Rolf Dobelli

Rolf Dobelli (2010)

Rolf Dobelli - The Art of Thinking Clearly ( The art of clear thinking ) at the London School of Economics (LSE) on 11 April 2013

Rolf Dobelli (* 15. July 1966 in Lucerne as Rolf Döbeli ) is a Swiss writer and entrepreneur .

Life

Rolf Dobelli studied philosophy and business administration at the University of St. Gallen , where he with a dissertation on the subject of deconstruction of the economic discourse doctorate was. He then worked in business, for example as chief financial officer and managing director of various Swissair subsidiaries . In 1999, together with friends, he founded getAbstract , a publisher of book summaries, but resigned from its operational management in 2011 to devote himself to writing.

Together with Andreas Scholz from Bloomberg Television , he hosted the weekly television program Seitenweise Wirtschaft from 2001 to 2009 . In 2010 Dobelli moderated the weekly book show on NZZ Online. He wrote the weekly clear thinking column for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (until the end of 2011); the Swiss Sunday newspaper (2010 to 2012) and until October 2012 for Die Zeit . From 2013 to 2014 he wrote a weekly column for Stern . He is currently writing in the Saturday edition of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung .

Dobellis book The art of clear thinking was several months in the first place the mirror bestseller list and was Spiegel bestseller of 2012. His book The Art of clever action appeared in 2012 and was also on the Spiegel bestseller list. Both books were in the top 10 bestseller lists in the UK, Korea, India, Ireland and Singapore. "The Art of the Good Life", Rolf Dobelli's international bestseller, has been sold over 220,000 times in Japan since April 2019. This makes the title one of the best-selling business books in Japan in 2019.

Rolf Dobelli at the Frankfurt Book Fair (2017)

In his novel Thirty-five - A Midlife Story (2003), the protagonist Gehrer, a 35-year-old successful manager, reflects on his previous life. He describes - sometimes sarcastically - his crisis of meaning, his past and present friends and his goals. Dobelli's next works were And what do you do for a living ? (2004), a novel about the collapse of a successful managerial existence; Himmelreich (2006), a romance novel borrowed from Max Frisch's Homo Faber ; Who am I? 777 indiscreet questions (2007); Turbulenzen (2007) and Massimo Marini (2010), a development novel and history of immigration.

Dobelli denounces the hunger for new news in an essay written for the Swiss month and abridged in the Guardian . He himself refrains from consuming messages, which he compares with poisons for the brain and the spirit, and advocates a “healthy message diet”. In 2019 his book The Art of Digital Life was published. How to do without news and master the flood of information.

Dobelli is the founder and curator of Zurich.Minds .

In September 2013, the author Nassim Nicholas Taleb alleged that Dobelli had plagiarized several passages from his work in The Art of Clear Thinking and in an article in the ZEIT . Dobelli called the majority of the allegations ridiculous or absurd in an interview with the Tages-Anzeiger . He admitted, however, that in the small print appendix of the book he had included two sections by the psychology professors Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons without the quotation marks. However, the reference to the authorship of the two sections is clearly there. Claudius Seidl , head of the features section of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung , takes care of the arguments of Taleb and Chabris: "Not the smallest sentence suggests that Dobelli would have thought it all up; on the contrary, sometimes it is almost a little tiring, as Dobelli keeps referring to refers to the academic authority of those people from whom he has his knowledge. "

Dobelli is married to the writer Clara Maria Bagus, father of twin sons and lives in Bern.

Works

• Postmodern philosophy and the company's discourse culture. Diploma thesis, University of St. Gallen, 1991.
• Deconstruction of the economic discourse. Dissertation, University of St. Gallen, 1995.
• Thirty-five. A midlife story. Novel. Diogenes, Zurich 2003, ISBN 3-257-06352-0 . (2004 as audio book : read by Ulrich Noethen , director: Karin Lorenz, 3  CDs , Patmos, Düsseldorf 2004, ISBN 3-491-91161-3 : ISBN 978-3-257-23445-9 as Diogenes paperback detebe 23445).
• And what do you do for a living? Novel. Diogenes, Zurich 2004, ISBN 978-3-257-06446-9 .
• Heaven. Novel. Diogenes, Zurich 2006, ISBN 978-3-257-06537-4 .
• Who am I? 777 indiscreet questions. Diogenes, Zurich 2007, ISBN 978-3-257-06563-3 .
• Turbulence. 777 bottomless thoughts. Diogenes, Zurich 2007, ISBN 978-3-257-06594-7 .
• Massimo Marini. Novel. Diogenes, Zurich 2010, ISBN 978-3-257-06754-5 .
• The art of clear thinking. 52 Mistakes in thinking that are better left to others. Hanser, Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-446-42682-5 . ( No. 1 on the Spiegel bestseller list in 2012 )
• The art of wise action. 52 Wrong paths that you better leave to others. Hanser, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-446-43205-5 . ( Number 1 on the Spiegel bestseller list from September 17 to 23, 2012 )
• The Paradox of Material Progress in: What Should We Be Worried About? John Brockman, Ed., Harper, New York 2014, ISBN 978-0-062-29623-8 .
• Questions about life. Diogenes, Zurich 2014, ISBN 978-3-257-06901-3 .
• The art of the good life. 52 surprising ways to happiness. Piper, Munich 2017, ISBN 978-3-492-05873-5 .
• The art of digital life. How to do without news and master the flood of information. Piper, Munich 2019, ISBN 978-3-492-05843-8 .

Memberships

• Royal Society of Arts
• PEN center
• Authors from Switzerland

literature

• Rolf Dobelli in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely available)
• Entry about Rolf Dobelli in the lexicon of the Association of Authors of Switzerland

Web links

Commons : Rolf Dobelli  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Publications by and about Rolf Dobelli in the Helveticat catalog of the Swiss National Library
• Literature by and about Rolf Dobelli in the catalog of the German National Library
• Rolf Dobelli's website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Radio 1 , "Colon" with Rolf Dobelli from October 17, 2010 ( Memento from July 4, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) (MP3; 52.9 MB).
2. ↑ Team (Management)
3. ↑ nzz.ch ( Memento from September 19, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
4. ↑ blog.helmutfuchs.de
5. ↑ persoenlich.com
6. ↑ October 11, 2012: Farewell article ( Memento from June 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
7. ↑ Stern No. 45/2013, October 31, 2013, p. 3 and p. 66.
8. ↑ archive of Dobellis Star columnist ( Memento of November 9, 2013 Internet Archive )
9. ^ Spiegel bestseller list, July 2, 2012
10. ↑ Spiegel 1/2013, p. 121
11. ↑ Spiegel bestseller list December 3, 2012.
12. ↑ The Times bestseller list hardback non-fiction, April 21, 2013.
13. ↑ [Crossword book retailer's bestseller list, June 2013]
14. ↑ Writing.IE Bestseller List, June 14, 2013
15. ^ The Straits Times bestseller list non-fiction, April 28, 2013.
16. ^ PM Piper Verlag; 29th July 2020
17. ↑ Forget the news. March 2011 (PDF).
18. ^ The Guardian , April 12, 2013
19. ↑ Explore the world: Rolf Dobelli and ZURICH.MINDS. 3Sat, December 2012.
20. ↑ Speed ​​dating with ideas. World on Sunday , December 23, 2012.
21. ^ Nassim Nicholas Taleb's website Fooled by Randonmess , September 11, 2013.
22. ^ Nassim Taleb attacks Rolf Dobelli. Article of the daily gazette.
23. ↑ «The majority of the allegations are ridiculous» Interview, September 12, 2013.
24. ↑ Christopher Chabri's blog from September 12, 2013
25. ↑ A bestselling author under pressure. In: Tages-Anzeiger, September 13, 2013.
26. ^ Claudius Seidl: Plagiarism dispute about Rolf Dobelli: think logically . In: FAZ.NET . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed June 26, 2020]).
27. ↑ Simon Widmer: "Those who are successful are often just lucky" Interview in: SonntagsZeitung / 12app.ch from October 29, 2017.