How to Tell When You're Tired A Brief Examination of Work [Paperback]

A longshoreman on the San Francisco waterfront for over thirty years, Reg Theriault distills that experience into a wry, knowing, tough-minded book that finally gives voice to the thoughts and conditions of laboring men and women. It is an engaging and moving defense of the working class's right to its portion of credit and dignity for building, job by dirty, demanding job, the civilization we inhabit. Here is a book George Orwell would understand--and applaud.Theriault has packed this charming little primer with all the work lore and humane radicalism of the old Wobblies. . . . An often moving meditation on the meaning of work, play and class.Theriault could be destined to become the laureate of labor.I found it extraordinary. This is an absolutely wonderful book about work, our blessing and our curse. What makes it so exhilarating is that it was written, not by a cool and detached scholar, but by a working man. Eloquent and witty, it may become something of a classic. --Studs Terkel