Posted by Recently, in a shopping mall, I spotted a copy of Malcolm Gladwell‘s book, Outliers, for sale at HMV. It’s hard to believe it, but Gladwell must be the first business book author who is truly a rock star.
That wasn’t the only time I have felt this way about Gladwell. A few weeks prior to the shopping mall incident, I was on a flight and a female flight attendant was talking to another female passenger who was sitting one row behind me, and the conversation went something like this:
Flight attendant: Did you read his latest book?
Passenger: No, I bought it, but I’m reading Blink first. Do you have the new one? Is it any good?
Flight attendant: He is so fascinating and writes in such an accessible way. He’s also very cute. He flies with us from time to time, and he’s always so nice and polite. On top of that, he’s an amazing dresser and he has the coolest hair.
That’s Malcolm Gladwell (he is very dreamy). He’s reached Bono-like status in pop culture and his star power continues to soar. Just in time for the holidays, he released a new book, What The Dog Saw, which is a compilation of his essays from The New Yorker. Earlier this week, C-SPAN spent an hour with Gladwell. It’s well-worth watching:
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I think you are very right in your description of Gladwell as a “rock star.” Everything about his, style, subject matter and the undercurrent that flows through some of his writings lends itself to mass popularity.
This article in from the G&M awhile ago discusses this populist undercurrent of Gladwell’s work. Might be of interest to some: http://tinyurl.com/yjhdved
Thanks for the post.
I am a huge fan of Malcolm Gladwell, and I think most of his critics are not getting what he’s all about. Anyone who can make information and thinking and looking at things in a different way fun and even exciting, he or she has done readers a significant service. Malcolm Gladwell has done this over and over. I can’t wait to get and read his next book.
Coming back from a conference last week, I had The Tipping Point in my purse, one of my colleagues bought What the Dog Saw at the airport bookstore, my other colleague had just finished reading Blink. And we had ALL read Outliers within the last 6 months. Gladwell’s books are word-of-mouth marketing gone wild.