Hodgkinson founded The Idler, a cult magazine about intelligent slacking, in 1993. The magazine is available online, but if you subscribe to the print edition you get one of life’s better tote bags. It’s decorated with a drawing of a snail. I like to think of it as an emotional support snail.

In “How to Be Idle,” Hodgkinson takes novitiates by the hand and leads them through an entire day, hour by hour, in 24 chapters. These chapters include “10 a.m. Sleeping In,” “Noon: The Hangover,” “2 p.m. On Being Ill,” “3 p.m. The Nap,” “4 p.m.: Time for Tea,” “5 p.m. The Ramble,” “6 p.m.: First Drink of the Day,” “7 p.m. On Fishing,” “2 a.m. The Art of Conversation” and so on.

“This book seeks to recover an alternative tradition in literature, poetry and philosophy, one that says not only is idleness good, but that it is essential for a pleasurable life,” Hodgkinson writes in his preface. “Where do our ideas come from? When do we dream? When are we happy? It is not when staring at a computer terminal worrying about what our boss will say about our work. It is in our leisure time, our own time, when we are doing what we want to do.”

He recommends not clicking on news radio upon waking. He nails me entirely when he writes, “A certain type of person feels it is their duty to listen to it, as if the act of merely listening is somehow going to improve the world.”

He is the laureate of sleeping in. “The lie-in — by which I mean lying in bed awake — is not a selfish indulgence but an essential tool for any student of the art of living, which is what the idler really is. Lying in bed doing nothing is noble and right, pleasurable and productive.”

He likes the lie-in, too, because it annoys the wrong people.

“To the bureaucrat, the man of business, there is nothing more offensive than the idea that potentially productive citizens are prone, inactive, staring at the ceiling,” Hodgkinson writes, “while he is bustling away doing something ‘useful,’ like inventing new ways to sell popcorn to the masses or delivering summonses for nonpayment of parking fines. Inaction appalls him; he cannot understand it; it frightens him.”

He is a critic of modern medicine. Once upon a time, a sick person was advised to convalesce, a word (and an idea) he relishes. Now we’re handed a prescription and told to get on with things. He recommends calling in sick as often as is plausible.