The Joy of Quiet: Desperate to Unplug (or coping with the age of always-on)

Join us for a lively discussion about the impact of the contemporary era of connectedness on our ability to think, create, and participate in the world. In this busy, always-on age, many are eager to find ways to disconnect. Internet addiction camps. TV-free resorts. Yoga retreats that promise restoration from our busy lives.

This winter, celebrated writer Pico Iyer (who has yet to own a cell phone) extolled the virtues of peace and quiet. In The New York Times, he wrote: “In barely one generation we’ve moved from exulting in the time-saving devices that have so expanded our lives to trying to get away from them — often in order to make more time. The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug. Like teenagers, we appear to have gone from knowing nothing about the world to knowing too much all but overnight.”

Pico Iyer is the author of eight works of non-fiction, including Video Night in Kathmandu, The Lady and the Monk, The Global Soul and The Open Road, describing more than thirty years of talking and traveling with the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. His most recent book, on Graham Greene —The Man Within My Head—came out earlier this year. Lisa Napoli is a journalist and author. She is correspondent at KCRW. She is author of RADIO SHANGRI-LA: What I Learned in Bhutan, the Happiest Kingdom on Earth.

Iyer and Napoli sign copies of their latest books following the talk. Fowler members $15 (Use code 'FOWLER" at checkout); $20 general. Tickets at www.livetalksla.org

Note: come early for our Fowler Out Loud A Capella concert at 6 pm and to visit our exibitions, open until 8 pm.