I’m not sure if I’ve ever read anything by Malcolm Gladwell. This book, Blink, came up recently for me, so I decided this was the one. I heard that the book has been pretty widely criticized, but I didn’t know why. It’s one of his older books. Now that I’ve read it, I think I know why it’s been criticized. And, I think most of the problem could have been avoided if Gladwell had used more tentative language. Instead of “X people are Y,” a simple, “Many X people experience Y.” This approach is less essentialist and more accurate. However, whether Gladwell thought the more essentialist approach was stronger, or whether an editor pushed him into that so-called “stronger” language (I could see either being the case), the outcome is a language and an approach that simply hasn’t aged well. Most of this problem wasn’t noticeable to me until the last part of the book, but then he really doubles down. I think the book is interesting and entertaining, but may not have a whole lot of value beyond that. Now I’m very curious to read another one of his books to see how his writing has evolved. I assume it has. Like the rest of us.