The Little Book of Calm

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The Little Book of Calm (ISBN 0140285261) by meditation teacher Paul Wilson is a small book targeted at helping those in stressful situations to calm down. It was a distillation of Wilson's larger book "Instant Calm", a rewrite that he undertook during a Zen seminar in Japan. Published by Penguin Books, it is little to enable the said stressful readers to carry it upon their person and thereby use it in an emergency stress event. Reviews described it as "the first and still one of the best books aimed at counteracting stress"[1], and a "publishing sensation".[2] The book has been translated into 24 languages[3] including Italian[4], French[5], and Mandarin Chinese[6]

First released in 1997, the sales of The Little Book of Calm led to a number of small books being released by various publishers to "cash in" on its success.[7] Wilson followed up the book with titles including The Little Book of Calm at Work and The Little Book of Pleasure in 1998, The Little Book of Sleep and The Little Book of Hope in 1999, and The Little Book of Calm for Life in 2000.[8][9] The book has been described as having a similar "feel good" message to "Wear Sunscreen", an essay by Mary Schmich which had a similar message to The Little Book of Calm, and later inspired a best-selling single by Baz Luhrmann.[10]

[edit] References in popular culture

The book featured in numerous satires and parodies in the late Nineties, with cartoons[11] regularly appearing in UK daily newspapers. 'The Little Book of Calm was featured in the first episode of the British comedy Black Books, The book becomes lodged between the small intestine and the pancreas of Manny Bianco. We learn that "if it rotates a centimetre or two to the left, [he'd] be dead in seconds." Later The Little Book of Calm is absorbed into the body of Manny and he becomes one with the world and is able to dole out helpful calm-inviting taunts to passersby, such as "When you're feeling under pressure, do something different. Roll up your sleeves, or eat an orange". (Written by the screenwriters, not the book's author.) [12]

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ The Top Ten Self-Help Books by Susan Quilliam, iVillage. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  2. ^ Active Communication, Flemming Olsen and Birgit S�ndergaard. Some content available on Google Books. (Forlaget Samfundslitteratur, 2000) (ISBN 8759308524)
  3. ^ ABC Radio http://www.abc.net.au/rn/spiritofthings/stories/2007/1917354.htm
  4. ^ Il picolo libro della calma, Google Books. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  5. ^ Le petit livre du calme au travail, Google Books. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  6. ^ Ping jing xiao shu, Google Books. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  7. ^ Review of 1089 and all that from maths.org. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  8. ^ Books on calm from The University of East Anglia. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  9. ^ Little Books by Paul Wilson, Google Books. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  10. ^ E-mail inspires cult dance track, BBC.co.uk. Accessed 3 December 2007.
  11. ^ CartoonStock http://www.cartoonstock.com/lowres/jdo0882l.jpg and http://www.cartoonstock.com/newscartoons/cartoonists/rro/lowres/rron65l.jpg
  12. ^ "Cooking the Books" summary at TV.com. Accessed 3 December 2007.
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