Writing What You Want to Read

...and finding people you want to find

John Bryson/Getty Images

Ted Geisel was very wealthy, so he needed financial advisers and lawyers. And yet, he was bored by his own finances.

He did, though, once credit his success to the law firm of Grimalkin, Drouberhannus, Knalbner, and Fepp. No such law firm exists, but he liked the sound of it. Geisel had a made-up name for himself too: Dr. Theophrastus Seuss—later shortened to just Dr. Seuss.

Geisel adored whimsy—in his work, of course, but also in his personal life, to liven up topics he found dreary. Here’s part of a letter he wrote to his assistant about taxes:

“Our accountant and our attorney are still trying to figure out…how much should we defer according to this year’s tax problem, next year’s tax problem, and the cigar tax in Bulgaria in the year 55,202. If Bulgarians, according to my accountant, stop smoking cigars, the situation will be entirely different from what my attorney claims will happen if cigars suddenly start smoking Bulgarians.”

When acquaintances bragged about their children, Geisel would expound the exploits of his daughter, Chrysanthemum-Pearl Geisel, who he claimed could “carry one thousand stitches on one needle.” Like the law firm, Chrysanthemum-Pearl didn’t exist (although The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins is dedicated to her).

Geisel wrote to entertain himself, whether the writing was public or not.

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Geisel, in his own way, lived by the first tip that artist and author Austin Kleon recently shared in a short video about writing a newsletter: Write a newsletter that you yourself would read. (Austin has a huge newsletter, so whatever he’s doing is working.)

When I started this newsletter a few years ago, it was just to have a place to write briefly about topics I was thinking through, and an excuse to do Q&As with interesting people.

My friend Pablo Torre (a former Range Widely Q&A guest) just signed a big licensing deal between his podcast, Pablo Torre Finds Out, and the New York Times–owned Athletic. I think his podcast fits Austin’s tip, down to the title: Pablo has expansive curiosity, and I think the show is a vehicle for making the kind of podcast he wants to listen to.

As Austin explained, if you write a newsletter you want to read, then you will find the kind of people you want to find. I had all but given up on online comments sections before starting this newsletter, but based on the quality of the comments below these posts, I think Austin is on to something. I never expected that I’d be responding to so many comments here, but so many of them are so good, and I often learn new things or pick up reading recommendations from perusing them.

Austin shared two other newsletter tips: Make it regular—send at the same time and in the same format—and turn off unsubscribe notifications.

I have thus far completely ignored regularity of form or timing in this newsletter—and I didn’t even know unsubscribe notifications were a thing (so I guess I’ve followed that advice, unwittingly). Based just on tip #1, this newsletter is about to crack 50,000 email subscribers. So I wanted to thank you for being here, and for being the kind of people I wanted to find.

Thank you for reading, and I do plan to post more regularly someday—hopefully as I approach publication of my next book. There is a section in it about how constraints foster creativity—which is why I was researching Dr. Seuss, who famously wrote Green Eggs and Ham on a bet that he couldn’t write a children’s book using only fifty words. (It wasn’t the only book he conceived that way, and he later presented other children’s book writers with a constellation of helpful constraints.)

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Lastly, as an experiment I added a voiceover to this post, and to my last post on the arrival fallacy. I’d love to know if it’s something worth continuing.

Until next time…

David