The School of Life

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For other uses, see School of Life (disambiguation).

The School of Life
Three 13 Solutions, Campus London LLP, ELOE Limited, STOA Limited.[1]
Founded2008; 18 years ago (2008)
FoundersAlain de Botton, Sophie Howarth
Headquarters
London, England
Websitewww.theschooloflife.com Edit this at Wikidata

The School of Life is a British multinational[2] social media company founded in 2008 by British author and public speaker Alain de Botton.[3][4] The company is headquartered in London.[5] It publishes various materials dealing with the topics of anxiety management,[6] emotional intelligence, relationships, work, creativity, and spirituality. The company also offers talks, workshops, and counseling services.

History

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The School of Life was founded in 2008[4] by Alain de Botton and Sophie Howarth. Its publishing arm was launched in 2016, with books produced by a content team, some of which were (in 2023) training to the be therapists.[7][8]

Publishing

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As of 2016, The School of Life owns a publishing press named "The School of Life Press."[9] As of 2025, the company's website sells 98 titles in its "books" category, some of which are workbooks.

Books (incomplete selection)

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  • Great Thinkers (2016)
  • Relationships (2017)
  • Why You Will Marry the Wrong Person (2018)
  • How to Overcome Your Childhood (2018)
  • Anxiety (2019)
  • Big Ideas for Curious Minds (2019)
  • What They Forgot to Teach You at School (2020)
  • The Good Enough Parent (2021)
  • On Self Hatred (2022)
  • How Modern Media Destroys Our Minds (2022)
  • Big Ideas From Literature (2024)[10]

Reception

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The company has been criticized for its representations of philosophers and philosophical arguments. The Los Angeles Review of Books criticized a series of books by the School of Life as being a "vortex of jargon pitched somewhere between the banal banter of daytime talk shows and the schedule for a nightmarish New Age retreat."[11] Professor Hans-Georg Moeller of the University of Macau has criticized the School's video on Lao Tzu, stating that it used fabricated quotes and misrepresented the Tao Te Ching.[12]

The New Republic criticised The School of Life's self-help books for being poorly written and pretentious with little or no useful insight.[13]

The philosophy blog, Erraticus, praised the company for its critiques of romanticism and efforts to foster emotional intelligence using philosophy, arguing that The School of Life offers "self-help for those who might need a bit more engagement with the intellect to consider the complete living that comes with also employing our faculties that operate from the neck down."[14]

References

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  1. ^ "Campus London LLP – Overview (free company information from Companies House)".
  2. ^ "A Brief History of the School of Life". Happiness.com. Retrieved 2 February 2024.
  3. ^ "The School of Life: An Interview With Alain de Botton". HuffPost. 12 May 2016. Retrieved 20 June 2017.
  4. ^ a b Wyndham, Susan (29 June 2016). "Alain de Botton and his School of Life come to Sydney". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 20 June 2017.
  5. ^ "Londoner's Diary: Alain De Botton and his school exit Europe". London Evening Standard. 10 April 2017. Retrieved 20 June 2017.
  6. ^ Dynes, Robin (28 April 2017). "Preparing for Anxiety Management Training". Anxiety Management. pp. 1–18. doi:10.4324/9781315172941. ISBN 9781315172941.
  7. ^ "By combining self-help and literature, the School of Life's first novel does both a disservice". The Guardian. 7 July 2023.
  8. ^ "Faculty". The School of Life. Archived from the original on 6 December 2016. Retrieved 7 December 2016.
  9. ^ "The School of Life | Your Path to Mental Wellbeing". The School of Life. Retrieved 30 November 2023.
  10. ^ Dillon, Melanie (28 April 2024). "Big Ideas From Literature by The School of Life". School Reading List. Retrieved 1 September 2024.
  11. ^ Levy, Lisa (11 May 2013). "How To Think More (But Not Better): Alain de Botton's School of Life". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved 15 June 2021.
  12. ^ WORSE Philosophy Videos! School of Life on Eastern Philosophy - Lao Tzu, 17 March 2021, archived from the original on 20 December 2021, retrieved 15 June 2021
  13. ^ "How to Be a Pseudo-Intellectual". The New Republic. 3 January 2013.
  14. ^ Howard, Jeffrey (5 November 2019). "'The School of Life' Preaches Pessimism over Romanticism". Erraticus. Retrieved 10 September 2025.
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