THE REAL WORK: ON THE MYSTERY OF MASTERY

Bestselling author and New Yorker writer Adam Gopnik embarks on a wildly creative inquiry into perhaps the oldest question: how do we learn a new skill? For decades Adam Gopnik has been one of our most beloved writers a brilliantly perceptive critic of art food France and more. But recently he became obsessed by a fundamental matter: how did the people he was writing about learn their outlandish skill whether it was drawing a nude or baking a sourdough loaf? In The Real Work-the term magicians use for the accumulated craft that makes for a great trick-Gopnik apprentices himself to an artist a dancer a boxer and even a driving instructor (from the DMV) among others trying his late-middle-age hand at things he assumed were beyond him. He finds that mastering a skill is a process of methodically breaking down and building up piece by piece-and that true mastery in any field requires mastering other people''s minds. Exuberant and profound The Real Work is ultimately about why we relentlessly seek to better ourselves in the first place.PRAISE FOR ADAM GOPNIK''A real treat . . . Heartening proof of a life lived fully and fully savoured'' Claire Lowdon Times Literary Supplement''Gopnik has written with entrancing penetration on just about everything'' Christopher Bray Spectator''Witty and wise. Gopnik is a sleek stylist and a high-minded big-hearted moralist into the bargain'' Peter Conrad Observer ''Adam Gopnik is a dazzling talent - hilarious winning and deft'' Malcolm Gladwell