The book is an attempt to understand the origins of modern world alienation. She does so partly by comparing modern life/society to classical greece's and partly through historical analysis of philosophical thoughts and scientific progress.

It's an interesting book; while I'm not fully on board with some of the arguments, it gave me some vocabulary to re-frame my thinking. I also don't really read non-fiction, much less philosophy so unsure if this is the norm but the multiple qualifiers in every sentence drove me a bit nuts.

The first part of the book romanticizes classical greece a bit too much I think. The next three parts distinguishes between different human activities - namely labor, work and action. The final part is about modern age.

I'm still not fully sure how to translate some of her arguments to the current world. Among the three kinds of human activities, she places (political) action as the highest form. I wonder what she would think of the current world where everything is political. Would she consider our current political discourse as "action"? We have essentially made political discourse into "labor" by her definition. We endlessly create and consume political content. So what is the role of action in this world?

It's a funny book to read right now, though, especially when the dawn of AI is upon us. Ready or not, Alienation on steriods, here we come!