Learning to Love You More

by Harrell Fletcher, Miranda July

A collaboration between writer, filmmaker and artist Miranda July and Harrell Fletcher, this book brings together the best of the popular website learningtoloveyoumore.com, which asks ordinary people to contribute to assignments posted on the site and features responses that are surprising, touching, imaginative, and often hilarious.

Genres: Art, Nonfiction, Short Stories, Photography, Contemporary, Essays, Poetry

160 pages, Paperback

First published September 20, 2007

About the author

Harrell Fletcher (1967) is an American artist in Portland, Oregon who creates socially engaged interdisciplinary projects

Reviews

[Emily B · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 rounded up

I’m surprised I didn’t come across the learning to love you more website when I was a big fan of other websites such as a softer world and postsecret.

There are more pictures than text or essays. I appreciated this as community art and found each contribution and interpretation of the assignments interesting

[Melanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I openly wept on the subway three times while reading this book. It is alternately inspiring, heartbreaking, hilarious, cute, and consistently rivetting.

I can't say enough about it. As cheesey as it sounds, I actually do think I learned to love more. Or at least appreciate more.

And then at the end, Miranda thanked my good friend Shauna. Which was just icing on the cake.

[Denver Public Library · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once upon a time, when the Internet was young, a pair of artists made a site called http://learningtoloveyoumore.com/. They created "assignments" which people carried out, posting the results. It was sweet. It was wonky and personal and empowering. The site is still up. My favorite assignment is "Make an encouraging banner." This book documents some of the submissions for the project, which ran from 2002-2009. One of the artists was the now-famous Miranda July. Since then, collaborative Internet projects no longer dazzle us. This rough, charming little exercise in hope and free-spirited-sharing still shines.

Get Learning to Love You More from Denver Public Library

- Sarah E

[Karen Foster · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful collection of essays, photographs, art projects, sometimes just a few sentences, all submitted to a website founded by artists Fletcher and July. Over 5 years, visitors to the page were invited to accept various assignments and submit their work. This is just a fraction of the 5,000 submissions in all.
Sometimes moving, sometimes beautiful, sometimes funny, but always fascinating.... How humans respond to a simple creative prompt, exposing something real and true about themselves.

[Olivia · Rating 5 out of 5]

obviously was gonna start off the new year w a miranda july book

amazing and perfect and made me cry just like everything else she makes!

anyone who loves the beauty in the mundane, considers themself to be an artist/ creative, or just ppl looking for inspiration should read this. actually everyone should read this

also i would recommend reading this in one sitting. this was what i chose to do and it was a very immersive and cathartic experience!

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

more images, photography and drawings than essays and text but it occurred to me that this was written in 2007 (well before high volume usage of instagram, tumblr, etc. and i use those examples as they are image-based platforms).

very compelling how creatives expressed their "art" and world viewpoints during this time. the age of the digital camera and myspace and word-of-mouth trends (probably idk i was 8). very interesting scope into the lives of other people through this medium (ex: having people submit their favourite childhood books from around the world, have people give advice to kids). makes me wish we had a form of social media that was more fueled by creativity and fascination for others.

[Matthew Funke · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know why I bought this when it was free online.. anyways I liked it, and I still have some assignments to complete

[Erin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect pandemic book. I’m not familiar with Harrell Fletcher but everything Miranda July touches continues to be magic.

[Lucy Johnston · Rating 3 out of 5]

The phone calls you wish you could have were my favorites. A bit too ✨ for me

[shoshi · Rating 5 out of 5]

completely gorgeous

[jess · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is winter in Olympia! Even our "January Project" of new vegan recipes on the daily can't entirely distract me from the foggy, gloomy Janu-Februaries that haunt me. I keep coming back to these LTLYM exercises, stories, images and moments that push my brain a little bit, just enough to stretch my heart. I am trying to consciously be more engaged in the process of "loving more." I feel disappointed in my own apathetic, half-assed attempts at relating to people during recent years. It's hard work / it's heart work, and I'm glad to have people like Miranda July, Harrell Fletcher, and their merry band of LTLYM-er's to help me along this path.

I have long mulled over Miranda July & Harrell Fletcher's website, www.learningtoloveyoumore.com, and appreciated the simple assignments done by many people. Selections from the website submissions have been compiled into this book. I like learning new ways for people to come together and feel new feelings. I like series of repeated items. I like Learning To Love You More. I'm not sure why it took me so long to read this book - possibly the same reason it has taken me so long to do any of the LTLYM assignments. I delighted in the pages of this book, though, finding photos and stories from people I know, and poring over the words and images from people I will never know. I read parts of it with my wife, parts of it with our son, parts of it in the early morning with a cup of coffee, and part of it alone with a book lamp under the covers after lights-out.

You don't have to do the assignments in any particular order, nor do you have to do them all, and the organization of the book reflects that - there is not a sequential order to the pieces, and the trajectory is unclear, but the assignments are listed in the back in order. So you can see everyone else's work, get fired up about your own ideas, and then get to the end and find your own "to do" list.

[Karima · Rating 5 out of 5]

From Publishers Weekly
In this selection of art and personal stories from their website, learningtoloveyoumore.com, artists Fletcher and July (author of the short story collection No One Belongs Here More than You) present a jumble of the poignant and slapstick. Founded in 2002, the website provides its visitors with arty "assignments" and asks that participants post their responses online. Assignments range from the straightforward (#9: "Draw a constellation from someone's freckles") to the absurd (#1: "Make a child's outfit in an adult size...and wear it as much as possible") to the heart-wrenching (#31: "Spend time with a dying person"). The resonance of the work submitted and displayed on the easily navigated website is sadly diminished in book form, where a willing lack of organization often isolates contributions from the same assignment; though it's probably the authors' way of encouraging readers to slow down and browse a bit, the awkward format doesn't do the lively, carefully crafted contributions justice. A more conventional presentation (including, say, an index) would have gone a long way toward making the most of both contributors' works and readers' time. More compelling is a complete list of assignments in the final pages, which offers many points of departure for the inspired browser. 160 color illustrations.

from Karima: Wonderful book. Wonderful idea. NOT just for artists. Full of exercises to keep you heart and mind OPEN. also a lot of fun to do with a friend.

[Jesse · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book surprisingly touching and intimate. People taking pictures of their parents kissing, shots of what goes on under the bed while animals and dust bunnies think you aren't looking, strangers hugging. It helped me think about connection and ways we are and are not connected and ways to make those connections happen.

[Bistra Ivanova · Rating 5 out of 5]

i do love the online project and the book is also cool but i really missed the audio and video assignments
everything is quite different when you read it on paper :-)

[Steve Portigal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't know Harrell Fletcher, but Miranda July has a certain gift for finding the beauty in the mundane, or highlighting the mundane in a way that surfaces its beauty, perhaps. This "artistic" submissions from the website which were then selected for this book render it fairly uneven, with many banal examples, and some profoundly devastating ones (mostly when people write their life stories). Perhaps this flavor everyday stuff from everyday people - especially in the aggregate - is just 10-years-ago, and I might have had more of a reaction if I had looked at it earlier?

A few really great essays at the end of the book shifted my enthusiasm up a notch, kind of like when you watch a reasonable movie but then listening to the commentary makes you feel more excited about the movie than you otherwise would have.

[Edina Paljevic · Rating 5 out of 5]

a gem that i found recently in a little free library. i loved everything about this book. in 2002, miranda and harrell created an online art project where over 8,000 people posted work that they created to a series of assignments. some of the prompts were write down a recent argument, take a picture of strangers holding hands, spend time with a dying person, write your life story in less than a day, make an encouraging banner, write the phone call you wish you could have, and so on. this book was really touching and inspiring at the same time. i found myself smiling and slightly tearing up at other pages. the world is a strange strange place with lots of beautiful, weird, exciting, and upsetting moments that fill our everyday lives. and luckily this book gave me the chance to see from a strangers prospective.

[gaby :-) · Rating 5 out of 5]

unknown if i would count this as a book. yes i did read passages at some point but it just felt more like a journal.

this was beautiful. absolutely stunning. its a book full of prompts that these authors gave to random people on their website and people’s responses to it. this book is full of people’s lives and stories and words and it is really a beautiful beautiful thing. the photos of the sun made me tear up, and the ones that ask to write about a phone call you wish you could have. so beautifully simple, thinking about buying this one for myself

also, want to do this. unsure how? asking friends when drunk? making a website to submit things like this? maybe making it for myself that i send random questions that i Have to do and make a journal out of it? unsure, will ponder

[Samet · Rating 4 out of 5]

it is an entertaining book about the outcome of an art project. it was interesting to see/read what ordinary people created.

[SYK · Rating 4 out of 5]

All send in conversations for Assignment 52 were my favorites.

[Tim Rideout · Rating 4 out of 5]

The world is stranger, more beautiful, more diverse, more frightening, more fleeting than we ever realise.

[Kristen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best pieces July has made. The projects that she and Fletcher curated we’re moving and interesting. I was especially fond of the personal narratives they chose.

[Erin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to submit an odd thing or two to the LTLYM site, yet somehow this book has completely escaped my attention. I picked it up today, and really enjoyed it!

[gracie · Rating 5 out of 5]

weeping

[Lobke · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful project and great book design

[laura]

I believe this is the first book that has ever made me cry

[Hannis ⭐️ · Rating 5 out of 5]

this was made for an artist like Me

[Em Adamo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love these corny mfs. I loved this even though it’s a lil too similar to a tumblr.. I could sense the empowerment felt by contributors thru this process.

[Jocelyne Flores · Rating 5 out of 5]

An ode to human feelings, what could be better than that

[Jada Hauser · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short and sweet read. I want to do some of the prompts in this book!

[lu merk]

I really liked this book and it made me yearn to be active within a blog space/substack community