Everyday Play: A Campaign against Boredom

by Julian Rothenstein (Editor)

Are you bored by daily routine? Learn how to restore play to the everyday, with games and life tips from artists, writers and thinkers from Louise Bourgeois and Hunter S. Thompson to Lydia Davis and Karl Lagerfeld “Life must be lived as play,” said Plato, and this book will help you rediscover the wonder in the weekly grind, and the extraordinary in the ordinary. Throughout history, philosophers, artists and writers have found liberation in taking play seriously. Everyday Play shows you how you can use creativity, games and the imagination to transform your life.
Learn how to be someone else for a day; explore how to draw a poem, paint a book and reorient your library; enjoy writers using constraints or languages they don’t understand; play the Edible Book Game or become a living sculpture; become a writer and play word games to find new ways of saying what you mean.
Everyday Play is the essential compendium of artists’ games, philosophers' inquiries and manifestos against the banal. They will challenge our perceptions of work, rest and play, with contributions from, among others, Joan Acocella, Luis Buñuel, Lewis Carroll, Robert Creeley, Adam Dant, Lydia Davis, Jeremy Deller, Dashiell Hammett, Will Hobson, Nina Katchadourian, Andrei Monastyrski, Francis Ponge, Erik Satie and Mark Wahlberg.
“ Everyday Play is fabulous!” –Cornelia Parker
“ Everyday Play will jiggle your syntax and bio-energize your astral enzymes. It reads like the misbehaving son of ‘Redstone.’” –Ed Ruscha

Genres: Nonfiction

172 pages, Paperback

Published March 15, 2022

About the author

Julian Rothenstein is the publisher, editor, and designer of Redstone Press. He lives in London, England.

Reviews

[Ariane Laxo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this wishing for ideas for facilitating workshops and design charrettes. Wish granted, and some! I've laughed, enjoyed a short page on a break from work, and had sparks of creative ideas. Delightful.

[Sheri · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the work of Peter Wutrich, who is included in this. Laughed out loud a few times, but wasn’t crazy about this.

[Dixie · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you need creative inspiration — not creative instruction, but pure inspiration — this book might well do the trick.

[yipeng · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a fun read that sparked some inspiration in ways to incorporate play into our adult lives.

[Shu · Rating 2 out of 5]

‘Toy making’

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a silly and delightful book. Plus I now have ideas for Halloween costumes

[Casey · Rating 2 out of 5]

The two stars are for the images in this book, not for the words.