What a month. Hybrid life seems to be more than twice as busy as either Zoomland or life in the beforetimes. Still, a highlight was the Festival of Economics in Bristol at the end of last week. I chaired a panel on the economics of household labour with Sonia Oreffice, Sarah Smith, Mary Ann Sieghart and Andy Eyles, and so before heading there I read Mary Ann’s book The Authority Gap: Why women are still taken less seriously than men and what we can do about it. (Festival recordings will go online shortly.)

It’s an excellent, if enraging, read. There are jaw-dropping accounts from very senior women – presidents, CEOs – of the various put-downs and mansplaining they’ve endured (for example, from Pope John Paul II in the case of Mary McAleese, then President of Ireland. Or Roula Khalaf, now Editor of the FT, being told she was too soft spoken to get on, i.e. not a man). It’s rather depressing to read so many ever-so-familiar experiences of being patronised, ignored, insulted or belittled even by such eminent women. The book summarises a good deal of the academic literature documenting discrimination and its consequences (for pay, promotion, health, happiness), without hitting the reader with a sledgehammer.

But what to do about it, as the subtitle promises? The book argues that there is much we can do, and that if we do it will be good for men as well. And it offers 20 pages of suggestions – for us, for employers, for the media, for policymakers. Many of the lists in each category start with noticing: do we address the men first in meetings or call on them first? Do we think about the adjectives we use? Do male partners reading this take the initiative in organising household matters, rather than waiting to be asked or told (no matter how cheerfully compliant)? There are some excellent ideas here, although I did feel the book is a bit too optimistic about how much some employers/partners/media want to change. Still, there are many good ideas here, helpful to those willing to make the effort.

Apart from this, much of November has been taken up with reading Louis Menand’s The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War. I loved The Metaphysical Club so was keen to read this. I’ll give it its own post when I’ve finally finished, but will just moan here that it’s a 700 page hardback that can only be read propped up on two cushions, and can’t be popped into a bag to read on the train. The consequence is that I’ve found it hard to keep the arc of the argument in mind, reading it on just a couple of evenings a week at home. But more of that later. BTW, around page 500 out of 700, the book introduces a chapter on ‘Women’s Lib’, observing that it’s all been about men so far.

And I read Abdulrazak’s Afterlives, which is wonderful.