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What it argues
Daily Rituals is Mason Currey's compilation of the working habits of 161 writers, artists, composers, philosophers, and scientists — from Beethoven to Darwin, Kafka to Freud, Maya Angelou to W.H. Auden. The book grew from Currey's blog, which was itself provoked by E.B. White's assertion that the only way for a writer to succeed is by writing regularly, no matter how they feel. Each entry is brief — typically one to three pages — describing the subject's daily schedule, working conditions, stimulant use, and the rituals they depended on.
The book has no overarching argument. It is a collection rather than a thesis. But patterns emerge from the accumulation: most of the most productive creative people worked relatively short focused hours on their primary work — rarely more than four to five hours per day — and spent the rest of the day in rest, correspondence, walks, and social activity. Many used alcohol, caffeine, or other stimulants as part of their working ritual. Almost all of them had fixed rituals that signaled the beginning and end of work.
What it gets right
- 1.
Most highly productive creative people worked relatively short focused hours on their primary work — often only three to five hours per day — rather than grinding all day.
- 2.
Fixed daily rituals — specific times, places, and conditions for working — appear consistently across the lives of productive artists, regardless of their other eccentricities.
- 3.
The ability to return to the work reliably, day after day, regardless of mood or circumstance, is the most consistent feature of the productive lives documented here.
What it covers
Who wrote it
Mason Currey is an American writer and editor who worked in publishing before starting the Daily Routines blog in 2007, which became the basis for Daily Rituals. He worked on the book full-time while also editing at Metropolis magazine, which meant he was writing about creative routines while struggling to maintain one himself — a irony he acknowledges in the book's preface. He published a sequel, Daily Rituals: Women at Work, in 2019. He lives in New York.
