The Buddha. Rene Descartes. Emily Dickinson. Greta Garbo. Bobby Fischer. J. D. Salinger: Loners, all—along with as many as 25 percent of the world's population. Loners keep to themselves, and like it that way. Yet in the press, in films, in folklore, and nearly everywhere one looks, loners are tagged as losers and psychopaths, perverts and pity cases, ogres and mad bombers, elitists and wicked witches. Too often, loners buy into those messages and strive to change, making themselves miserable in the process by hiding their true nature—and hiding from it. Loners as a group deserve to be reassessed—to claim their rightful place, rather than be perceived as damaged goods that need to be "fixed." In Party of One Anneli Rufus -- a prize-winning, critically acclaimed writer with talent to burn -- has crafted a morally urgent, historically compelling tour de force—a long-overdue argument in defense of the loner, then and now. Marshalling a polymath's easy erudition tomake her case, assembling evidence from every conceivable arena of culture as well as interviews with experts and loners worldwide and her own acutely calibrated analysis, Rufus rebuts the prevailing notion that aloneness is indistinguishable from loneliness, the fallacy that all of those who are alone don't want to be, and wouldn't be, if only they knew how.
Party of One: The Loners' Manifesto
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From Publishers Weekly
In this compendium of everyone who was anyone who ever spent a moment alone, readers bump fleetingly into Kurt Cobain, French Resistance fighters, the Lone Ranger ("Tonto notwithstanding"), Michelangelo, Alexander Pope, John Lennon, cowboys, Saint Anthony and other solo acts. Rufus, the books editor of East Bay Express, views Degas's plain-faced dancers as "pretty ballerinas" whom the artist leaves every time he exits his studio, and Warhol's biography as "tellingly titled Loner at the Ball." She chases her motif, not so much a manifesto as a cri de coeur, through an assortment of perspectives: religion, advertising, clothes, crime, art, eccentricity, environment, literature, religion and popular culture. She also identifies "pseudoloners" like Theodore Kaczynski and Jesus Christ (who "was too good at guiding crowds to have been one of us"). There's an us/them tone to this book that makes one wonder who the audience might be. The "us" people "do not need writers to tell us how lovely apartness is"; the "them" people will surely weary of being identified as "Nonloners. The world at large. The mob." Taken in column-sized doses, Rufus may be entertaining and informative, but her book feels as if too much random information has been cut-and-pasted together.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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IMAGINE YOU'RE A loner whose ideal home would be a cottage on the beach, miles from the nearest neighbor. Read the first page
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IMAGINE YOU'RE A loner whose ideal home would be a cottage on the beach, miles from the nearest neighbor. Read the first page
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
By V. Marshall
Format:Paperback
Finally an answer to a loner's prayers! We are not as strange as the world wants to make us out to be afterall.
Anneli Rufus has done a magnificent job telling about life from a loner's perspective and making it all sound capable and NORMAL. She writes chapters on the loner in community, popular culture, films, advertising, friendships, love & sex, technology, art, literature, religion, sanity, crime, eccentricity, clothes, environment, solo adventures and at last childhood. The words are a true manifesto for a loner's hungry soul, finally another person who understands.
In a world where loners are thought to be strange, crazy serial killers who cannot conform to society, Rufus encourages the idea that most loners in truth are the great creators and contemplators of the world. Issac Newton, Michaelangelo, writers, artists and philosophers become necessary human beings within all of their secretiveness. Instead of being arrogant attention getting hounds most loners create from the heart and give without a need for recognition, the truly unselfish can be found only in those selfish enough to enjoy being alone.
I would have loved to have given this book to a teacher who I had as a child. I remember sitting in a room with my parents while they were told by the "teacher" that she felt I was somehow autistic and withdrawn and might need "special" education. Despite my A's, my ability to pay attention and my athletic ability I was labeled and marked as a failure in her eyes. I wonder how many children today are pegged as something they are not and guided in a wrong direction. It took me 40 years to figure out how unique and completely normal I really am but I would hope after reading this book many others could celebrate the adventure alot sooner. A must read for those of you with quiet, withdrawn children who would rather day dream than stand around with all the other cattle.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I agree with the few other reviewers that didn't like this book. Like everyone else, I was attracted to the book because it sounded like an interesting treatment of my dominant personality trait, introversion. However, the book seems more like a one-sided journal of grievances, where loners are always poor sensitive souls who are abused by an the majority 'mob' of extoverts. This is a way too simplistic view, especially for someone who claims that loners are typically more thoughtful and insightful than most. For one, the world isn't divided into introverts and 'the mob'--personalities come in all shades between shy and gregarious. And describing non-introverts as a 'mob' is encouraging an unfair, close-minded view that anyone who doesn't understand you, or who prefers socializing, must be a dull, insensitive part of some herd. Only introverts can be individuals? Give me a break. It's not easy being shy when outgoing is the norm, but blaming other people for your problems isn't going to help. I would have prefered a fairer treatment of all types of people, rather than pages and pages of "us vs them, and we are always right".
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By R. Speizer
Format:Paperback
When I first looked at this book I thought it was going to be rather a dry read. I was completely wrong. While light hearted, it is a serious and entertaining look into what is a loner, and why they are important to society.
Anneli Rufus pulls together so much. Why are loners the persecuted minority, yet worshiped in literature and the arts.
Perhaps the most telling chapter is how the media constantly pushes the image of the "loner" as the criminal type involved in so many violent crimes. The reality is that such people are not loners by choice, but outcasts who do not want to be alone.
If you are an introvert, and don't understand why people won't leave you alone, or why people think you are a weirdo because you prefer your own company, or even the spouse of a loner, this is a book not to be missed.
Anneli Rufus pulls together so much. Why are loners the persecuted minority, yet worshiped in literature and the arts.
Perhaps the most telling chapter is how the media constantly pushes the image of the "loner" as the criminal type involved in so many violent crimes. The reality is that such people are not loners by choice, but outcasts who do not want to be alone.
If you are an introvert, and don't understand why people won't leave you alone, or why people think you are a weirdo because you prefer your own company, or even the spouse of a loner, this is a book not to be missed.
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3.8 out of 5 stars
Most recent customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Take a peak into the life of that person in the corner ....
Growing up, Barbra Streisand sang that "people who need people are the luckiest people in the world." I didn't get it. Read more
Published on July 16 2004 by C. P.
2.0 out of 5 stars
A disappointment.
This book would have been more helpful and credible had it been written by an objective person. Instead, it is written by someone who calls herself a "loner" (without... Read more
Published on July 12 2004
1.0 out of 5 stars
trite
This book is more a platform for Ms. Rufus's political views than a manifesto on solitude. She resorts to tired cliches rather than doing any useful research. Read more
Published on July 4 2004
5.0 out of 5 stars
Insightful and resourceful
I stumbled upon this book during a jaunt through my favorite local book store, and decided to give it a try. Read more
Published on Jun 28 2004 by Skip
1.0 out of 5 stars
Still an outcast...
The book made me feel like the Delta loner, a weak, pessimistic person who needs attention yet won't admit it around the Alpha loners.
Published on Jun 21 2004 by Raquel
5.0 out of 5 stars
Be a loner and rejoice!
After picking up this tome, I was pleased to read a humorous but serious take on the loner persona. Being a loner, i truly understand the incidents and feelings described in this... Read more
Published on Jun 15 2004 by S. Brainard
5.0 out of 5 stars
the best read a loner could ever take on
instead of addressing how much i liked the book lets go over what the none likers of this book said. for the guy that thinks this was a poor definition of loner. Read more
Published on May 3 2004 by sevendlysins
5.0 out of 5 stars
BEWARE: Incorrect description of *Loner* in this book!
First, a few major flaws in this work that i'd now like to bring to light:
The author's definition of a loner excludes people who are alone but who desperately want to be... Read more
The author's definition of a loner excludes people who are alone but who desperately want to be... Read more
Published on April 26 2004
5.0 out of 5 stars
In Praise of Loners
I can't imagine being a loner and not being thrilled with this book. What a breath of fresh air to read the positives of lonerdom instead of a "how to be an introvert in an... Read more
Published on April 9 2004 by SeaSoul
4.0 out of 5 stars
witty read
I am an introvert and a loner (the two are not always interchangeable). As loners do not often open up to many around them, I appreciated meeting another loner who thought and felt... Read more
Published on Mar 15 2004
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