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Danes are the happiest people in the world. They say they get there with hygge – coziness. We’ll ask how that works. GUESTS PENELOPE GREEN, style reporter for the New York Times. (

@greenpnyt) MEIK WIKING, CEO of the Happiness Research Institute and research associate for Denmark at the World Database of Happiness. Author of the new book, “ The Little Book of Hygge:

The Danish Way To Live Well.” ( @meikwiking) ABBEY COLLINS, reporter for KHNS news in Haines, Alaska. Former On Point Radio producer. ( @abigail_collins) FROM TOM’S READING LIST NEW YORK

TIMES: Move Over, Marie Kondo: Make Room for the Hygge Hordes — “Denmark frequently tops lists of the happiest countries in the world, in surveys conducted by the United Nations, among other

organizations, consistently beating its Scandinavian cousins, Sweden and Norway — as well as the United States, which hovers around 13th place. While all three Nordic countries share

happiness boosters like small populations and the attendant boons of a welfare state (free education, subsidized child care and other generous social supports), what distinguishes Denmark is

its quest for hygge.” NEW YORKER: The Year Of Hygge, The Danish Obsession With Getting Cozy — “Winter is the most _hygge_ time of year. It is candles, nubby woolens, shearling slippers,

woven textiles, pastries, blond wood, sheepskin rugs, lattes with milk-foam hearts, and a warm fireplace. _Hygge_ can be used as a noun, adjective, verb, or compound noun, like

_hyggebukser_, otherwise known as that shlubby pair of pants you would never wear in public but secretly treasure. _Hygge_can be found in a bakery and in the dry heat of a sauna in winter,

surrounded by your naked neighbors.” THE GUARDIAN: The Hygge Conspiracy — “But for all the earnest cultural analyses, linguistic glosses and quotations from Kierkegaard, it is the images,

more or less common in style to each title, that one falls for: hands cupping warm mugs; bicycles leaning against walls; sheepskin rugs thrown over chairs; candles and bonfires; summer

picnics; trays of fresh-baked buns. To look at them is to long for that life, that warmth, that peace, that stability – for that idealized, Instagrammable Denmark of the imagination.” READ

AN EXCERPT OF “THE LITTLE BOOK OF HYGGE” BY MEIK VIKING Array Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.