The amateur : the pleasures of doing what you love / Andy Merrifield.

Includes bibliographical references.

Preface: feeling "more alive" -- 1. Professionals and amateurs -- 2. A question of faith -- 3. The measure of knowledge -- 4. City of amateurs -- 5. Work in the Crystal Palace -- 6. Professional democracy -- 7. The genius of curiosity -- 8. Hobby-horse -- 9. The amateur revolution -- Acknowledgements -- Notes.

"We have lost our amateur spirit and need to rediscover the radical and liberating pleasure of doing things we love. In The Amateur, thinker Andy Merrifield shows us how the many spheres of our lives—work, knowledge, home, politics—have fallen into the hands of box tickers, bean counters and pedants. In response, he corrals a team of independent thinkers, wayward poets, dabblers and square pegs who challenge accepted wisdom. Such figures as Charles Baudelaire, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Edward Said, Guy Debord, Hannah Arendt and Jane Jacobs show us the way. As we will see, the amateur takes risks, thinks the unthinkable, seeks independence—and changes the world. The Amateur is a passionate manifesto for the liberated life, one that questions authority and reclaims the iconoclast as a radical hero of our times."--Publisher's website.