kthread reads: outliers
Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
rating: 3 of 5 stars
I think of Malcolm Gladwell books as a sophisticated guilty pleasure.
He Who Must Name Patterns is the darling of airport bookstores (which I think amuses him; there is a part on airplane crashes in Outliers that is difficult to read on a flight, similar to beginning Ian McEwan’s Saturday while in the air), and the chapters are nicely organized for casual reading–each extended anecdote about the length of a New Yorker article, come to think of it.
Gladwell’s books belong in the self-discovery section of a bookstore that I imagine next to the self-help aisles, their cheerful covers in contrast to the signature manilla Gladwell titles with serious serifs and a centered object (Outliers has a colored orb, Blink an asterisk that makes me think of Vonnegut’s infamous doodle in Breakfast of Champions, and Tipping Point a match). Whereas in the previous books you might be able to slot yourself into one of the three special groups of people (Connectors, Mavens, Salespeople) or note your snap judgments, this recent book has fewer lessons that can be easily applied–aside from his 10,000 hours thesis.
Of more interest, Gladwell takes the signature Stewart Smalley line to pull apart specific examples of success; beyond the “smart enough” threshold, social savvy makes key figures (read: connectors) in your life like you enough to bend the norms and let 10,000 opportunity hours bloom.
The epilogue is an explanation of how Gladwell explains the community figures who paved his path to success, and I couldn’t resist marking the page lauding “divergence tests”–an alternative way of measuring intelligence through timed creative responses. In elementary school, I put in a good thousand hours or so solving problems with my Odyssey of the Mind teams, the brainiac Olympics for entitled children (Gladwell mentions entitlement as a key skill for success), and I do want to think those Saturdays spent designing PVC pulley systems and blurting out ten spontaneous uses for pipe cleaners will serve some larger purpose.
After spending years at a top ten U.S. university in a graduate program with disturbingly smart people, I will cite Gladwell’s book in this season of cocktail parties and feel entirely justified in my prediction that the wittiest of my friends are marked for success in that field. Comprehensive knowledge as well as a keen sense of timing in impersonations on John’s part, snarky classroom literary dissections on Ben’s, obscure musical categorization references from art historian/XML geek Dana, appreciation of rap and West coast culture from ascot-wearing Miltonist Eric, and Jordan’s inspired nudges in the Charlottesville underground arts recommend them for future renown.
If success depends on your forbearing community, perhaps the next Gladwell treatise will be on how to sustain the communities you successfully choose later–
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Posted by Kristen Taylor on Sunday, November 30th, 2008, 12:08 pm * Filed in Books, Networks. * Tags: Books, gladwell, goodreads, kristen, kthread, malcolm, outliers, taylor. Follow responses through the RSS 2.0 feed. Leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
November 30th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
There’s a silly part of me that hasn’t read _Outliers_ simply because it is so fashionable right now, even though I enjoy Gladwell’s work. Your review has prompted me to reconsider such an unnecessarily contumacious stance.
I’m so thankful for your friendship, K.
December 1st, 2008 at 7:14 am
what a good word, Dana; so glad we’re friends too. The nice part about reading it now is that you’ll be in the community of first readers–
March 29th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Great review thanks so much for your insight