Add it to your IMDb page. Find out more at IMDbPro ». How Much Have You Seen? How much of Alain de Botton's work have you seen? Known For. My Last Five Girlfriends Writer. The Art of Travel Writer.
The Future Is Now! The Philosopher. Show all Hide all Show by Hide Show Writer 6 credits. Show all 6 episodes. Hide Show Actor 1 credit. Hide Show Producer 1 credit. I have lots of fears as a writer - that what I write is not good enough. A huge fear, but mostly, what I write and think about first time is rather poor and has to be improved upon.
I am not sure if any writer is ever satisfied first time around, but I am certainly not. So this demands nerves of steel - one has to think: "It is terrible now, but hopefully one day it can be good. Music means a lot to me.
I am moved, on the one hand, by the cantatas of Bach and, on the other hand, I am drawn mostly to modern female vocalists, in particular, Sinead O'Connor and Natalie Merchant. Like most writers, I wish I could have been a musician.
I confess not to be very interested, myself, in "popularising" philosophy. I am keen, though, to look at certain ideas that have appeared in philosophy, as well as in history, art, science, etc, and weave my own reflections in with them. It is clear to me that there is no good reason for many philosophy books to sound as complicated as they do. It is not the ideas that necessitate such impenetrable prose, it's that the authors can't write very well or, if they can, they are overtly interested in frightening the reader.
I am in general a very pessimistic person with an optimistic day-to-day take on things. The bare facts of life are utterly terrifying, and yet, one can laugh. Indeed, one has to laugh precisely because of the darkness: the nervous laughter of the trenches. I was uncomfortable writing fiction. My love was the personal essay rather than the novel.
My first book, 'Essays In Love', was, in fact, an essay, but my publisher changed its definition to a novel because she thought it would sell better. Yes, it is self-therapy.
And if other people find value in it, it's precisely on that basis. So I'm the opposite of an academic who comes at knowledge from a desire to find out exactly what Plato thought. My view is: OK, let's find out what Plato thought because he might make a difference to me, to you, he might tell us something that is of use. Although de Botton seems very confident now - he turns 40 this year - he says any confidence is recently gained.
As a child, he was too shy to look anyone in the eye. As a teenager, he was "quite puppyishly keen to make friends and never quite understanding why that didn't happen. I was an incredibly lonely, very alienated, teenager. It also made him think about ageing, which is unusual at He thinks it matured him psychologically, but he still had a long way to go. He had a pattern of falling in love with girls but then going off them when they showed signs of loving him back.
The problem was only solved with two years of psychotherapy in his early 30s. I learnt to stop fantasising about the perfect job or the perfect relationship because that can actually be an excuse for not living. I was full of youthful romanticism, which teeters on solipsism and a kind of narcissism. So I think I possibly wouldn't have been able to get married and have children if I hadn't had some of those very earth-shattering conversations.
He met his wife Charlotte in in a typically quirky de Bottonian way. He was talking with friends late at night and someone asked him to describe his ideal girlfriend, so he did, in great detail, and "miraculously one person in the room took note of this and introduced me to Charlotte the very next weekend.
He said his ideal girlfriend had to be a doctor's daughter who grew up outside London and worked in business or science, all of which Charlotte was. Why a doctor's daughter? I think partly because I'd observed in my parents' life a kind of unpleasantness that can come at the top of society. My father, because he needed to find investors in his business, had to spend a lot of time sucking up to rich people. And I rather ran away from that.
I was interested in the idea of 'the normal', and I thought the country was more normal. Did he say that his ideal girlfriend had to be Jewish? I preferred not Jewish. I think I might have gone so far as to say that she must have had a Christian education, which indeed she had. Because it was so taboo! My parents said if you marry a Christian, they will turn round one day and call you a dirty Jew - that's what all good Jewish children are brought up thinking. My sister married a non-Jew and there was quite a lot of fuss.
De Botton says in Proust, "What is fascinating about marriage is why anyone wants to get married. In a way, they want to end powerful feelings, or certainly the negative ones. To me, that was the promise of marriage, that it would answer all those questions about love once and for all. The Art of Travel investigates the issues that lie behind our desire to travel, and the themes of Status Anxiety , are also examined in a Channel 4 television series.
Alain de Botton lives in London. He has been involved in making a number of television documentaries, and helps to run a production company, Seneca Productions. Alain also started and helps to run a school in London called The School of Life, dedicated to a new vision of education. He typically raises questions: how to live, how to love and how to find happiness — and suggests some Self Help solutions to these perennial conundrums.
Recently de Botton has helped found two new organizations - Living Architecture and The School of Life - the latter aiming to challenge traditional university teaching and direct students to a more fulfilled life see alaindebotton.
His first book, Essays in Love: A Novel , is a playfully erudite mix of fiction and philosophical questioning.
It follows the progress of a love affair between the architect narrator and Chloe, a young graphic designer, who meet during a flight between Paris and London. But this is no conventional love-gone-wrong. Also fascinating his discussions of the origins of characters within In Search of Lost Time.
The book then turns into an instruction manual, replete with Proustian maxims, on how to love life, stop wasting time, how to be happy in love.
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