A young worker at the C & NW RR 40th Street shops, Chicago, Ill, photograph by Jack Delano, 1942. Library of Congress.

A young worker at the C & NW RR 40th Street shops, Chicago, Illinois, 1942. Photograph by Jack Delano. Library of Congress.

Lines of Work

Volume IV, Number 2 | spring 2011

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Women become skilled shop technicians after careful training in the school at the Douglas Aircraft Company plant, Long Beach, CA, photograph by Alfred T. Palmer, 1942. Library of Congress.

Preamble

The Servant Problem

By Lewis H. Lapham

It is man’s nature to be doing something, or at least to fancy that he’s doing something, but to what purpose?

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Pushing Paper

By Ben Kafka

Paperwork has never fit comfortably into our idea of what work means—it has no heroes and few sympathies.

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Map

Cornering the Market

The countries that rule the industries.

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c. 1548 | Geneva

Assigned Positions

John Calvin explains how to find your vocation.More

1976 | Pagsanjan

Set Decoration

Behind the scenes of a filmmaker’s apocalypse.More

c. 1923 | Paris

Mutual Interest

The courting of Marie Curie.More

Charts & Graphs

The Worst Jobs in the World

A matrix of unsavory employment.

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German writer, composer, and painter E. T. A. Hoffmann.

Lewis Lapham at his desk

Portrait of Chinese Daoist Zhuangzi.

Bust of Hesiod

Painted portrait of Florentine statesman and philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli.

American abolitionist and author Harriet Jacobs.

Roman playwright Terence.

Engraving of Scottish economist Adam Smith.

I like work; it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.

—Jerome K. Jerome, 1889

Color portrait of German theologian and reformer Martin Luther.

British philosopher, logician, and social critic Bertrand Russell.

Martin Luther & Bertrand Russell

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