Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review 2022 | Is It Worth It?

This article “Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review” will provide you with the opportunity to read an in-depth evaluation of Malcolm Gladwell’s Masterclass, including information on how the lessons are presented, who the course is best suited for, the cost, and what I enjoyed about it, etc.

Author Malcolm Gladwell has received widespread appreciation for his writing, which has appeared in The New Yorker and his first published book, entitled The Tipping Point.

Writing non-fiction is an art that Malcolm Gladwell teaches in his MasterClass on the subject (with an emphasis on bringing stories to life).

I was really excited to take Malcolm Gladwell’s MasterClass and get some advice on writing from one of the most well-known authors of our generation.

If you are reading this review, you are undoubtedly curious about the quality of the Malcolm Gladwell MasterClass, whether or not it has anything to offer you, and whether or not it is worth the time and money you will put into it.

This objective assessment of the Malcolm Gladwell MasterClass is intended to assist you in making your decision.

I will discuss my own experience of finishing the course in its entirety, describing the positives, negatives, and everything in between.

If you are short on time or are only interested in the most important information, this article on “Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review” is for you:

Who Is Malcolm Gladwell?

Malcolm Timothy Gladwell CM is an English-born Canadian journalist, author, and public speaker. He has been a staff writer for The New Yorker since 1996.

His works such as “Talking to Strangers,” “David and Goliath,” and “What the Dog Saw” has earned him several accolades.

Pushkin Industries is an audio production company that creates podcasts on a variety of topics, including history and music, and he is one of the co-founders of the company.

In addition, Malcolm was named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world.

On social media platforms such as Twitter, where he has a large following of 735k followers, Malcolm Gladwell often posts content that is both cool and intriguing.

What Is MasterClass?

MasterClass is an instructional platform that was established online in the year 2015. It features more than 80 video courses taught by famous artists who have garnered praise on a global scale for their work.

Some of these artists include David Lynch, Judy Blume, and Gordon Ramsay. It should come as no surprise that MasterClass has attained such a high level given that names like these are hosting their classes.

However, it’s possible that MasterClass isn’t the right fit for everyone. Before deciding to enroll in a class, you should carefully weigh the benefits of the high production quality with the potential negatives of the program.

Course Overview – Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review

The duration of each of the 24 lessons in Malcolm’s MasterClass ranges from 10 to 20 minutes. This amounts to approximately six and a half hours of video content.

In addition, there is a class Workbook that can be studied in conjunction with or separately from the videos.

To help you choose whether or not this is the perfect course for you, I’ve broken down each of the lessons into its component parts.

Introduction and Structuring Narrative

This is Malcolm’s first ever online lesson, and he begins by introducing himself. To give an overview of his career and share some of his inspiration, he provides a few snippets. This gave me a good idea of what he was going to cover for the rest of the class.

Here, he compares narrative structure to puzzle-solving, in which our task is to figure out where the parts go…. A fascinating framework for thinking about the concept of storytelling has already been constructed by him at this early stage in his work.

With his help, you may craft an engaging puzzle that piques the reader’s curiosity and leaves them with a “lingering flavor.” When he asks students what they find fascinating, he devotes a significant chunk of the course to answering this question.

When lecturing, Malcolm relies heavily on case studies and storytelling to convey his ideas. By using real-world examples, the course took on a meta-like character.

Holding Readers

In this section, Malcolm provides some sound advice on how to pique the interest of a reader. Readers must be given a framework to operate within, he says, and he focuses on the following:

• How readers think
• The provision of “tools” to guide your reader
• How data can enhance a reader’s experience of your story
• The use of “candy” within narratives
• Distinctions between talking and thinking

This part is further divided by MasterClass into the following two subgroups:

• Tools for Engagement
• Controlling Information

In both, Malcolm explains what it takes to be a writer and how to maintain a reader’s attention.

Overall, this segment was quite informative and eye-opening. When Malcolm presents a new idea, he goes into considerable detail to demonstrate the practicality of that proposal.

Malcolm’s expertise as a journalist makes it possible for him to convey to us the science of human experience. Many of his findings are grounded in psychology, including how we perceive emotions and the meaning of storytelling.

Nonfiction Malcolm Gladwell writing’s aims are amply illustrated in this well-written essay. Every single piece of Malcolm’s advice is useful in pointing out the ideal way to tell stories.

Research

Malcolm explains in this part how he approaches research with an open mind. Furthermore, he stresses the need of conducting research with an open mind. Additionally, he discourages us from conducting studies that could lead us to a precarious position.

Throughout the video, Malcolm explains the differences and drawbacks of various information sources. Insights into the research process were gained as a result of this. Basically, it taught us how to get the most out of our research by embracing an open mind at the outset.

Compiling articles and following lines of interest are covered in great detail. Like his other films, this one provides examples of how well-researched content appears on the website.

Malcolm introduces us to a few of his favorite authors and analyses their research skills. As a teaching tool, this was a great method for us to learn how to read critically and appreciate the value of a thorough study.

Selecting the Story

An anecdote about a criminologist serves as Malcolm’s starting point for our discussion. He explains how he came up with a new tale idea as a result of this experience.

“The principle of connectivity” and how to use it as a starting point are taught by Malcolm in particular.

To illustrate how to go about finding and crafting a story, Malcolm provides examples from his own works in this chapter. In addition, he gives us a few pointers on how to get started and what approaches to utilize to further investigate a concept.

That he offered us some essential beginning points and addressed what he called “the first-person dilemma” was a plus for me.

Developing the Story

Malcolm goes on to explain how to develop a concept further. For this, he offers several ways in which we can test our ideas and underline their importance of it.

An excellent mix of hard-hitting instruction and more philosophical examples characterize his advice. This was an effective teaching strategy because it gave the reader some responsibility for drawing their own conclusions from the author’s experiences.

At one point, Malcolm discusses how stories are structured and how this relates to our own recollection processes. To my surprise, this had a more scientific approach to storytelling than the creative writing courses I had previously completed.

Interviewing

This seemed to be the most factual and least anecdotal of all of Malcolm’s lessons. Malcolm spends a lot of time interviewing potential employees, and I believe this is where he offered some of his best advice.

While he is honest about his own shortcomings as a journalist, he offers the following advice on how to get the most out of an interview:

• Your job as an interviewer
• Types of interviews and their pros and cons
• What you need to know as an interviewer
• How to make your subject feel at ease
• Managing an effective interview

Even if we’re seasoned interviewers, this section provides us with a wealth of useful advice. When conducting an interview, it’s important to know what questions to ask and why some interviews succeed and others fail.

As an interviewer, Malcolm makes it a point to contrast our function with that of late-night talk show hosts, and he closes by offering new ways to look at our flaws (and how to get help for them).

Characters

Throughout the book, Malcolm makes a point of clearly distinguishing between fictional and nonfictional people. As a writer, he offers advice on how to convey the essence of a character in a way that is true to the (sometimes real) person.

I found Malcolm’s character development interesting. Aside from the basics of character description, he also explores the relationship between characters, the function of narrative in general, and world-building in his work.

He does this by reading passages from his character descriptions and describing the strategies he employs in each. Seeing his counsel in action was a great way to back up his ideas.

Language and Jargon

Here, Malcolm tells us about one of his favorite works of writing and what he found most interesting about it. – Malcolm’s writing doesn’t have to be complicated and the clearer the writing, the more effective the outreach will be.

Indeed, he devotes considerable attention to teaching us the art of enticing rather than repelling a reader through the appropriate use of language. In addition, he teaches us:

• Play with sentence structure for effect
• Use the form to create emotion
• Establish rhythm with punctuation
• Use jargon as shorthand
• Cultivate suspense through language

The more advanced his courses, the more he draws on passages from his own work to make his arguments. Understanding how different strategies work and how to adjust your writing to guide your reader was a valuable learning experience.

Malcolm uses a combination of textual examples and his experience as a public speaker to get a sense of the energy in a room and improve his ability to pay attention to his audience. It was enlightening to learn how public speaking might improve our writing, as I had never considered it before.

Tone and Voice

The first thing Malcolm tells us not to do is to use specific writing approaches that he considers to be terrible. He then offers advice on how to use tone to control our audience. Writing can be like a Q&A session at a public speaking engagement, but it can also be very different.

David and Goliath author Malcolm shares an example of how he begins a chapter and how he sets an intended tone from the start. In these opening paragraphs, he tells us what he intends to convey and how to use the opening to establish tone, scene, and character.

Along with this, he sets further writing tasks to encourage us to move between forms. Changing the tone and manner of your writing is a critical method to re-imagine your work, according to him.

Humor and Melancholy

Malcolm uses the concepts of humor and melancholy in this lesson to show us how to elicit strong feelings in our writing. He also talks about how to write about sadness in a way that is as authentic as possible, which is a sensitive topic.

His teachings on how to use humor effectively and how to set up a situation where responses come naturally rather than being forced are all part of this package.

Great advice on how to manage readers’ expectations and how to keep our humor tasteful and avoid falling into the “trying too hard” trap can be found in this article.

For many people, reading and engaging with a piece of writing is an essential part of the process of evoking emotions.

It isn’t all about the emotion, though: He shows us how to do it in this piece, too.

• How he brings characters to life
• What he wants to avoid when writing
• How to compensate for weaknesses in writing
• The importance of setting
• How to create an appeal through a vulnerability

For Malcolm, “Something Borrowed” serves as an example of how he manages to accomplish all of the above, as well as how he approached tackling such a delicate subject. For him, this work was all about making a statement.

Titles

Malcolm devotes an entire chapter to titles, unlike other writing courses I’ve taken. What the Dog Saw, Outliers, and The Tipping Point are just a few of the well-known works that he discusses.

He emphasizes the significance of titles in capturing the attention of the reader and explores how readers approach the task of finding a new book.

These are the main points that he emphasizes:

• What makes an effective and memorable title
• Creating tension in your title
• Using titles to provoke a reaction
• Embedding emotion into titles

The book’s title may be of secondary importance to some readers. Yet this is an important selling point for Malcolm, as well as an important part of the book’s public relations campaign. Examples of effective titles and the messages they convey to readers are given to him.

Drafts and Revisions

Malcolm explains how to draught and revise your work at the end of the course. The following are some of the things he teaches us:

• Reframe how we view productivity
• Organize your daily writing
• Draft and revise your work
• Manage your expectations as a writer
• Balance writing with research
• Edit in reverse

When it comes to editing, Malcolm draws on his previous discussions of suspense and humor. He shows us how to keep the reader in mind when approaching draughts, and even suggests where to begin to get the most out of revising.

Malcolm’s advice focuses a lot on how to best use narrative information and how to write with the reader in mind, rather than against them. Writer’s block is an issue that he discusses and suggests ways to overcome.

Each time I attend a writing workshop, I walk away with something new and valuable from the experience. Malcolm, in particular, explains the difference between simple and complex revisions, which helps us gain perspective.

When Your Story Enters the World

Malcolm’s post-publishing agency transfer advice follows from his editing perspective. As a writer, it’s important to know how to deal with the critical side of the writing process.

As an example of how readers may interpret our work, Malcolm cites some of the criticism he received when writing about the “10,000-hour rule.”

This advice was more geared toward those who had already published their work or were in the middle of it.

In any case, this was a fascinating way to see how writing is connected to the outside world and how much control you give up as an author when you write.

Working as a Writer

In this article, Malcolm offers advice on how to make the most of your writing career. Tells us the things that made him stand out and how we can do the same.

I appreciated how honest and open he was about his struggles to break into the field of journalism and how he overcame his flaws to do so.

In fact, Malcolm offers some helpful pointers on how to make a career out of writing. While he’s open about the difficulties of writing, he also shows us how he worked around the realities of his daily life to achieve his goals.

When it came to giving us concrete advice on how to advance in our careers, this section was a lot less anecdotal than the previous one.

Reading: How and Who

A writer and reader are inseparable, according to Malcolm’s view of things. Malcolm explains to us how to get the most out of reading on a deeper level by following his advice.

He also teaches us what to look for when reading a piece of writing and suggests how this can help us to improve our own writing.

Malcolm dispels many myths about the role of a critic and shows us how we can approach work in both a critical and appreciative manner. How we can achieve this in our work is the subject of his discussion.

Another writing exercise, this time to help us better understand the work of other writers, is provided by him.

To hear about Malcolm’s favorite authors and why he finds their work so compelling was something I was looking forward to hearing about the most. It is revealed that he is an avid reader who enjoys reading about puzzle-solving and high-quality research, and we learn about the books he enjoys reading.

Malcolm concludes by discussing his own anxieties as a writer and offering advice on how to overcome them. To get to the level of authorship that he has today, he had to learn to read critically and improve the quality of his writing over time.

Conclusion: A Theory of Other Minds

His final lecture focuses on the “other minds” issue. In Malcolm’s view, this theory of child development is crucial to grasping and crafting stories.

The following is what he teaches us:

• How the “other minds” theory pertains to writing
• What draws us to a story
• How writing differs from other art mediums
• The ways in which we can represent other minds to the world

After Malcolm finishes the video, he tells us why reading is so enjoyable. You can see more of his book What the Dog Saw by reading through the excerpts that he’s included here.

This was a unique way to wrap up the course, and it gave me a lot more to think about. “To inhabit other minds is to share new worlds with readers,” he says. “It is a privilege to do so.”

Who Should Take This Course?

Gladwell’s MasterClass focuses on writing nonfiction with journalistic tendencies and a lot of the skills that fiction writers use to draw in an audience, with a lean toward journalism.

When it comes to Gladwell’s books, I’m sure you’ll find the course interesting and useful. But before we make a final decision, we should check out the course review.

Plans & Pricing – Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review

You can choose from two different options.

• A one-time fee of $90 is required for each MasterClass. All video lessons, workbooks, and office hours are included in this package.
• A one-year, $180 All-Access Pass to every MasterClass and all of its features is available.

Isn’t that a lot? So be it. Regardless of which option you choose, MasterClass will refund your money. You’ll get a full refund if you don’t like any of your lessons within 30 days of signing up.

Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review: Is It Worth It?

Because I am more interested in creative writing, this was a less-than-stellar experience for me. It’s also a good option if you’re interested in writing nonfiction.

On the topic of breaking into journalism, Malcolm provides a lot of helpful advice but also shares a lot of valuable information that can benefit anyone.

There are many other MasterClasses available if fiction is more your cup of tea. To give two examples, Margaret Atwood teaches creative writing and Neil Gaiman specializes in novel and short story storytelling.

Not reading Malcolm’s books is required to understand the course material. In each of his videos, Malcolm tells a story. In other words, it’s not like reading a lengthy novel.

If you’re not sure if you want to read more of his work, you can take a look at some of it on his website or in the Workbook.

Overall, I believe Malcolm’s MasterClass is a valuable resource for anyone interested in honing their nonfiction/journalistic writing abilities. I appreciated Malcolm’s obvious enthusiasm for his subject matter.

He also revealed some of his own ideas about how to keep an audience interested. I gained a lot from the class, and I’m looking forward to diving deeper into the material.

Thank you for reading this article “Malcolm Gladwell Masterclass Review.” If you have any concerns, questions, or suggestions regarding this article, please write them in the comment section below. And don’t be hesitant about passing on this piece of knowledge to others.

Frequently Asked Questions