How to Do Nothing with Nobody All Alone by Yourself: A Timeless Activity Guide to Self-Reliant Play and Joyful Solitude

by Robert Paul Smith, Elinor Goulding Smith (Illustrator), Paul Collins (Introduction)

Remember how to make a spool tank? How to whip apples? What to do with a discarded umbrella? Whether "pennies" comes before or after "spank the baby" in mumbly-peg? And your kid never knew any of these things in the first place, to forget in the second place? Robert Paul Smith remembers, and he has set it down for all to see — these things and many others, like rubber-band guns, and slings, and clamshell bracelets, and the collection, care, and use of horse-chestnuts. This book frees children from video games for a few hours, a handbook on the avoidance of boredom, a primer on solitude — a child’s declaration of independence. It reveals "how to do nothing with nobody all alone by yourself" — real things, fascinating things, the things that we and our parents did as kids. It’s a book for kids, but parents are not prohibited from reading it.

Genres: Nonfiction, Self Help, How To, Childrens, Psychology, Education, Audiobook

130 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1958

About the author

Authored the classic evocation of childhood: 'Where Did You Go? Out. What Did You Do? Nothing.'

Graduated from Columbia College in 1936, worked as a writer for CBS Radio and wrote four novels: So It Doesn't Whistle (1946); The Journey, (1943); Because of My Love (1946); The Time and the Place (1951).

The classic "battle-of-the-sexes" comedy 'The Tender Trap', a play by Smith and Dobie Gillis creator Max Shulman, opened in 1954 with Robert Preston in the leading role. It was later made into a movie starring Frank Sinatra and Debbie Reynolds.

'Where Did You Go? Out. What Did You Do? Nothing' is a nostalgic evocation of the inner life of childhood. It advocates the value to children of privacy; the importance of unstructured time; the joys of boredom; and the virtues of freedom from adult supervision. He opens by saying "The thing is, I don't understand what kids do with themselves any more." He contrasts the overstructured, overscheduled, oversupervised suburban life of the child in the suburban 1950's with reminiscences of his own childhood. He concludes "I guess what I am saying is that people who don't have nightmares don't have dreams. If you will excuse me, I have an appointment with myself to sit on the front steps and watch some grass growing."

Reviews

[Clumsy Storyteller · Rating 3 out of 5]

i don't think kids nowadays care to read books to begin with let alone try to make these things! Try to take their Iphones away and replace it with a book *Don't blame me if your kid tries to set your blanket on fire in your sleep*

i genuinely worry about kids who spend more time alone because spending so much time on your own growing up is both a blessing and a curse.. they would enjoy the quiet peace of mind for a while but also it'll be hard for them to socialize with people which means the kid will grow to be a social outcast!

[Kirk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reminiscent of Bill Bryson and, to a lesser extent, Amy Sedaris.

---------------------------------------------
If you don't know what a willow tree looks like, go to the public library and get out a book about trees. You'll notice that all through this book, I advise you to go to the library when you want to find out something. I think that just plain going to the library and getting out a book is a swell thing to do. It's something to do, when you've got nothing to do, all by yourself. It's still a thing I do when I've got nothing special to do.

Now I'm going to tell you about another thing we made, a kind of dart, and it's my guess that when your mother or father sees it, you may catch a little hell; I don't know. I did.

Everything is impossible until it's done. Then whatever has been done is possible, and there's a new thing that's impossible.

[…] the name of this books is How to Do Nothing with Nobody All Alone by Yourself. I understand some people get worried about kids who spend a lot of time all alone, by themselves. I do a little worrying about that, but I worry about something else even more; about kids who don't know how to spend any time all alone, by themselves. It's something you're going to be doing a whole lot of, no matter what, for the rest of your lives. And I think it's a good thing to do; you get to know yourself, and I think that's the most important thing in the world.

[Ron · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I wrote on Beatrice: "David Mamet was born in 1947. He was eleven years old when Robert Paul Smith’s How to Do Nothing with Nobody All Alone by Yourself was published in 1958. I’m not able to get in touch with Mamet to ask him if he read this book, but I am willing to bet folding money that he did, then or shortly after."

How can you not love a kid's book roughly ten percent of which is dedicated to all the intricate levels of mumbly-peg?

[Angel Polskiina · Rating 5 out of 5]

hilarious! Do not read while drinking!

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not that I needed much to read this but it was fun to do so!^_^

[Dpbsmith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Here are some things you can do following the instructions in this book:

Make a spool tank (a homemade windup toy that creeps forward slowly like an army tank); a "button buzz-saw;" a handkerchief parachute; a harmless handkerchief "blackjack." Make a squeaky noise with two blades of grass. Do cool things with dandelion stems and leaves. Make a little basket out of burrs. Put your name on a pencil. Give a pencil a decorative checkerboard grip. Play Mumbly-Peg with a boy scout knife. Make a bracelet out of a clamshell. Make a needle dart. Make a leather sucker. Play "killers" with horse chestnuts. Make a Spanish bolas with horse chestnuts. Make a bull-roarer, an indoor boomerang, an outdoor boomerang, several kinds of slingshot, a throwing-stick. Make a bow and arrow out of a broken umbrella. Make polly-noses from maple tree wing things. Pop jewel-weed pods. Make pussy-willow bees and cats. Make a pin piano. Make a "bavoom-thing," a peach-pit basket, a rubber-band-powered paddlewheel boat, a paper airplane, a paper helicopter, and a thing made from a wishbone that surprises people by jumping suddenly into the air.

[Freder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Happy happy joy joy! This is one of the best books in the world and I was so glad to learn that it's back in print. I picked up my copy and it is just as wonderful as I remembered. I'm also surprised to see how much of this stuff I actually learned and did and made when I was about eight years old and reading it for the first time.

[Child960801 · Rating 5 out of 5]

How I wish I had found this book as a kid. It's full of all the dangerous projects that kids used to do by themselves using a penknife and whatever the heck they could find. A fast read that reminds me of my childhood.

[Don Gubler · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was given this book as a kid and it provided me hours of enjoyment.

[Genia · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book wasn't translated to audiobook very well. There were a lot of illustrations in the book but there was only a reference to them (for example "see illustration 1e").
This is why the rating is this low. If I read the physical copy I would probably rate it as a 3 stars. A nice book to read while waiting in line, nothing more.

[Fara7 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I truly enjoyed this 2010-reprint of that 1958-book! How I wish I had come across it when I was much younger _ certain things in my personality would have been different..that's for sure! This awesome book describes crazy activities that might be deliciously dangerous if not done exactly as directed or that might be inappropriate for young children. If you still want to read this book after that author's warning, you are an awesome human being_ let alone with a bit of a magical touch of wild craziness, too.
This is probably the kind of thing that my dad did when he was growing up wildly free from the horrific confinement of today's electronic social media; with no Facebook, Twitter or WhatsApp around the corner!
Isn't it superb to learn how to make a whistle out of a blade of grass?! Isn't it nice to make a basket out of lapful of burrs?!
If you want to relive the joy of your childhood and its carefree days, this is the book for you! And the author's wife makes it easier for us to follow her husband's directions by illustrating the book.
I think in the future I won't have grandchildren with the I-am-bored attitude around me, having read this hilarious book!
😂😍😘

[Cecily Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Originally published in 1958, this book is the ideal answer when you tell your kids to go play outside and they don't know what to do. This is the answer to boredom in free time, away from screens and devices. I wish I'd had this book when I was 7-12 years old. I had plenty of apples to whip, had I known about whipping apples! I had plenty of horse chestnuts to string. I had no idea you could make a suction cup out of a piece of leather and some string. I didn't know you could put maple tree helicopters on your nose like a rhino! Oh, the things I missed.

I love the author's style and tone, the way he talks to kids like a confidante, like he's face-to-face with the reader like a cool uncle. I like the pace and the informality of the writing. This book makes me want to read his other titles.

[Donald · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this book for my birthday when I was a child. I found it a wonderfully imaginative book with marvelous illustrations by Elinor Goulding Smith. It was first published in 1958. It was an age before electronics and social media and the books describes how kids could entertain themselves with everyday objects.

I managed to track down a copy which I have presented to my grand nephew to give him an idea how we used to entertain ourselves!

[Alexandra Chauran · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was pretty awesome. Right away I could tell that this book was for older kids, who can handle a pocket knife. However, the language of it was so old fashioned and comforting that my young children listened while I read it cover to cover over a series of bedtimes. Definitely will have to purchase this book when they're a little older.

[Carol Covin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating look into life for children in the 1920s.

Great ideas for any time a child says to you, "I'm bored."

http://newgrandmas.com/11249/newmemor...

[◈ ɣεɾɑ ◈ · Rating 2 out of 5]

This books' views are very outdated when it comes to some games, it might be inappropriate for children even. I realize it was written in the 50s but still, It's interesting for what it were but I would not recommend it to any kid or parent, honestly.

[Evgeniy Vasilev · Rating 4 out of 5]

Audiobook is probably the worst option for this book. Fortunately I recall reading the book in my childhood so I'm familiar with the various contraptions.

[Sheri Bauer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun book of remembrances of my childhood.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

You're too old to read this book, or too young. It was written a year after Smith's classic book, "Where Did You Go?" "Out" "What Did You Do?" "Nothing" (1957), in which he extols the virtues of children doing things on their own, unsupervised, in a neighborhood that they feel free to wander around. Mr. Smith grew up in Mount Vernon, New York, during the 1920s, and children's activities are a good deal more supervised today. In that book he pointed out that children can make their own toys and teach each other how to play games, and learn a great deal in the process. In "How to Do Nothing" Smith shows how to make the toys that he described in the earlier book. He also describes, with illustrations, how to play mumbly-peg, a game that develops coordination by the hair-raising use of a pocket knife. The materials used for some of the handmade toys are simplicity itself: a shoestring and a horsechestnut for one toy; burrs and mapleseeds. The materials used for some others were common when he was a boy but harder to obtain today, such as wooden spools and cane umbrella struts. Parents probably wouldn't want their kids to make darts out of matchsticks and needles anyway -- though my brother made a couple of delightfully dangerous ones that flew beautifully. Read the books if you want to know what kids really did with their time in the early twentieth century. But read them in order for best satisfaction.

[Gerganini]

Reading between /behind perhaps is more suited/ the lines of the bookie I was flooded with many thoughts. The importance of things is not situated in the things themselves, not in the material incarnation. Neither can it be granted as a result of having had a good time, as for children a good time is not a unit of measurement. They don't possess yet the clutter of expectations that veils their experiences not with what they are but in relation to something else. They still possess the ability of authenticity, being in the present. Boredom is however a unit of measurement for children. Yet children left on their own devices speaking of a multitude of children together are great at overcoming boredom with such ease by immersing themselves in the world around them. Interacting with the world in a very serious matter without making it tedious, without attaching expectations of good time or significance. For the time spent playing it is already significant. This is I suppose where importance comes into play, through play.

[Laurel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book so much when I was a girl. I lived way out in the country, in a small red house between a field and a forest, and spent much time roaming them alone. The book probably entered our home soon after it was published back in the fifties. I made numerous spool tanks over the years, carefully carving the washers out of soap, and cutting out little ridges around the ends of the spools to give the wooden wheels more traction, as instructed. I did have a pen knife, and never damaged myself with it. Another favorite was making little baskets out of burrs — what a great book! I loved making things back then, and still do.

[Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the few (only?) books that I have read that comes with a parental advisory notice on the back flap. Brilliant! This is a brilliant little book, aimed at an eight year old audience from the 1950s, full of slightly dangerous things to do so as not to get bored. Though I'm not even close to that old, some of these are things that we did as children. So much fun, a window on a time that is similar to now....but so different.

[Elisabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh, it was okay. I feel a bit cheated because some of the games that are described are not actually things to do by yourself. It's also a shame that this hasn't been revised in any way but instead features some outdated stuff. But oh well. I might try one or two things by myself sometime.

[Natty S · Rating 4 out of 5]

A classic (i.e. dated -- especially language around gender) how-to book for middle grade (and middle class) kids about how to entertain yourself (and your friends) with stuff you find around the house or yard.

[Paulette · Rating 3 out of 5]

Those were the days when kids carried pocket knives and made something out of nothing and were happy! Fond memories.

I don't know many kids now who would pick up this book to learn about fun things to do. They wouldn't even google it but would have to be taught in a class...or not!

[Sasha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Outdated, but charming in concept.

[Michael Fitzgerald · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good stuff, even now.

[Ikrame Ettayaa · Rating 1 out of 5]

It sounds fun.. im going to try one of them someday

[Trudy Ferrer · Rating 3 out of 5]

bringin’ back the classics... 😹

[Arturo Pacheco · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a touching homage to childhood exploration and the creative spirit. It is at once a love letter to our future and an instructional manual for young tinkerers and adventurers.