From the author of Stylish Academic Writing comes an essential new guide for writers aspiring to become more productive and take greater pleasure in their craft. Helen Sword interviewed one hundred academics worldwide about their writing background and practices. Relatively few were trained as writers, she found, and yet all have developed strategies to thrive in their publish-or-perish environment.
So how do these successful academics write, and where do they find the “air and light and time and space,” in the words of poet Charles Bukowski, to get their writing done? What are their formative experiences, their daily routines, their habits of mind? How do they summon up the courage to take intellectual risks and the resilience to deal with rejection?
Sword identifies four cornerstones that anchor any successful writing practice: Behavioral habits of discipline and persistence; Artisanal habits of craftsmanship and care; Social habits of collegiality and collaboration; and Emotional habits of positivity and pleasure. Building on this “BASE,” she illuminates the emotional complexity of the writing process and exposes the lack of writing support typically available to early-career academics. She also lays to rest the myth that academics must produce safe, conventional prose or risk professional failure. The successful writers profiled here tell stories of intellectual passions indulged, disciplinary conventions subverted, and risk-taking rewarded. Grounded in empirical research and focused on sustainable change, Air & Light & Time & Space offers a customizable blueprint for refreshing personal habits and creating a collegial environment where all writers can flourish.

《涂尔干死了！》是阿瑟·阿萨·伯格最近一部学术推理小说，这是一部集社会学理论和推理小说于一体的作品。来自19世纪和20世纪最重要的几位社会学家和社会思想家W.E.B·杜波依斯、埃米尔·涂尔干、西格蒙德·弗洛伊德、弗拉基米尔·列宁、格奥尔格·齐美尔、比阿特丽斯·韦布和马克斯·韦伯在出席在伦敦举行的一个学术讨论会。在会前的一个晚会上，发生了学者斗殴、珠宝失窃、涂尔干失踪等一系列可怕的案件，杰出的私家侦探夏洛克·福尔摩斯和他忠实的搭档约翰·华生博士介入了这群社会学家，展开调查。社会学家们纷纷向福尔摩斯讲述他们的社会学理论，并展开了一些争论。马克思主义、女权主义、种族理论、精神分析等社会在这里激烈交锋，充满了智慧、思想和幽默。终于，这场扑朔迷离的案子真相大白，一切的一切，都是源于涂尔干的一个试验而已。