A Kind of Teacher
A review of “What the Dog Saw And Other Adventures” by Malcolm Gladwell
Gladwell, Malcolm. What the Dog Saw. England, Penguin Books, 2010. Print.
Dear Fellow,
A quick disclaimer on this one. This piece feels more like a biography than a book review. Also, I felt quite nervous writing this piece for some good reasons. One, I do not feel I have sufficient resources for the piece to glow, in view of the kind of work the subject of this piece undertakes. Two, I feel that this piece may be an undue representation of the subject. However, I feel more excited than nervous that I eventually get to talk about the subject as I will in this piece. As you read, gather your thoughts, responses, opinions, and critiques in place; I would appreciate it if you share them in the comment when you are done reading. Let’s get to the dance.
The Backstory
If I recall correctly, I first came across this witty writer one time in 2019. His book Outliers: The Story of Success was the book for that month on Book-Troverts, the first book club I gained membership in. I could not read the entire text, but I remember that the book invaded my school hours. I remember squeezing it into wait intervals between when a lecture ended and the next lecturer came in for his class. The points the author shared in the book were enticing, exciting, educating, and comforting altogether. He addressed issues that formed a great part of my thought process through the first two years of my life at the university. He offered new ways of looking at success and pointed at the gaps in the general conception of success, on the field, in the classroom, and in the corporate world. Malcolm Gladwell got me hooked on his nonfiction scientific book. His impact didn’t end there.
Last year, I was enrolled in a data science course. The time for the project came around. A key feature of the project was to make a presentation of our findings from the dataset every individual worked on. I knew that storytelling with data was key to outstanding performance during the presentation. I learned that in the long run, if data analysis is a skill I will hone, storytelling with data is a must. As it is with my writing evolution, I placed Gladwell in this class of people to glean from, people who have done well and gone ahead in the craft. He became a favourite author in that regard. I am reading him again for the current phase of my life.
I am a final year undergrad in Education. As a part of the requirement for my certification, I am expected to produce research work of a certain length and depth in content. I bet you, academic literature can be so boring. A good number of them by my fellow countrymen make you drowsy in a short span of time. I do not want to produce such works myself, given that I fancy serving in the world of academia. Gladwell was for the taking to influence my writing process and style, while still abiding by the rules and ethics of writing APA-guided literature.
The Reading
What the Dog Saw is my fourth read for the year. Interestingly, it wasn’t picked only because I wanted to read Gladwell; a single sentence in the prelims hooked me in. I stumbled at it while leafing through the book at the bookstore. ‘Growing up,’ Gladwell writes, ‘I never wanted to be a writer.’ Here we go again, the story of a writer who perhaps stumbled into the craft. Growing up, I also didn’t imagine myself doing this writing thing. So, I was curious to know more about his journey. What then was his desire, his pursuit, and his passion? How then did he become a writer?
‘I wanted to be a lawyer,’ he continued, ‘and then in my last year of college, I decided I wanted to be in advertising.’ He applied for a job at eighteen advertising agencies and received eighteen rejection letters. Graduate school didn’t work out for him due to poor grades. For Gladwell, writing was like a last resort, but one that seemed purposeful. He writes further: ‘Writing was the thing I ended up doing by default, for the simple reason that it took me forever to realise that writing could be a job. Jobs were things that were serious and daunting. Writing was fun.’
Malcolm Gladwell is a Canadian journalist with English and Jamaican origins. A staff writer for The New Yorker since 1996, Gladwell is also a public speaker, co-founder of the podcast company Pushkin Industries, the podcast host of Revisionist History, and a bestselling author on The New York Times Best Seller List. Wikipedia summarises Gladwell and his works: His ‘writings often deal with the unexpected implications of research in the social sciences, like sociology and psychology, and make frequent and extended use of academic work.’ He is the son of a Mathematics professor, Graham Gladwell and a Jamaican psychotherapist, Joyce Gladwell.
What the Dog Saw is a collection 19 of selected essays written by Gladwell for The New Yorker since 1996 allows you into his element and style of reasoning and writing. The book title is the title of the sixth chapter of the book—an article he wrote in 2006, where he attempts to describe the psychology of dogs while relying on the insights from various experts and largely on Cesar Milan, founder of the Dog Psychology Centre and the host of Dog Whisperer, a National Geographic television channel. One of the articles was published on my birth date, 21st August 2000—the twelfth chapter, titled “The Art of Failure: Why Some People Choke and Others Panic.”
The Lessons
Since I turn to Gladwell for some inspiration when writing scientific pieces, the lessons I gleaned from this book are more beneficial to my writing.
If you read through any of Gladwell’s works you will hardly miss his regard for experts. For example, in the chapter bearing the book’s title, Gladwell leveraged the insights of six experts; namely, a dog trainer, an anthropologist, an ethologist, a writer, a dance expert, and a psychotherapist. Aside from these, he weighed in on the opinion of other participants in the story. This chapter spans 23 pages. In a culture where there is distrust and disregard toward expertise, this is a vital takeaway; if it all credible writing is the goal.
Chapters ten and fourteen compete for first place in my preference rating of all the chapters. Both are expositions that are educative to any person who works in the creative industry. Chapter 10 entitled “Something Borrowed” explores the story of a famous playwright who was charged with plagiarism in 2004. In this chapter, Gladwell dealt with the questions the topic of plagiarism often throws up when it is discussed—What really is intellectual property? Is original artwork not a myth? In chapter 14, “Late Bloomers”, Gladwell tackles this question which is the chapter’s subtitle: “Why do we equate genius with precocity?” The best of this piece is gotten when you read the book. However, before you get the book, this statement in the chapter, offered for your contemplation, is a good place to start:
‘Genius, in the popular conception, is inextricably tied up with precocity—doing something truly creative, we’re inclined to think, requires the freshness and exuberance and energy of youth.’
In other words, is creativity an exclusive privilege of youth? Share your thoughts in the comment.
The Conclusion
So far, Malcolm Gladwell has written 7 books:
1. The Tipping Point (2000) 2. Blink (2005) 3. Outliers (2008) 4. What the Dog Saw (2009) 5. David and Goliath (2013) 6. Talking to Strangers (2019) 7. Bomber Mafia (2021).
Reading all of these books is as good as taking a course in storytelling with data. Therefore, the goal is to purchase all of his books this year. I already have #1 and #4 on my shelf.
You can support this pursuit also. If you wish to support in cash or in kind, reach me
Keep learning; stay curious. See you next week.
Your LetterMan,
Tongjal, W. N.