir of literature, and our view is that this is a significant literary work, which deserves to be brought back into print after many decades. The contents of the vast majority of titles in the Classic Library have been scanned from the original works. To ensure a high quality product, each title has been meticulously hand curated by our staff. Our philosophy has been guided by a desire to provide the reader with a book that is as close as possible to ownership of the original work. We hope that you will enjoy this wonderful classic work, and that for you it becomes an enriching experience.
64 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1920
69 people are currently reading
340 people want to read
About the author
Arnold Bennett
982 books312 followersEnoch Arnold Bennett was an English author, best known as a novelist, who wrote prolifically. Between the 1890s and the 1930s he completed 34 novels, seven volumes of short stories, 13 plays (some in collaboration with other writers), and a daily journal totalling more than a million words. He wrote articles and stories for more than 100 newspapers and periodicals, worked in and briefly ran the Ministry of Information during the First World War, and wrote for the cinema in the 1920s. Sales of his books were substantial, and he was the most financially successful British author of his day.
Born into a modest but upwardly mobile family in Hanley, in the Staffordshire Potteries, Bennett was intended by his father, a solicitor, to follow him into the legal profession. Bennett worked for his father before moving to another law firm in London as a clerk at the age of 21. He became assistant editor and then editor of a women's magazine before becoming a full-time author in 1900. Always a devotee of French culture in general and French literature in particular, he moved to Paris in 1903; there the relaxed milieu helped him overcome his intense shyness, particularly with women. He spent ten years in France, marrying a Frenchwoman in 1907. In 1912 he moved back to England. He and his wife separated in 1921, and he spent the last years of his life with a new partner, an English actress. He died in 1931 of typhoid fever, having unwisely drunk tap-water in France.
Many of Bennett's novels and short stories are set in a fictionalised version of the Staffordshire Potteries, which he called The Five Towns. He strongly believed that literature should be accessible to ordinary people and he deplored literary cliques and élites. His books appealed to a wide public and sold in large numbers. For this reason, and for his adherence to realism, writers and supporters of the modernist school, notably Virginia Woolf, belittled him, and his fiction became neglected after his death. During his lifetime his journalistic "self-help" books sold in substantial numbers, and he was also a playwright; he did less well in the theatre than with novels but achieved two considerable successes with Milestones (1912) and The Great Adventure (1913).
Studies by Margaret Drabble (1974), John Carey (1992), and others have led to a re-evaluation of Bennett's work. The finest of his novels, including Anna of the Five Towns (1902), The Old Wives' Tale (1908), Clayhanger (1910) and Riceyman Steps (1923), are now widely recognised as major works.
Born into a modest but upwardly mobile family in Hanley, in the Staffordshire Potteries, Bennett was intended by his father, a solicitor, to follow him into the legal profession. Bennett worked for his father before moving to another law firm in London as a clerk at the age of 21. He became assistant editor and then editor of a women's magazine before becoming a full-time author in 1900. Always a devotee of French culture in general and French literature in particular, he moved to Paris in 1903; there the relaxed milieu helped him overcome his intense shyness, particularly with women. He spent ten years in France, marrying a Frenchwoman in 1907. In 1912 he moved back to England. He and his wife separated in 1921, and he spent the last years of his life with a new partner, an English actress. He died in 1931 of typhoid fever, having unwisely drunk tap-water in France.
Many of Bennett's novels and short stories are set in a fictionalised version of the Staffordshire Potteries, which he called The Five Towns. He strongly believed that literature should be accessible to ordinary people and he deplored literary cliques and élites. His books appealed to a wide public and sold in large numbers. For this reason, and for his adherence to realism, writers and supporters of the modernist school, notably Virginia Woolf, belittled him, and his fiction became neglected after his death. During his lifetime his journalistic "self-help" books sold in substantial numbers, and he was also a playwright; he did less well in the theatre than with novels but achieved two considerable successes with Milestones (1912) and The Great Adventure (1913).
Studies by Margaret Drabble (1974), John Carey (1992), and others have led to a re-evaluation of Bennett's work. The finest of his novels, including Anna of the Five Towns (1902), The Old Wives' Tale (1908), Clayhanger (1910) and Riceyman Steps (1923), are now widely recognised as major works.
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February 16, 2013
BOOKSALE. A book store's name here in the Philippines which is the potent marriage of two words most capable of bringing joy to people who love to read: "book" and "sale."
"Sale" as in cheap. Very cheap. Pocketbooks you can buy here at half a dollar (US, in its peso equivalent); paperback editions at around two to three dollars; and hardbound editions even cheaper, for about a dollar or less. Old, new, slightly damaged, lone copy or several, coffeetable books, dictionaries, sex books, books on religion, business and finance, fiction and nonfiction, children's books, biographies, compendiums of what-nots, all kinds Booksale has them. Last week I saw a dilapidated Bible, with the initial pages of Genesis missing, and in a child's handwriting was the name of its owner Betty Sue Hale, a gift from her father and mother. The year was 1948. A google search by my brother presented the possibility that Betty Sue Hale was the youngest child of Luther and Hattee Hale from Tennessee which made Betty Sue 13 years old in 1948 and now most likely dead already (or still alive, at 78, with eyes that had long ceased to be capable of reading fine prints).
BOOKSALE could also be "books" and "ale" for the books here, like ale (beer), can intoxicate. A long sought-for classic novel which I almost bought at a classier bookstore for about US$71.00 I found one day at Booksale with a price tag of around US$3.00. I was drunk with happiness when I went home that day with the book firmly grasp in my hand.
Booksale's branches are scattered all throughout the country's major cities and are often conveniently situated in malls. They are small, maybe with the average 20 or so square meters floor area, crammed with all kinds of titles with very little space to move around. There are no chairs and tables for reading and no reliable system of categorizing the books which are everywhere, mixed and topsy-turvy, from the floor going up to about 7 feet. I once had my right hand stepped on by another customer because I had it spread on the floor to support my body as I peered underneath a pile. On another occasion my ass went right smacked into the face of a young lady as I got up from a crouching position unaware that she was right behind me likewise looking under a dark cavern of books.
It pays to hop from one branch to another because they do not have the same inventory of books to sell. I imagine its owner buying cheap books abroad in huge volumes, loading them all in freight containers, shipping them to the Philippines, dumping them first in his main warehouse and from there distributing them among these small branches.
That was why I had a mild shock when, given the chance to shop at the MAIN WAREHOUSE ITSELF (courtesy of a friend of a friend who works for Booksale) my aforementioned brother, the k.d. here at Goodreads who reviews books almost daily, DECLINED to go with me. His reason: he already has too many books in his tbr pile.
But don't we all buy books even if we already have so much in our tbr that it is not possible for us to finish reading them all even if we reach the age of 120 with fully-functioning eyesight? And don't we always find justification for this compulsive behavior when facing the derision of those who lead more simple lives, those who read only the traffic signs when they drive and the contracts they need to sign? You share with me, I am sure, these justifications which k.d. now seemingly mocks:
1. Buying books by itself makes us happy (k.d.--"look at it another way: does pointlessly wasting money make you happy?");
2. We buy books always with the hope of reading them someday--and hope is eternal (k.d.--"yes, but mathematics is an exact science and it shows you can never read all the books that you've bought and are still buying. You are not hoping, you are daydreaming!");
3. Buying more than what we are capable of reading in our lifetime is just like going to a food buffet: we are not expected to eat everything there, just those we fancy trying (k.d.--"the more apt analogy here is going to a library where you do not pay for all the books on display. What you are doing is more like PAYING for ALL the food in the buffet spread");
4. We can't help but buy, we don't know why (k.d.--"a confession, not a justification"); and
5. the books plead with us to buy them (k.d.--"you are hallucinating!").
The complete title of this book, first published in 1920, by the same author of the magnificent classic "Old Wives' Tale," is "Mental Efficiency and Other Hints to Men and Women." Here, Arnold Bennett is at his most funny, giving advices on such diverse topics like how to improve one's mental efficiency (read, write and think, in that order, he says), expressing one's individuality, getting married (better than staying single, he says, which mini-essay I find more enjoyable than that much longer discourse on this subject matter in Rabelais's "Gargantua and Pantagruel"), how to live one's life, how to succeed in it and how to achieve contentment. And there is, of course, a chapter about books and in it is a delightful sub-chapter entitled "The Philosophy of Book-Buying." Let me quote here a portion of it to help expose the errors of my brother's current state of mind. Arnold Bennett writes:
"...Are we only to buy the books that we read? The question has merely to be thus bluntly put, and it answers itself. All impassioned bookmen, except a few who devote their whole lives to reading, have rows of books on their shelves which they have never read, and which they will never read. I know that I have hundreds such. My eye rests on the works of Berkeley in three volumes, with a preface by the Right Honourable Arthur James Balfour. I cannot conceive the circumstances under which I shall ever read Berkeley; but I do not regret having bought him in good edition, and I would buy him again if I had him not; for when I look at him some of his virtue passes into me; I am the better for him. A certain aroma of philosophy informs my soul, and I am less crude than I should otherwise be. This is not fancy, but fact.
"Taking Berkeley simply as an instance, I will utilize him a little further. I ought to have read Berkeley, you say; just as I ought to have read Spenser, Ben Jonson, George Eliot, Victor Hugo. Not at all. There is no 'ought' about it. If the mass of obtainable first-class literature were, as it was perhaps a century ago, not too large to be assimilated by a man of ordinary limited leisure IN his leisure and during the first half of his life, then possibly there might be an 'ought' about it. But the mass has grown unmanageable, even by those robust professional readers who can 'grapple with whole libraries.' And I am not a professional reader. I am a writer, just as I might be a hotel-keeper, a solicitor, a doctor, a grocer, or an earthenware manufacturer. I read in my scanty spare time, and I don't read in all my spare time, either. I have other distractions. I read what I feel inclined to read, and I am conscious of no duty to finish a book that I don't care to finish. I read in my leisure not from a sense of duty, not to improve myself, but solely because it gives me pleasure to read. Sometimes it takes me a month to get through one book. I expect my case is quite an average case. But am I going to fetter my buying to my reading? Not exactly! I want to have lots of books on my shelves because I know they are good, because I know they would amuse me, because I like to look at them, and because one day I might have a caprice to read them. (Berkeley, even thy turn may come!) In short, I want them because I want them. And shall I be deterred from possessing them by the fear of some sequestered and singular person, some person who has read vastly but who doesn't know the difference between a J.S. Muria cigar and an R.P. Muria, strolling in and bullying me with the dreadful query: 'Sir, do you read your books?'
"Therefore I say: In buying a book, be influenced by two considerations only. Are you reasonably sure that it is a good book? Have you a desire to possess it? Do not be influenced by the probability or the improbability of your reading it. After all, one does read a certain proportion of what one buys. And further, instinct counts. The man who spends half a crown on Stubbs's 'Early Plantagenets' instead of going into the Gaiety pit to see 'The Spring Chicken,' will probably be the sort of man who can suck goodness out of Stubbs's 'Early Plantagents' years before he bestirs himself to read it."
For me, this impeccable logic leaves no other option but to go on and on with book hunting until money and life itself are exhausted. Every kill will never cease to give pleasure and the ever-growing number of books--unread--will continue to educate and give happiness!
"Sale" as in cheap. Very cheap. Pocketbooks you can buy here at half a dollar (US, in its peso equivalent); paperback editions at around two to three dollars; and hardbound editions even cheaper, for about a dollar or less. Old, new, slightly damaged, lone copy or several, coffeetable books, dictionaries, sex books, books on religion, business and finance, fiction and nonfiction, children's books, biographies, compendiums of what-nots, all kinds Booksale has them. Last week I saw a dilapidated Bible, with the initial pages of Genesis missing, and in a child's handwriting was the name of its owner Betty Sue Hale, a gift from her father and mother. The year was 1948. A google search by my brother presented the possibility that Betty Sue Hale was the youngest child of Luther and Hattee Hale from Tennessee which made Betty Sue 13 years old in 1948 and now most likely dead already (or still alive, at 78, with eyes that had long ceased to be capable of reading fine prints).
BOOKSALE could also be "books" and "ale" for the books here, like ale (beer), can intoxicate. A long sought-for classic novel which I almost bought at a classier bookstore for about US$71.00 I found one day at Booksale with a price tag of around US$3.00. I was drunk with happiness when I went home that day with the book firmly grasp in my hand.
Booksale's branches are scattered all throughout the country's major cities and are often conveniently situated in malls. They are small, maybe with the average 20 or so square meters floor area, crammed with all kinds of titles with very little space to move around. There are no chairs and tables for reading and no reliable system of categorizing the books which are everywhere, mixed and topsy-turvy, from the floor going up to about 7 feet. I once had my right hand stepped on by another customer because I had it spread on the floor to support my body as I peered underneath a pile. On another occasion my ass went right smacked into the face of a young lady as I got up from a crouching position unaware that she was right behind me likewise looking under a dark cavern of books.
It pays to hop from one branch to another because they do not have the same inventory of books to sell. I imagine its owner buying cheap books abroad in huge volumes, loading them all in freight containers, shipping them to the Philippines, dumping them first in his main warehouse and from there distributing them among these small branches.
That was why I had a mild shock when, given the chance to shop at the MAIN WAREHOUSE ITSELF (courtesy of a friend of a friend who works for Booksale) my aforementioned brother, the k.d. here at Goodreads who reviews books almost daily, DECLINED to go with me. His reason: he already has too many books in his tbr pile.
But don't we all buy books even if we already have so much in our tbr that it is not possible for us to finish reading them all even if we reach the age of 120 with fully-functioning eyesight? And don't we always find justification for this compulsive behavior when facing the derision of those who lead more simple lives, those who read only the traffic signs when they drive and the contracts they need to sign? You share with me, I am sure, these justifications which k.d. now seemingly mocks:
1. Buying books by itself makes us happy (k.d.--"look at it another way: does pointlessly wasting money make you happy?");
2. We buy books always with the hope of reading them someday--and hope is eternal (k.d.--"yes, but mathematics is an exact science and it shows you can never read all the books that you've bought and are still buying. You are not hoping, you are daydreaming!");
3. Buying more than what we are capable of reading in our lifetime is just like going to a food buffet: we are not expected to eat everything there, just those we fancy trying (k.d.--"the more apt analogy here is going to a library where you do not pay for all the books on display. What you are doing is more like PAYING for ALL the food in the buffet spread");
4. We can't help but buy, we don't know why (k.d.--"a confession, not a justification"); and
5. the books plead with us to buy them (k.d.--"you are hallucinating!").
The complete title of this book, first published in 1920, by the same author of the magnificent classic "Old Wives' Tale," is "Mental Efficiency and Other Hints to Men and Women." Here, Arnold Bennett is at his most funny, giving advices on such diverse topics like how to improve one's mental efficiency (read, write and think, in that order, he says), expressing one's individuality, getting married (better than staying single, he says, which mini-essay I find more enjoyable than that much longer discourse on this subject matter in Rabelais's "Gargantua and Pantagruel"), how to live one's life, how to succeed in it and how to achieve contentment. And there is, of course, a chapter about books and in it is a delightful sub-chapter entitled "The Philosophy of Book-Buying." Let me quote here a portion of it to help expose the errors of my brother's current state of mind. Arnold Bennett writes:
"...Are we only to buy the books that we read? The question has merely to be thus bluntly put, and it answers itself. All impassioned bookmen, except a few who devote their whole lives to reading, have rows of books on their shelves which they have never read, and which they will never read. I know that I have hundreds such. My eye rests on the works of Berkeley in three volumes, with a preface by the Right Honourable Arthur James Balfour. I cannot conceive the circumstances under which I shall ever read Berkeley; but I do not regret having bought him in good edition, and I would buy him again if I had him not; for when I look at him some of his virtue passes into me; I am the better for him. A certain aroma of philosophy informs my soul, and I am less crude than I should otherwise be. This is not fancy, but fact.
"Taking Berkeley simply as an instance, I will utilize him a little further. I ought to have read Berkeley, you say; just as I ought to have read Spenser, Ben Jonson, George Eliot, Victor Hugo. Not at all. There is no 'ought' about it. If the mass of obtainable first-class literature were, as it was perhaps a century ago, not too large to be assimilated by a man of ordinary limited leisure IN his leisure and during the first half of his life, then possibly there might be an 'ought' about it. But the mass has grown unmanageable, even by those robust professional readers who can 'grapple with whole libraries.' And I am not a professional reader. I am a writer, just as I might be a hotel-keeper, a solicitor, a doctor, a grocer, or an earthenware manufacturer. I read in my scanty spare time, and I don't read in all my spare time, either. I have other distractions. I read what I feel inclined to read, and I am conscious of no duty to finish a book that I don't care to finish. I read in my leisure not from a sense of duty, not to improve myself, but solely because it gives me pleasure to read. Sometimes it takes me a month to get through one book. I expect my case is quite an average case. But am I going to fetter my buying to my reading? Not exactly! I want to have lots of books on my shelves because I know they are good, because I know they would amuse me, because I like to look at them, and because one day I might have a caprice to read them. (Berkeley, even thy turn may come!) In short, I want them because I want them. And shall I be deterred from possessing them by the fear of some sequestered and singular person, some person who has read vastly but who doesn't know the difference between a J.S. Muria cigar and an R.P. Muria, strolling in and bullying me with the dreadful query: 'Sir, do you read your books?'
"Therefore I say: In buying a book, be influenced by two considerations only. Are you reasonably sure that it is a good book? Have you a desire to possess it? Do not be influenced by the probability or the improbability of your reading it. After all, one does read a certain proportion of what one buys. And further, instinct counts. The man who spends half a crown on Stubbs's 'Early Plantagenets' instead of going into the Gaiety pit to see 'The Spring Chicken,' will probably be the sort of man who can suck goodness out of Stubbs's 'Early Plantagents' years before he bestirs himself to read it."
For me, this impeccable logic leaves no other option but to go on and on with book hunting until money and life itself are exhausted. Every kill will never cease to give pleasure and the ever-growing number of books--unread--will continue to educate and give happiness!
July 10, 2012
This guy is a genius, great analysis, good advice and astounding way of conversation between the author and the reader!
He talked about various topics, psychology, a little bit of philosophy, and the will of power and its relation with sincere desire.
Some quotes:
Most writers on success are, through sheer goodness of heart, wickedly disingenuous. For the basis of their argument is that nearly any one who gives his mind to it can achieve success. This is, to put it briefly, untrue. The very central idea of success is separation from the multitude of plain men; it is perhaps the only idea common to all the various sorts of success -- differentiation from the crowd. To address the population at large, and tell it how to separate itself from itself, is merely silly.
One of our chief national faults is our hypocritical desire to suppress the truth on the pretext that to admit it would encourage sin, whereas the real explanation is that we are afraid of the truth. I will not be guilty of that fault. I do like to look a fact in the face without blinking.
I though disagree with him on his materialist view on life, and soul, and his Sartre-like explanation of the unity of force and the disposal of interior and exterior (body and soul).
He talked about various topics, psychology, a little bit of philosophy, and the will of power and its relation with sincere desire.
Some quotes:
Most writers on success are, through sheer goodness of heart, wickedly disingenuous. For the basis of their argument is that nearly any one who gives his mind to it can achieve success. This is, to put it briefly, untrue. The very central idea of success is separation from the multitude of plain men; it is perhaps the only idea common to all the various sorts of success -- differentiation from the crowd. To address the population at large, and tell it how to separate itself from itself, is merely silly.
One of our chief national faults is our hypocritical desire to suppress the truth on the pretext that to admit it would encourage sin, whereas the real explanation is that we are afraid of the truth. I will not be guilty of that fault. I do like to look a fact in the face without blinking.
I though disagree with him on his materialist view on life, and soul, and his Sartre-like explanation of the unity of force and the disposal of interior and exterior (body and soul).
March 29, 2013
My mom and I have a long tradition of listening to books on tape (well, really I guess they were CD’s mostly) when we would travel. When Minnie and I were driving back from Olympia this weekend, we continued this tradition. We listened to Mental efficiency, and other hints to men and women by Arnold Bennett. Really, I think it is more of a collection of essays, but he has proven to be a timeless writer even with more than 100 years between its first being published and now.
Read the rest of my book review on my blog, How's Your Mental Efficiency, a Review of Arnold Bennett's Book or more reviews.
January 1, 2021
1.5 stars
What a fitting way to end my 2020 reading because oof, no.
I thoroughly enjoyed Bennett's How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, a turn of the century self help book about time management. I was expecting this book to be similar, concentrating on "mental efficiency", but it seems to be a random collection of his newspaper columns. The title piece is shallow and surface level, and while there's a nice line here and there (worth an extra half star) I was rarely delighted or enlightened.
Bennett's sexism, par for 1911 I'm sure, is more evident here than in 24 Hours. He refers to "men and women" when talking about people in a general sense, but only "men" in an essay about success. It grates.
I was able to squeeze an insight or two out of these pages, but it wasn't worth the trouble. I'm much more hesitant to dive into his backlist now - I may just leave it be.
What a fitting way to end my 2020 reading because oof, no.
I thoroughly enjoyed Bennett's How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, a turn of the century self help book about time management. I was expecting this book to be similar, concentrating on "mental efficiency", but it seems to be a random collection of his newspaper columns. The title piece is shallow and surface level, and while there's a nice line here and there (worth an extra half star) I was rarely delighted or enlightened.
Bennett's sexism, par for 1911 I'm sure, is more evident here than in 24 Hours. He refers to "men and women" when talking about people in a general sense, but only "men" in an essay about success. It grates.
I was able to squeeze an insight or two out of these pages, but it wasn't worth the trouble. I'm much more hesitant to dive into his backlist now - I may just leave it be.
March 22, 2019
A collection of essays loosely connected by a theme of living well. Some better than others of course.
March 3, 2017
The importance of pay attention to exercising the brain just as much as we preen the body.
October 25, 2015
Bennett wrote a number of self-help books in this vein, and all are in my opinion worth reading or listening to, at least the handful I've tried so far. He was probably a cantankerous, moody complainer at least some of the time. And he could be highly opinionated, e.g. in his aversion to Benjamin Franklin and his autobiography, and is often summarily dismissive of views that don't agree with his own. But he was a thinker and a disciplined and productive writer, and I inevitably enjoy the expositions of his thought processes on sundry life philosophy-related topics, and where they lead him. I've already quoted him on the air on his views regarding the benefits of books that you buy and keep on the shelf but will probably never read. Though Bennett claims to have been reluctant to share something so personal and close to the core of his being, he offers in the last chapter his rather Buddhist view of human life, with a bit of enlightened, non-dogmatic Christianity mixed in. Very good audio reading by Librivox volunteer Ruth Golding.
August 5, 2015
This is a fun read. Not only is it a charming look into the time period in England, much of the advice, with slight modifications, still applies today. The chapter on books could easily be translated to current arguments about ereaders vs physical books. The argument about the cult of the body and physical exercise vs mental exercise certainly applies today! A wonderful read, I highly recommend all read this, keeping in mind the times it was written in.
December 29, 2012
I ran across this book by chance and listened to most of it as an audiobook; then liked it so well that I pulled it up on Gutenberg.org and read the whole thing in print. I'd never read anything by Bennett, and I'm glad to make his acquaintance. He is at the same time sensible and hilariously witty.
December 30, 2015
This was described as one of the first self help books. An interesting and sometimes very funny commentary on "mental efficiency", and the authors commentary on marriage, success and other things. I will put it on my to read again list. 3.5
February 4, 2016
I have the 1911 edition.
I read this as a youngster in Junior High,
along with 'How to Live on 24 Hours a Day' 1910 edition
and 'Self And Self-Management' 1918 edition.
I referred back to them all the way through college.
They helped me stay 'on track' and achieve.
I read this as a youngster in Junior High,
along with 'How to Live on 24 Hours a Day' 1910 edition
and 'Self And Self-Management' 1918 edition.
I referred back to them all the way through college.
They helped me stay 'on track' and achieve.
March 16, 2016
Another excellent book by Arnold Bennett. It's a candid collection of Bennett's thoughts on Success, Marriage, Mental Efficiency, buying/not buying books and many more burning topics of life. Again a short read, but very pragmatic.
September 23, 2020
I really enjoy reading this author.
For this particular book, however, I am still puzzling how the chapters following the first are related to the title. Nevertheless, I gleaned some useful advice from this book and would read it again.
For this particular book, however, I am still puzzling how the chapters following the first are related to the title. Nevertheless, I gleaned some useful advice from this book and would read it again.
March 23, 2013
I forgot to log in when I finished this, so I'm guessing 2/28/13. This was quite entertaining, with many funny quotations to remember, lots of pithy humor.
January 28, 2020
With witty writing and timeless insights, this is the perfect way to fulfill your dream of having a sassy fin-de-siècle English life coach.
January 20, 2018
Rarely have I seen such a good analysis on life, culture and the values of the human being. That is not saying that the book falls into the trap of inducing the reader into weariness with redundant details. For from it. As small as this book is, it packs quite a punch.
I picked it up in order to have a small reading on a commute and even from the first page I knew that I had bought something good.
Aside the fact that I resonate with most things written in there, I genuinely love the way it's written.
Look at, for instance, how he ridicules these "Get fit with 10 minutes a day" programs: "I, too, lay on the floor, my delicate epidermis separated from the carpet by only the thinnest of garments, and I contorted myself according to the fifteen diagrams of a large chart (believed to be the magna charta of physical efficiency) daily after shaving.
In three weeks my collars would not meet round my prize-fighter's neck; my hosier reaped immense profits, and I came to the conclusion that I had carried physical efficiency quite far enough."
I will definitely be reading Bennett again.
I picked it up in order to have a small reading on a commute and even from the first page I knew that I had bought something good.
Aside the fact that I resonate with most things written in there, I genuinely love the way it's written.
Look at, for instance, how he ridicules these "Get fit with 10 minutes a day" programs: "I, too, lay on the floor, my delicate epidermis separated from the carpet by only the thinnest of garments, and I contorted myself according to the fifteen diagrams of a large chart (believed to be the magna charta of physical efficiency) daily after shaving.
In three weeks my collars would not meet round my prize-fighter's neck; my hosier reaped immense profits, and I came to the conclusion that I had carried physical efficiency quite far enough."
I will definitely be reading Bennett again.
October 28, 2018
Mental Efficiency And Other Hints to Men and Women Arnold Bennet (1913)
I honestly thought this was a book about psychology and ended up liking what substance I found in it. It goes back to being meditative in our day to day life. The highlight for the whole books what that section of books.
How funny that reading and writing go hand in hand. Of particular interest is the fact that buying books and having them arranged on a shelf does not necessarily mean you are going to read them. The notion you have that you have classics arranged on your shelf is in itself a hindrance to reading.
A good book to read.
I honestly thought this was a book about psychology and ended up liking what substance I found in it. It goes back to being meditative in our day to day life. The highlight for the whole books what that section of books.
How funny that reading and writing go hand in hand. Of particular interest is the fact that buying books and having them arranged on a shelf does not necessarily mean you are going to read them. The notion you have that you have classics arranged on your shelf is in itself a hindrance to reading.
A good book to read.
March 21, 2020
Hilarious, engaging treatise on success. How poorly it explains itself and how much luck is underrated. High acuity observations. Mental efficiency shouldn't be the title in my view, as a proportion of all the topics it was more like a mention.
How things have changed in a century. The love and pursuit of money is more obsessive and ever more elusive. Success in science is not as huge as it was then. Neither the arts. It's more about money fame notoriety now. Few claim contentment with their lot.
For a free ebook on amazon-this offers more value than a lot of paid content
How things have changed in a century. The love and pursuit of money is more obsessive and ever more elusive. Success in science is not as huge as it was then. Neither the arts. It's more about money fame notoriety now. Few claim contentment with their lot.
For a free ebook on amazon-this offers more value than a lot of paid content
March 26, 2020
What a load of pointless, disjointed, tortuous, flowery, outdated drivel!
I've listened to two chapters and, by jolly, I still can't tell what the point is that can't be summarized in one sentence, "Mental efficiency is also important".
What a waste of time. Maybe it was interesting back in 1911 when it was published, but now, it's an utter piece of useless junk.
I've listened to two chapters and, by jolly, I still can't tell what the point is that can't be summarized in one sentence, "Mental efficiency is also important".
What a waste of time. Maybe it was interesting back in 1911 when it was published, but now, it's an utter piece of useless junk.
July 16, 2017
A nice conversation whit the reader, not much to learn but considering when this book was writen this is accualy preaty amazing. I shall recomend this book to newcommers into psycologi. Indeed a good read if you have a hour of your live to read a good book. not
October 7, 2025
3.5/5 - I think it is a fun short read. I picked it up from the free apple books. I have quite a few highlighted quotes from this book, which I consider as little nuggets of wisdom.
“One man cannot tell another man where the other man wants to go”.
“One man cannot tell another man where the other man wants to go”.
July 13, 2017
Not much new here
March 28, 2021
Practical.
February 13, 2022
The chapter on success was my favorite part of the book.
April 15, 2022
Some part of this book comes out as very shallow. But There are good parts in it too.
June 12, 2022
This is a funny book about you.
March 26, 2023
holy shit this book was terrible
June 26, 2022
What an awesome book. The way author conversed with the readers is so good.
The story is mostly about achieving productivity mentally. The author describes how we give great importance to physical excellence and try to achieve it but not a lot of people care to do the same for mental excellence. This book is a compilation of things that’ll help one achieve mental excellence.
The story is mostly about achieving productivity mentally. The author describes how we give great importance to physical excellence and try to achieve it but not a lot of people care to do the same for mental excellence. This book is a compilation of things that’ll help one achieve mental excellence.
July 9, 2022
honestly not sure how true these things are or how much i agree with them, but i enjoyed this book a lot. it’s well written and thought provoking. i’m surprised it’s not more talked about.
July 28, 2023
Trata del poder de la mente para hacerla nuestra aliada en todos nuestros resultados. Me gustó el enfoque en la educación temprana de esta mentalidad, en la relación entre el ejercicio físico y la capacidad de la mente para concentrarse y en la necesidad de estar siempre ejercitando la memoria y el raciocinio.
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