![]() ![]() Biss is ambivalent about her newly purchased home, perhaps the ultimate cultural symbol of prosperity: “After years of looking, I was no longer convinced that I wanted a house,” she writes. Having and Being Had deploys memoir, research, and criticism to explore what happens after you get what you want-or what you have been told to want. ![]() Despite the supposed meritocracy at work, grit and determination are not enough.Īfter years of inconsistent employment, Biss, a writer and college professor, secures a stable job and is able to buy a house. The dream of affluence lures Casey into its orbit but never quite admits her. In her single-minded pursuit of wealth, she also manages to alienate her parents, her mentor, and her partner, and must confront whether the class mobility is worth the price. She’s also tripped up by her own expensive taste: Though she handles large sums on the trading floor, her personal finances are undermined by purchases of an antique book and luxe clothing. But she carries the constant anxiety of trying to keep up with her primarily white peers who come from money and live a lifestyle she can’t afford. Taking a summer internship at an investment-banking firm, she navigates its grueling hours and cutthroat competition very capably. But she covets a different kind of American dream: “a bright, glittering life” of luxury goods. Her parents, who emigrated from Korea and manage a Manhattan dry cleaner, urge Casey to pursue a steady job in a field like law or medicine. Lee’s first novel opens with a warning: “Competence can be a curse.” The warned is Casey Han, a recent Princeton graduate. They acknowledge how social factors shape both what we aspire to and what’s considered attainable, and they challenge us to think critically about the things that we decide are desirable and why.įree Food for Millionaires, by Min Jin Lee The following seven titles offer ways to rethink our relationship to the sometimes knee-jerk impulse that pushes us to want more. Recent changes in my own job situation have encouraged me to reassess, with the help of reading, where I fall on that scale: What is it I actually want? If I had more of a say in directing the flow of my efforts, where would they go? When it really comes down to it, how hard do I actually want to be working-and when would I simply prefer not to? Literature is rife with characters like Jay Gatsby, whose ambition eventually brings him down, or who have no ambition to speak of, like Herman Melville’s Bartleby. This is a question that books are well equipped to answer. Rather than seeing boundless striving as an unquestioned virtue, a wide swath of people is now just as likely to ask whether it might be doing them more harm than good. The pandemic, for many 9-to-5ers, prompted a large-scale assessment of what to reach for, how hard to try to attain it, and whether the object or the effort is truly worth it. Mass layoffs are taking place in sectors that include tech and journalism. ![]() Wages haven’t kept pace with the cost of living. The classic American story of ambition-work hard and you will be rewarded-has never seemed more outdated. ![]()
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