''Waiting for the Weekend'' is a book published in 1991 by

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

, professor and writer

Witold Rybczynski Witold Rybczynski (born 1 March 1943) is a Canadian American architect, professor and writer. He is currently the Martin and Margy Meyerson Professor Emeritus of Urbanism at the University of Pennsylvania. Early life Rybczynski was born in Ed ...

. In ''Waiting for the Weekend'', Rybczynski recounts the evolution of the seven-day week, which came into being with the

Babylonian calendar The Babylonian calendar was a lunisolar calendar with years consisting of 12 lunar months, each beginning when a new crescent moon was first sighted low on the western horizon at sunset, plus an intercalary month inserted as needed by decree. T ...

, and the later, more modern, development of the two-day weekend. In so doing, he tells the history of

leisure Leisure has often been defined as a quality of experience or as free time. Free time is time spent away from business, work, job hunting, domestic chores, and education, as well as necessary activities such as eating and sleeping. Leisure ...

and time off; starting first with "

taboo A taboo or tabu is a social group's ban, prohibition, or avoidance of something (usually an utterance or behavior) based on the group's sense that it is excessively repulsive, sacred, or allowed only for certain persons.''Encyclopædia Britannica ...

" days, market days, public

festival A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or eid. A festival c ...

s and

holy days A holiday is a day set aside by custom or by law on which normal activities, especially business or work including school, are suspended or reduced. Generally, holidays are intended to allow individuals to celebrate or commemorate an event or tra ...

and how, with the coming of the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

the practice of "keeping

Saint Monday Saint Monday is the tradition of absenteeism on a Monday. Saint Tuesday is the less common extension of this to a Tuesday. The tradition of taking Monday off has been common among craft workers since at least the seventeenth century, when the wor ...

", that is, staying home from work, evolved into the modern weekend.

Notes

1991 non-fiction books Books by Witold Rybczynski Working time {{hist-book-stub