To the ears of ceaselessly busy and ambitious modern Westerners, it will come as a shock, and perhaps as an insult, to be told that human affairs are “unserious.” But this fundamental truth is exactly what James Schall, following Plato, has to teach us in this wise and witty book.

Schall cites Charlie Brown, Aristotle, and Samuel Johnson with the same sobriety—the sobriety that sees the truth in what is delightful and even amusing. Singing, dancing, playing, contemplating, and other “useless” human activities are not merely forms of escape from more important things—politics, work, social activism, etc.—but an indication of the very nature of the highest things themselves.

On the Unseriousness of Human Affairs is an instructive volume whose countercultural message is of vital importance.