Advance Praise for Shop Class as Soulcraft:

“Matt Crawford’s remarkable book on the morality and metaphysics of the repairman looks into the reality of practical activity. It is a superb combination of testimony and reflection, and you can’t put it down.”

Harvey Mansfield, Professor of Government, Harvard University

“Every once in a great while, a book will come along that’s brilliant and true and perfect for its time. Matthew B. Crawford’s Shop Class as Soulcraft is that kind of book, a prophetic and searching examination of what we’ve lost by ceasing to work with our hands—and how we can get it back. During this time of cultural anxiety and reckoning, when the conventional wisdom that has long driven our wealthy, sophisticated culture is foundering amid an economic and spiritual tempest, Crawford’s liberating volume appears like a lifeboat on the horizon.”

Rod Dreher, author of Crunchy Cons: The New Conservative Counterculture and Its Return to Roots

“This is a deep exploration of craftsmanship by someone with real, hands-on knowledge. The book is also quirky, surprising, and sometimes quite moving.”

Richard Sennett, author of The Craftsman

“Matt Crawford has written a brave and indispensable book. By making a powerful case for the enduring value of the manual trades, Shop Class as Soulcraft offers a bracing alternative to the techno-babble that passes for conventional wisdom, and points the way to a profoundly necessary reconnection with the material world. No one who cares about the future of human work can afford to ignore this book.”

Jackson Lears, Editor in Chief, Raritan

“We are on the verge of a national renewal. It will have more depth and grace if we read Crawford’s book carefully and take it to heart. He is a sharp theorist, a practicing mechanic, and a captivating writer.”

Albert Borgmann, author of Real American Ethics

“Shop Class as Soulcraft is easily the most compelling polemic since The Closing of the American Mind. Crawford offers a stunning indictment of the modern workplace, detailing the many ways it deadens our senses and saps our vitality. And he describes how our educational system has done violence to our true nature as ‘homo faber.’ Better still, Crawford points in the direction of a richer, more fulfilling way of life. This is a book that will endure.”

Reihan Salam, associate editor at The Atlantic, co-author of Grand New Party

“Crawford reveals the satisfactions of the active craftsman who cultivates his own judgment, rather than being a passive consumer subject to manipulated fantasies of individuality and creativity.”

Nathan Tarcov, Committee on Social Thought, University of Chicago