When we meet online the polymath is sitting in the airy basement of his house in Rishon LeZion about 25 miles from Tel Aviv where he lives with his wife Daniela. There are crammed book shelves in the background and a pile of soft toys on a sofa, presumably belonging to the 61-year-old’s grandchildren Imanuel and Michaela.
A Bachelor and Master of Science, Shapira also holds Tel Aviv University PhDs in mathematical genetics and science education with a focus on the “concept of infinity.” Despite these daunting subjects his lectures and writings are conversational and accessible, as is his book, a philosophical enquiry into, among other things, the nature of happiness.
In its 300 pages it delves into the writings of ancient Chinese philosophers and invokes the ruminations of their Greek counterparts as wells as Western authors, thinkers and artists concerned with the human condition.
“Don’t thank me for the book,” says Shapira modestly. “Thank Aristotle, Tolstoy, Zhuang Zhou, Hegel, Nietzsche, Engels, Wittgenstein and the Talmud, ” he says, barely scratching the mountain of sources he cites.
Shapira has citied Aristotle in his work (Photo: Alamy)
“Being happy is a lifetime’s work and not something you will find in a book,” he admits. Any publication that promises to lead you to happiness with ‘three minutes of practice per day is a false prophet’ and not worth the paper it is written on. Motivational speakers also ply a form of fakery.
“My book is a lighthouse that has no power to quell the stormy waves of life. But it can guide you through them.”
Whatever its merits the guide is well timed. It arrives in an era when exploring the nature of happiness seems to be a vanishing art in a world plagued with extremism and war.
“Anxiety today may be greater than ever,” agrees Shapira. “The left is becoming more extreme. The right is becoming more extreme,” before adding with an exasperated wave of his arms that even moderates are more extreme than they used to be.
“Approximately one third of America’s population have what we can call clinical anxiety. This is not just ‘arrggh I’m a little bit anxious’. No! This is on a clinical level.”
The phenomenon is well known says Shapira by specialists in Positive Psychology, a field which much like Shapira’s book attempts to address the question “What is happiness?” The answer may be elusive but Shapira is pretty sure where this precious resource can be found and why it is there and not somewhere else. He holds up his mobile phone.
“I just got this a couple of days ago. I have here a list of the happiest countries in the world. It is very interesting. Finland is top, Denmark, Iceland...Israel! Israel is four! UK is 19” he adds scrolling down. “But five is Netherlands, then Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Luxembourg, New Zealand… All these countries are democracies. You cannot find happiness in countries that are even close to a dictatorship. So in order to be healthy it is not enough to tell someone to wake up with a big smile.”
Haim Shapira's book Notes on the Art of Life (Photo: Getty)
Does he worry about happiness in his own country Israel which is currently riven by protests accusing Netanyahu’s government of authoritarianism?
“I can only hope. But if you are living in a country, which is some kind of dictatorship, you cannot be happy,” he says emphatically.
Shapira is Lithuanian by birth. Born in 1962 to a teacher on his mother’s side and a locksmith father, the parents were survivors of the Holocaust in a country where 98 per cent of its Jews were murdered. He is still incredulous at the statistic. “Ninety eight per cent!” he repeats. “And not all by Nazis. Lithuanians too.”
His father read voraciously. Tolstoy, Chekhov, Dostoyevsky and also Walter Scott.
“Walter Scott!”, declares Shapira, incredulous again. “My father read every one of his books. Even Walter Scott I suspect did not read all his books.”
The family emigrated to Israel in 1977 when Shapira was 14 years old.
“We arrived the same day that [Egyptian leader] Anwar Sadat came to Israel. We were on the same road and I thought all the people standing there were for me. But no, it was for Anwar Sadat making peace with Menachem Begin.”
Still, back then happiness was in the Israeli air. “I hope my country will be OK,” says Shapira bringing us up to his here and now.
Shapira has citied Tolstoy in his work (Photo: Getty)
His book was a result of a need. Not the kind that led the controversial clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson, who Shapira also cites in his book, to address what is widely seen as a crisis in masculinity. No, this was a need to read the kind of book Shapira could not find.
“You know, I love to read and sometimes it happens that I cannot find the right book. So I realised that what is missing is a book that is a mixture of nonfiction and fiction, a blend of eastern and western philosophy combined with insight from literature and psychology, as well as movies and art. I could not find this book so I decided to write it.”
Shapira shrugs as if to say: “What else could a piano playing philosopher, mathematician game theorist do?”
It turns out that the soft toys are not his grandchildren’s. “They are all mine,” he declares proudly. Is that Winnie the Pooh at the top of the pile?
“Ah yes! Vinnie the Pooh!” he says in his Lithuanian/Israeli accent. “Vinnie is a great Poohlosipher,’ says Shapira who is in agreement with the widely held view that AA Milne’s bear unwittingly relays the thoughts of such titans as Plato and Aristotle but in the most direct and simple language.
However for Shapira there is also much to be learned from Pooh’s donkey friend Eeyore.
“Eeyore is a great example of someone who loves his corner and so, although he is pessimistic he is also happy,” observes Shapira. “It is quite possible to be both.”
Notes on the Art of Life by Haim Shapira (Watkins) is out this week
