'What the Dog Saw' by Malcolm Gladwell - Book Review

Malcolm Gladwell is perhaps known best for his non-fiction best-sellers Blink, The Tipping Point, and Outliers, but What the Dog Saw is a collection of the essays from The New Yorker that put him on the map. The topics range from ketchup to plagiarism to failure. They're each about 15-25 pages long, are self-contained, and can be read in any order. Gladwell writes engagingly and has a gift for bringing out fascinating perspectives on nearly every topic he touches.

The first section of What the Dog Saw is about what Gladwell calls "minor geniuses," including the famed kitchen gadgeteer Ron Popeil and the inventor of the Pill, a devout Roman Catholic who believed he had found a natural means of regulating ovulation that his Church would (and nearly did!) welcome.

The second section is about problem solving, and it provides several examples of Gladwell's signature devices: making a distinction between two notions that we use almost interchangeably (e.g., choking vs. panicking) and drawing on the social sciences to explain our experience. In an article I didn't expect to enjoy, he defends the Enron executives by distinguishing between puzzles and mysteries. They didn't cover up facts, which would have created a puzzle with missing pieces of information, but rather presented a truthful account of their complicated financial maneuvers that was overwhelmingly complete. Their precarious position was entirely available, though obscured by their complex financial tools and bets on future unknowns that were not obviously unsound. In short, Enron's (in)solvency was a mystery with no simple answer.

The final section is on intelligence and personality and covers topics like whether all geniuses display their talents early (they don't; many labor late into life before genius appears) and whether all pit bulls are vicious by nature (also not; the owner is key).

Not every essay herein was of equal interest to me, but there's variety enough for all to enjoy.