Make friends with the eminent dead.

Charlie Munger’s snappy way of saying learn from the past and read biographies.

Author

Enda Mac Nally
September 04, 2024 • Read it in: 5 minutes

SMALL UPDATE: I’ve moved the newsletter from Convertkit to Beehiiv
You might notice a few small differences here and there. Let me know if anything’s not working!

Here are 3 things that have been on my mind this week:

Charlie Munger’s snappy way of saying ‘read biographies’.

"I am a biography nut myself. And I think when you’re trying to teach the great concepts that work, it helps to tie them into the lives and personalities of the people who developed them.

I think you learn economics better if you make Adam Smith your friend. That sounds funny, making friends among the “eminent dead,” but if you go through life making friends with the eminent dead who had the right ideas, I think it will work better for you in life and work better in education.

It’s way better than just giving the basic concepts,"

There’s something really nice here.

Virgil Abloh had an insight he referred to as ‘candle theory’: one story is told by an object itself, and another is told by the staging around it.

He explains, by referencing a small candle in a dented tin can:

“If I put this candle in an all-white gallery space, it looks like a piece of art.

If I put it in a garage it looks like a piece of trash.

[…]

I often use this analogy in design.

I could either design the candle and spend a lot of time telling you about the candle, or I could design the room it sits in,”

If you look at the image of Kanye West’s ever-evolving stage presentations below, you can see this playing out. The performance is largely the same, but each bold visual has a unique tone and framing that elevates that core experience, and forces you to see it from a new perspective:

Time is the real currency of life.

‘fatFIRE’ is a Reddit community for people looking to retire early.

(…it stands for ‘Financial Independence, Retire Early’)

Like most Reddit communities, it features a mix of obnoxious stuff and some really solid practical content.

This one might be obvious to some, but it bears repeating:

There’s a story about the novelists Kurt Vonnegut and Joseph Heller visiting the house of a millionaire neighbour of theirs. Vonnegut jokes that the guy earned more in a week than Heller did in his entire career.

“I’ve got one thing he’ll never have,” replies Heller.

“What’s that…?” Vonnegut asks.

“Enough,”

Here are some other things:

👶🏼 ’My Next Life’ by George Carlin [TWEET]
A funny note from a true original.

💔 ‘Signs and Symbols’ by Vladimir Nabokov [SHORT STORY]
I found this via a list of Mary Gaitskill’s favourite short stories. It’s excellent, but be warned- it’s also extremely distressing and bleak…

🛩️ ‘The Country Husband’ by John Cheever [SHORT STORY]
Another from the same list. This one is great too, bursting with middle class suburban unrest.

Enjoy this email? ...forward it to a friend.
They can sign up for the next one below:

Click the image to learn more

Get in touch.

Comments? Suggestions? ...vague threats?​
Hit reply below, and I'll do my best to get back to you. 😎