Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns

FREE delivery Friday, December 23 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon

Or fastest delivery Wednesday, December 21

Arrives before Christmas

In Stock.

As an alternative, the Kindle eBook is available now and can be read on any device with the free Kindle app.

[{"displayPrice":"$16.00","priceAmount":16.00,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"16","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"00","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"1yZdsn0c24R%2FwvZKBe%2FaZwby8MveK320JRP2iR5UsRhrYttmankdzwrWRKgrLe44pkBU8WLPD9Qjs7LqwzJ6oOJh4NsCGeitcfjyv0hH1g6e53ekjw65esvb0Zw5eIT8ZyBDmijD2Ia2YAHsAJlQXQ%3D%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW"},{"displayPrice":"$9.00","priceAmount":9.00,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"9","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"00","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"i1clrl3LnvAQzMmcK7fbdvVaJA%2BfH%2BbcFYP08F182hkUCrSuoWU7sjd8X80kEw%2FITp7I17vZrd2Ku08Vj2F8vXiZgdaMsbQvNAATMq9g6jGGHxNBtmAkg%2BaEWDXrhmIvOJI4NkxI9FV9gECXOyKUzV%2FpvxHPNSSePS2%2FILFdYNn0WLK8ub4jgZbAha9ELFvM","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED"}]

$$16.00 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Secure transaction

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Details

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Return policy: Returnable until Jan 31, 2023

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery Wednesday, December 28 if you spend $25 on items shipped by Amazon

Arrives after Christmas. Need a gift sooner? Send an Amazon Gift Card instantly by email or SMS.

Select delivery location

Used: Good | Details

Sold by Bay State Book Company

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Other Sellers on Amazon

Added

Not added

$9.00
+ $4.19 shipping

Sold by: Vo Books

Added

Not added

$12.82
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: indoobestsellers

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See this image

Follow the Authors

Sheila Heti

Misha Glouberman

Chairs Are Where the People Go Paperback – July 5, 2011

by Misha Glouberman (Author)

43 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Kindle

"Please retry"

$9.99

—

Paperback

"Please retry"

$16.00

$9.00

$3.10

Enhance your purchase

Should neighborhoods change? Is wearing a suit a good way to quit smoking? Why do people think that if you do one thing, you're against something else? Is monogamy a trick? Why isn't making the city more fun for you and your friends a super-noble political goal? Why does a computer last only three years? How often should you see your parents? How should we behave at parties? Is marriage getting easier? What can spam tell us about the world?

Misha Glouberman's friend and collaborator, Sheila Heti, wanted her next book to be a compilation of everything Misha knew. Together, they made a list of subjects. As Misha talked, Sheila typed. He talked about games, relationships, cities, negotiation, improvisation, Casablanca, conferences, and making friends. His subjects ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous. But sometimes what had seemed trivial began to seem important―and what had seemed important began to seem less so.

The Chairs Are Where the People Go is refreshing, appealing, and kind of profound. It's a self-help book for people who don't feel they need help, and a how-to book that urges you to do things you don't really need to do.

Print length

175 pages
Language

English
Publisher

FSG Adult
Publication date

July 5, 2011
Dimensions

5.49 x 0.48 x 8.26 inches
ISBN-10

0865479453
ISBN-13

978-0865479456
See all details

Frequently bought together

+
+

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Some of these items ship sooner than the others.

Show details Hide details

Choose items to buy together.

by Misha Glouberman Paperback
$16.00
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
by Sheila Heti Hardcover
$10.95
Only 7 left in stock - order soon.
Sold by LT Trading and ships from Amazon Fulfillment.
Get it as soon as Wednesday, Dec 28
by Sheila Heti Paperback
$16.49
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Get it as soon as Wednesday, Dec 21

Sheila Heti
401
Hardcover
83 offers from $3.26
Sheila Heti
259
Hardcover
29 offers from $10.39
Sheila Heti
346
Paperback
55 offers from $5.09
Sheila Heti
3
Paperback
13 offers from $13.38
Sheila Heti
154
Paperback
36 offers from $4.84
Sheila Heti
17
Paperback
4 offers from $18.99

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A triumph of what might be called conversational philosophy... The world is better for these humane and hilarious essays." - The New Yorker

About the Author

Misha Glouberman is a performer, facilitator, and artist who lives in Toronto. She is the author of The Chairs Are Where the People Go: How to Live, Work, and Play in the City.

Sheila Heti is the author of several books of fiction and nonfiction, including How Should a Person Be?, which New York Magazine deemed one of the “New Classics of the 21st century." She was named one of "The New Vanguard" by The New York Times book critics, who, along with a dozen other magazines and newspapers, chose Motherhood as a top book of 2018. Her books have been translated into twenty-one languages.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ FSG Adult; Original edition (July 5, 2011)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 175 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0865479453
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0865479456
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 6.6 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.49 x 0.48 x 8.26 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #479,720 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #545 in Consciousness & Thought Philosophy
- #799 in Self-Help & Psychology Humor
- #4,100 in Happiness Self-Help

Customer Reviews:
43 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the authors

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Sheila Heti
Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.
Sheila Heti is the author of eight books, including the critically acclaimed "How Should a Person Be?" and the New York Times Bestseller, "Women in Clothes" (edited with Heidi Julavits and Leanne Shapton). She is the former interviews editor at The Believer magazine, and has been published in The New Yorker, McSweeney's, The Paris Review, n+1, The London Review of Books, and more. Her work has been translated into a dozen languages. She lives in Toronto.
See more on the author's page
Misha Glouberman
Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.
Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more
See more on the author's page

Customer reviews

5 star		67%
4 star		15%
3 star		10%
2 star 0% (0%)		0%
1 star		8%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

BT

Lots of wisdom and a bit too much repetition

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 30, 2022

Verified Purchase

I liked it and I wish I could say I loved it. There's a lot of good stuff here that makes it a good book to read but some of the stuff was just too repetitive and made simple concepts too complex. Buy it-read it for the good parts. [You may like different parts than me but you can decide what is good]

Helpful

TALKING TO A GOOD FRIEND WHO HAS SOMETHING TO SAY

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 3, 2014

Verified Purchase

Sheila Heti is an author with three novels under her belt. Misha Glouberman is her friend. He’s a cool friend. He’s a performer and an artist: one of the things he does is facilitate performances that are kind of non-performances for other people. He lives in Toronto, which is important because some of the best pieces in this book have to do with where he lives and what it’s like living there. Misha is also, Sheila writes, a near-perfect conversationalist. He speaks in sentences that read well written down, with little or no editing.
So she had this idea. She asked Misha, the best talker she knows, to talk about anything he wanted and she’d write it down. And that’s what he –they- did. This book is Misha talking about things he cares about enough to talk about them or things he knows enough about that it’s worthwhile to explain them to people who only know him through this book.

The pieces are short. The longest is the last one in the book. It’s about quitting smoking and it runs six pages. Many are only one paragraph or page long. Hey! It’s a good idea! How many people do you know who once they start talking, can’t stop but just prose on, like the Little Engine That Could, until they run out of steam. Misha’s talkpieces are only as long as they need to be to say what Misha has to say. When he’s said it, he stops talking. Hurrah for Misha!

Misha is a delightful companion. He’s thoughtful. He has strong views and enthusiasms but he’s not doctrinaire. The way he expresses himself is elegant though seeming casual: many of his statements just to catch it, whatever it is he’s talking about. “The best conversationalist,” he writes (in a piece entitled Storytelling Is Not the Same as Conversation), “are people who are hoping to end up somewhere they didn’t expect.” By that standard Misha does well.

One of his preoccupations is with creating surprise. “Suspend[ing] the fear of failure” is how he expresses it. He conducts ‘music’ workshops where they create music that ‘s really mutually created noise –there’s no rhythm, harmony or melody. He doesn’t teach people to play instruments -- that’s a trap: henceforth you’re caught up in the Amateur Musician trap. He organizes unconferences where attendees create their own agenda by moving around and joining with other people with similar interests. Who knows better what interests the people there than they themselves? In an age of Google, why should a conference consist of hundreds of people sitting and listening to one person lecturing in front of them? He’s also somewhat skeptical about civic improvement: who benefits from banning automobiles from a market neighborhood like the one he used to live in? Why didn’t authorities talk to people who live and work there before they did it? He’s no NIMBY(Not In My Back Yard)ist: he accepts limits to what we can decide about our own neighborhoods but he thinks what the residents feel is important. It should be important to civic authorities too. Orders shouldn’t come from above without prior talking below.

This book feels like talking to a wise, good friend, someone who has something to tell you but doesn’t push it. There are lots of self-help books out there. Most of them are slick: they use zippy prose to offer fatuous advice. This isn’t one of those books. What’s on display in these pages is real and good.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Amazon Customer

I would love to attend one of his charades training classes

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 21, 2016

Verified Purchase

I bought this recently for my high-school-aged granddaughter. I especially wanted her to read the chapter about going to Harvard. Also the win-win solution surrounding the noisy bar on the street. Misha has a fresh way of looking at the world that I think we could all learn from. Each "chapter" is very short, but it packs a lot to think about into each one. I would love to attend one of his charades training classes. You won't be disappointed in this little book.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Doug

a friend who knows Misha said it's best to view this as an artwork

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 24, 2016

Verified Purchase

Not everyone's cup of tea, however, a friend who knows Misha said it's best to view this as an artwork, rather than any kind of structured and coherent coda. In that way it's simple and sweet. And there's some genuine wisdom there that has come through some hard won, but surprising channels.

Helpful

Bryan J. Fuhr

Useful Life Lessons and Insights Into Humanity

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 30, 2011

Verified Purchase

I had a chance to read The Chairs Are Where The People Go Last Weekend. I enjoyed it immensely. The stories provided useful life lessons. The insights into humanity felt real and practical. I was particularly moved by the recurring theme of compromise. It struck a chord for me given the acrimony so pervasive in our world right now.

7 people found this helpful

Helpful

Clay Zapalac

Interesting, thought provoking, without necessity

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 4, 2014

Verified Purchase

As a sculpture and performance artist I was recommended this book as a engaging resource for thinking about interdisciplinary work. the book was an easy read that made me think about how I approach things. Was it life changing? Will I be ranting to my friends and exclaiming you must read this book? probably not, but I think it was an appropriate tool to meditate on and get another artist perspective.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Lizzy Eads

common sense is not so common

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 20, 2011

Verified Purchase

I'm enjoying this book and will be sharing it with friends. Grounded, yet light and approachable philosophy and style. You know when you read something and go - oh my gosh, i've thought that but could never say it so well. And then there are the parts where I'm stretched. I appreciate the insights into improvisation and miscommunication. Hopefully someday I'll bump into Misha and share a beer.

7 people found this helpful

Helpful

123babsi

As decribed

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 23, 2019

Verified Purchase

The book is as described, just has some minor wear, very good for the price. I would definitely buy from this seller again.

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Translate all reviews to English

Customer

A "marmite" love or hate read.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on September 8, 2017

Verified Purchase

*Contains spoilers*
From all the previous reviews I gather that you will either love or hate this book. I am in the latter category. It consists of opinion pieces written by a millennial who:
a) Make money by teaching people how to play charades.
b) Teach "music" classes to musicians without being able to play an instrument. (groups of people sounding vowels out loud etc. Teaching them about improvisation)

I did not find any of the opinions very thought provoking. The piece from the title states that if you put as many as possible people close to a speaker you have a better chance of keeping their attention than if you put tables in the middle and make some people stand at the very back while listening. There is a piece stating that young people are better, and more realistic than their parents generation when it comes to marriage. It ends up being just a statement really without any real research or info.

This book will probably appeal to a younger "hipster" type of crowd, but If you have lived live you probably do not need someone to tell you how to deal with a noisy neighbour.

We do have different tastes and if you don't hate it like me, you will probably find it as an invaluable source of inspiration on how to navigate life. Happy reading.

One person found this helpful

John

A great book to learn about how people interact

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on January 19, 2015

Verified Purchase

An excellent book! Misha has spent a great deal of time helping people stretch themselves as they interact with one another. He is very observant, intuitive, kind and experimental.

S. F.

Weisheit im Alltag

Reviewed in Germany 🇩🇪 on May 25, 2015

Verified Purchase

ich liebe es klugen Gedanken kluger Menschen zu lauschen (oder zu lesen) und hin und wieder festzustellen, dass es so viel Menschliches allzu menschliches gibt, überall. Mich macht das glücklich und versöhnlich und die von Misha Glouberman erzählten Geschichten und Problemchen sind gar nicht so weit weg von meine ganz normalen Alltagswahnsinn.

Sofern man mit anderen zusammen lebt und arbeitet, und sich hin und wieder fragt wie und warum Gesellschaft so funktioniert und Menschen so sind wie sie sind ... hier gibt es viele Antworten und geistreiche Unterhaltung zu vielen Themen des Zusammenlebens in unserer Welt heute.

Translate review to English

AJ Kandy

Engaging, refreshing and enjoyable read

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on March 20, 2014

Verified Purchase

I met Misha back in the 90s when I was doing improv with McGill Theatresports. He was a great teacher, helping to unlock the imaginations of many a beginning player. 20 years later, this book encapsulates his unconventional, counterintuitive wisdom as it applies to improv, teaching, work, life, urbanism and community-building. A pleasure to read, you feel the cadences of a master storyteller at work. Highly recommended to anyone considering change in their lives.

One person found this helpful

karen king

Interesting, thoughtful. Read it.

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on August 23, 2019

Verified Purchase

The thoughts are brief but also interesting, well-articulated, and well-considered. A perfect length to read on the subway or to send an entire excerpt to a friend via text :) I'd have coffee and listen to Misha discuss these any day.

See all reviews

Buy new: $16.00$16.00 FREE delivery: Friday, Dec 23 on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon. Ships from: Amazon.com Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used: $9.00

Other Sellers on Amazon

Follow the Authors

Chairs Are Where the People Go Paperback – July 5, 2011

Enhance your purchase

Frequently bought together

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Editorial Reviews

Review

About the Author

Product details

Videos

About the authors

Sheila Heti

Misha Glouberman

Customer reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Buy new:

$16.00

FREE delivery: Friday, Dec 23 on orders over $25.00 shipped by Amazon.

Ships from: Amazon.com

Sold by: Amazon.com

Buy used:

$9.00