Overview

By Australia’s greatest contemporary author, an elegant, succinct meditation on what makes for a happy life. ;-) “Happiness surely is among the simplest of human emotions and the most spontaneous,” says David Malouf. But what exactly are we looking for when we chase happiness? At this particular moment in history, privileged, industrialized nations have lessened much of what makes us unhappy: widespread poverty, illness, famine. Yet we are still unfulfilled, turning increasingly to yoga, church, Match.com, drugs, clinical therapy and retail therapy. What is at the root of our collective stress, and how can we find our way to contentment?   Drawing on mythology, philosophy, art and literature, Malouf traces our conception of happiness throughout history, distilling centuries of thought into a lucid narrative. He discusses the creation myths of ancient Greece and the philosophical schools of Athens, analyzes Thomas Jefferson’s revolutionary declaration that “the pursuit of happiness” is a right, explores the celebration of sensual delight in Rembrandt and Rubens and offers a perceptive take on a modern society growing larger and more impersonal.   With wisdom and insight, Malouf investigates that simplest, most spontaneous of feelings and urges us to do the same.

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9780307907714

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Reviews

Advance Praise for The Happy Life<br> <br> A penetrating meditation on happiness...Malouf eloquently weighs the appeal of material goods and well-being against the heft or morality and individual longing for something we can't always articulate. <br>-- Booklist <br> <br> Engaging...A slim volume of meditations on the conundrum that is happiness. <br>-- Kirkus Review <br> <br><br>Praise for David Malouf<br><br> David Malouf is one of our finest writers, a poet with an ear for language that transforms an interesting concept into a classic meditation on the role of chance in each of our lives. <br>-- San Francisco Chronicle <br> <br> A richly imagistic writer, philosophical and literary in the best sense. <br>-- The Washington Post Book World <br> <br> A first-rate writer---a sensitive historian of the spirit. <br>-- The Wall Street Journal <br> <br> [Malouf is] a storyteller of achievement, for whom simple things gracefully become totems for deeper thought. <br>-- The Philadelphia Inquirer <br> <br> Malouf's prose is delicate, marvelously alert to the natural world, and endowed with a quality that has one name only: wisdom. <br>-- The Sydney Morning Herald

David Malouf is one of our finest writers, a poet with an ear for language that transforms an interesting concept into a classic meditation on the role of chance in each of our lives. <br>-- San Francisco Chronicle <br> <br> A richly imagistic writer, philosophical and literary in the best sense. <br>-- The Washington Post Book World <br> <br> A first-rate writer---a sensitive historian of the spirit. <br>-- The Wall Street Journal <br> <br> [Malouf is] a storyteller of achievement, for whom simple things gracefully become totems for deeper thought. <br>-- The Philadelphia Inquirer <br> <br> Malouf's prose is delicate, marvelously alert to the natural world, and endowed with a quality that has one name only: wisdom. <br>-- The Sydney Morning Herald

Author Information

David Malouf is the author of eleven novels, as well as bountiful collections of stories, poetry and opera libretti. He has won the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Award, the Prix Femina Étranger and the Australia-Asia Literary Award; he has also been short-listed for the Man Booker Prize. David Malouf died in 2026.

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