Book Review: Blink

I know, it's quite amazing. I actually read a book written by someone other than Bill Bryson. I mean, it only took around 4 months, but who's counting.

Anyways, I read this book. "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell. It's written in a very strange style. Typically, you divide literature into fiction and non-fiction. Non-fiction tends to have a very straightforward, information packed style of presentation. That's one thing that was odd about this book. The book is not fiction, it's non-fiction. But it's written in a kind of narrative style. To be honest, I found it a bit unnerving. But then again, I read from the perspective of a person who has spent the past four years of his life poring over dense history texts, and more recently, equally dense casebooks and case opinions. So you could say, in the realm of non-fiction, I'm more used to a blander, straightforward style. I suppose there's a reason that the general public isn't in the business of reading history monographs or case opinions for fun. To wrap it up, Gladwell attempts to write non-fiction with some oddish narrative/fiction style. Proceed at your own risk.

The whole point of the book is about snap judgments, that gut feeling you get when you know the answer to something, but you can't quite explain why. Basically, Gladwell argues that snap judgments can be more effective than analytically thought out judgments. I suppose I can see his point. Everyone's had experiences where this sort of snap judgment has worked out for them. I can't think of one at the moment, but I know I've had them. Gladwell describes this whole act as your brain "thin slicing" multiple aspects of a situation at once, enabling you to come to an instantaneous conclusion.

The tagline to the book is "The Power of thinking without thinking." I think that's a bit misleading. Basically, Gladwell spends the whole book explaining how in essence, snap judgments are the products of thought, but mostly on an unconscious level. And some of his stories weren't really about "snap" judgments at all. In one chapter, he talks about this psychologist who interviews couples on tape, and after reviewing the tape, can predict with 85% accuracy or whatever whether they'll be together in 15 years. But he's not making a snap judgment, he's just closely studying the tape for non-verbal clues to the inner conscious of the individuals. So it's more an exercise in observation more than a "snap" judgment.

I think the better tagline would have been something like, "How to Tell Lots of Stuff About People By Paying Close Attention To What They Do." A lot of the book is about how you can tell a bunch of stuff about people simply by close observation. The kind of close observation that is far too advanced for 95% of society. There's a fairly interesting chapter about reading facial expressions, and how this pioneer in the field could basically tell you everything about a person just by studying their facial expressions. I did find that interesting, but Gladwell's incessant use of medical terms for the facial muscles used got very tiresome. If he's not going to include an anatomical model of the human face, the name dropping doesn't mean anything except that the author is in love with his vocabulary. That's how I felt, at least.

I did enjoy the bit about New Coke. It made me want to drink a Coke. Going along with that, the whole bit about how people judge food in different containers made sense as well. I suppose that explains why folks are convinced Coke is better in a glass bottle.

Of course, I loved the end of the book, which focused on a female trombonist auditioning for the Munich Philharmonic, and how shocked the conductor was when he discovered the best trombonist was a woman. Lawsuits followed, all hell broke loose, blah, blah, blah. I just thought it was interesting, they talked about how traditionally, the world of classical music was solely the domain of men. However, with the advent of screened auditions, where one can be judged on sound and musicianship alone, so many new faces are playing music professionally. When I went and heard the Vienna Philharmonic, it was a perfect illustration of this old guard. Old white guys played most every instrument, save "feminine" instruments such as flute.

Anyways, I digress. All in all, "Blink" was a fairly good read. I don't think I would like Malcolm Gladwell in person, he seems like a person fairly in love with himself. And sometimes, the book kind of made me go "Really?" But, I'd say it's an interesting read if you're looking for some pop-science to read on the bus.