What do you need to know about people you don't know? What are the internal mechanisms that come into play when we meet strangers and make us trust them spontaneously? How did Fidel Castro manage to deceive the CIA for thirty years? Why did Neville Chamberlain believe he could trust Adolf Hitler? Why are we so bad at judging someone, reading a face, spotting a lie?
According to Gladwell, something is fundamentally wrong with the tools and strategies we use to understand people we don’t know. Through puzzles, encounters, and misunderstandings—from little-known stories to famous legal cases—Talking to Strangers is an unexpected journey into history and human psychology.
After the bestsellers David and Goliath and Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell offers a guide for turbulent times, because… strangers are never a simple matter.
Best Book of 2019 by The Financial Times, Chicago Tribune, Bloomberg.
What they said about the book:
“This book changes not only the way you see strangers but also how you see yourself.” –Oprah Winfrey
“In an age when the world feels the incredible surrounding polarization, a book that examines the diverse ways in which we misinterpret others or fail to communicate with them seems more necessary than ever…” –Los Angeles Times
“Gladwell uses compelling real-world examples to reveal the hows and whys behind our interactions with the people we are trying to understand.” –Forbes
Malcolm Gladwell studied History at Trinity College, University of Toronto. He is the author of five NY Times Best Seller books. He hosts the podcast Revisionist History and maintains a regular column in The New Yorker magazine. He has been named one of TIME magazine's "100 Most Influence People" and one of Foreign Policy's "Top Global Thinkers." He worked as a journalist at the Washington Post. He was born in England and grew up in Ontario, Canada. He currently lives in New York City.
