I was scared to make this post public public. Because it’s a stake in the ground and a peek behind the curtain at my private working life.
Most keep their goals fuzzy, never telling another soul, so there’s never a prospect of failure. If you don’t aim, you can’t miss. But I figured people love looking behind the scenes. The fun of Fight Night is the build-up to the bout. Seeing the training, the weigh-in, the face-off. Hearing the stories.
So here’s what I’m working on.
Hardcore Literature: An educational brand, focused (at least for now) on literature.
This will take the form of videos, podcasts, learning platforms, live interactions.
I have a problem with the current educational climate. Teaching is an applaudable role, but great teachers are rare. Material and method are both wanting in schools. We’re using an educational approach that does not work. An educational approach that was outdated a century ago. An educational approach geared towards creating nine-to-five wage slaves when such positions in the real world are becoming increasingly replaceable by artificial intelligence.
The reason people don’t respect the humanities, especially studies in literature, language, and philosophy, is because they are taught in such a way that the real value is never capitalised on. Reading the great works can result in more money, improved interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships, but not in the way it’s currently being taught. My aim here is to teach students a kind of reading, syntopic reading, that will actually improve their quality of life. We’ll be using the current testing systems as an entrance into their lives, but while they think they’re studying to pass an arbitrary exam, they’ll actually be learning so much more than that.
This is just the beginning, a kernel that will blossom into something magnificent. We’re going to be teaching people how to think, not what to think, (which schools rarely do) and implant the love of and drive for learning deep inside them. And we’re going to make it as accessible and affordable as possible. This is my passion project. We’re making books and learning sexy, rewarding, and fun.
How latest events are affecting this plan:
I hatched this project idea almost a year ago. I was living in Vienna and would take these long sauntering walks around the Schönbrunn Palace grounds. I’d have a book one hand, cup of fine Viennese melange in the other, and dreamt about scaling my one-to-one conversations about literature so that it became a global conversation.
I wanted to disrupt the educational system. But the current panic seems to have done that for me. This tragedy is shooing out the old, and ushering in the new. The gap that needed to be filled has opened up even wider. If you’re getting into the education industry in 2020, don’t tether yourself too tightly to the current institutions and paradigms (GCSE, A-Level, etc). They might not exist in the same way by the end of the year. It’s time to build your own institution.
Anyways, you might not love school. But you undoubtedly love to learn. You just need two conditions to be in place:
- Enthusing materials and teachers.
- A subject you’re passionate about.
Funnily enough, the first condition can tightly influence the second.
So I’m working on producing literary commentaries that the 15-year-old version of myself, awake late surrounded by books, would have loved. We’re talking full video courses with compelling syllabuses, book clubs in person and online, podcasts both solo and in tandem. Lecture series that give you a different, more beneficial lens through which to view the world.
I’m currently compiling a series of lectures on Shakespeare. One play per lecture. The first season of lectures will kick off with a guide on how to read Shakespeare, then proceed to wrestle with Hamlet, King Lear, Much Ado About Nothing, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, The Tempest, Macbeth, Richard II, Julius Caesar, and Venus and Adonis.
I also have a lecture series on living the great books in the pipeline, which will cover Homer, Tolstoy, Aristotle, Plato, and so forth. Other potential lecture series include one on Russian Literature, another on the joys of popular fiction, and another Dead Poets Society style series of poetry lectures. There will also be an audio theatrical production with readings of classic short stories (“Classic Saturday Matinee,” or something like that).
A note on creating a compelling syllabus:
How do you create a compelling syllabus? Create the course that would make YOU say hell yes and sign up in a heartbeat – the course that would make YOU want to do the reading immediately and turn up in the front row of every lecture. That’s the ethos I’m following here.
To get an idea of what I was aiming for with the podcast, here’s an excerpt from a letter to my good friend Misha Thomas where I explain:
At the moment, the podcast has been a great way for me to consolidate my syntopic reading and practice a style of engaging with the texts that you would call humanistic. In my mind, they aren’t normal book reviews. And I’ll illustrate what I mean by way of example. I was extremely taken by Les Miserables, so I downloaded a book review podcast on the novel with three “experts” in Victorian and French Literature put out by the BBC. I laced up my running shoes and lapped Regent’s Park. […] It was quite interesting, but only because I was interested in Les Mis. The reviewers talked about how Victor Hugo saw the novel as a vehicle for social change, but didn’t do much hands-on work. This is in stark contrast to the other great novelist of the century, Charles Dickens. Then they wondered about how the conversation between Dickens and Hugo might have looked seeing as Hugo’s second language was Latin and Dickens only had schoolboy French. I stopped the podcast there. Maybe they continued with more biographical readings or maybe they went on to pick apart language and metaphors. Either way, same old same old. I do not want this style of podcast. I want to read Rumi or Aristotle or Nietzsche and have at least fifty different practical things you can apply to your life. How can Aristotle make you more money? Then there’s am conversation about entrepreneurship that is practical and birthed from experience. How can Rumi improve your marriage? There’s a conversation about love languages, the shadow, and Eric Fromm to follow. How can Nietzsche improve your physical well-being? Cue a conversation outlining a marathon training routine. That’s the sort of review show I’ve always hungered for but could never find. This mindset and ambition has also influenced me to compile a syllabus for a series of lectures on Shakespeare, another series on Russian Literature, one on living the great books, one on picking poetry apart, and another on the joys of popular fiction. I have so much energy and enthusiasm, and yet I want all of this done now. I’m impatient and aware that this is going to take a long time.
Having mentioned Misha, I should mention that he and I have some very exciting collaborative works in the pipeline (I wish we had recorded our conversation the other night). Our shared love of Quora, Viktor Frankl, empathy, humanism, and the performing arts are going to combine to produce something exceptional. More on that as the plans take shape in the months to come!
Fiction writing projects.
I’m still writing fiction. Having taken something of a sabbatical from the craft, returning has shown me just how much I need this outlet in my life. It’s like physical exercise for me. If I take a week or two off from weightlifting, I feel stale, irritable, and directionless. Returning always reinvigorates me. The same with fiction. I feel fresh, content, fulfilled. Even if no one sees this work. Though I’m aware that showing this side of my work to others is something important I need to improve.
My philosophy when it comes to fiction writing is to always ask myself whether I’d be proud of what I’m working on several years down the line. At the same time, I’ve returned to an apprentice mindset. I’m learning my craft, putting in my hours of practice, sharpening my sword. This is a long play for me. If my fiction ever becomes even a small commercial success within the next three decades I will consider that a win.
As for actual writing projects, the big one involves musical theatre. Another involves Julius Caesar. And I’m writing stories influenced by the mythology of the Orient.
How current events are affecting this plan:
It’s been nothing but a positive influence. Lockdown life is simple and pure. I don’t watch TV. My screen time is down over 80%. I have a nice wind-down routine that results in feeling naturally sleepy around 8-9pm, so I typically get an early night, lots of sleep, and wake up to greet the dawn.
A normal day involves running, working, writing, reading books, playing chess, learning about art, listening to jazz, and preparing healthy meals. Routine has given me an arena in which to cultivate inspiration.
A common scene in my quarantine.
Advice if you want to start writing:
- Have lots of ideas. Idea production is a skill. You must practice it. Go for walks and let your mind wander. Challenge yourself to come up with ten ideas a day for things you’d love to write about. List your loves and hates, play with writing prompts, tie disparate ideas together, until you find something that speaks to you.
- Take a class from a writer you respect. I’ve rewatched Neil Gaiman’s Writing MasterClass. Following his writing exercise in which you are to create a short story inspired by each month of the year, I began to wonder about a short story for each country in the world, starting with the lesser-known countries. This idea led to another, then another, then my pen began to move.
- There’s three parts to writing. Research, writing, editing. Each of these has its place, and each counts as “writing.” If you have nothing to write about, it’s typically because you’ve neglected the first part. Get curious. Input influences output.
- Take the pressure off yourself. If you’re not writing from love, don’t write at all.
Personal brand.
I want to do something more with this website you’re looking at right now. There’s a huge room for improvement. Right now I’m sitting on a ton of video footage that I need to edit and publish. One of my main passions is education, so a lot of these videos are geared towards helping students get better grades.
I’m halfway through a free video course about effective study habits. My first video course was quite niche, but still proved to be popular. So I’ll put out another, and if this proves to be popular too I have at least ten more ideas for courses I can make. In addition to that, there’s videos on language learning, health, well-being, and so on. It’s just a matter of making the time to fit this stuff in.