5 Writing Tips from Barack Obama
When President Obama sat down with the Atlantic to discuss his new presidential memoir, he shared excellent writing advice
Today, November 17, 2020 the first volume of Barack Obama’s presidential memoirs A Promised Land is available from Crown Press. In an excerpt, published by The Atlantic, Obama reflects on the challenge of capturing the saga of a two-term presidency in words. Along the way, he offers wonderful advice for writers, about the project of great writing.
What comes across most forcefully in the excerpted Introduction is President Obama’s wisdom and humility. For example, he reflects:
“I’m convinced that the pandemic we’re currently living through is both a manifestation of and a mere interruption in the relentless march toward an interconnected world, one in which peoples and cultures can’t help but collide. In that world — of global supply chains, instantaneous capital transfers, social media, transnational terrorist networks, climate change, mass migration, and ever-increasing complexity — we will learn to live together, cooperate with one another, and recognize the dignity of others, or we will perish.”
His writing advice comes largely in the form of parenthetical notes, humorous quips to fellow writers, themselves a reflection of his humility. About his expectation that he could write the book…
