Mr. Gladwell’s smooth Canadian lilt worked perfectly in the sensitive-bro realm of podcasting, although his habit of narrative digressions — which worked so well in a magazine story — made for a potential mess in audio.
Julia Barton, Pushkin’s executive editor, would send him heavily edited transcripts. “It’s like saying, ‘You’re a master sand painter, but suddenly, for whatever reason, you have to sand paint at night when it’s dark, and you know what you’re doing but you don’t know,” Ms. Barton said.
Whereas “Talking to Strangers” is Mr. Gladwell at his most sky-is-falling serious, his podcast delivers the unexpected whimsy of his earlier writing. In one episode this season, he reframes the Boston Tea Party as the tea mafia trying to gain a market advantage. Another episode was sparked by a friend’s jog around the perimeter of the exclusive Brentwood Country Club in Los Angeles. Mr. Gladwell connects his disgust over the off-limits greenery to Bob Hope,…
