Avoid Boring People

Still on the vacation, so I'm scrambling to put up all of the books I've read.

Alrighty, so I have avoided Nobel prize winner James Watson's Avoid Boring People. I have been incredibly biased towards him ever since I learned about his treatment of Rosalind Franklin, and have refused to give him a second chance. I thought that he was a sexist jackass.

I stumbled upon this book for about the 4th time in the last two years and decided that I should finally give him a chance.

Frankly, it wasn't worth it. Watson portrays almost everyone---including himself---as the stereotypical Harvard tool that I've run into many a time. Every single description of a woman starts with her physical appearance ("the blond" is a common theme). He describes many of his lab techs as women who unfortunately had boyfriends. About 25% of this book is his description of his failure to "get" the woman who he has his eye on. Intelligence in women is portrayed as an afterthought.

His particularly infuriating last chapter revolves around his defense of the marks made by the Harvard president on women in science. (It's essentially "There are differences in men and women's brains! Why is everyone so mad? Also, my former student [Nancy Hopkins, prof at MIT] shouldn't outrage herself like that. It's not to her credit as a scientist.)

The book is written in an odd format: first Watson describes a particular period of his scientific career, and then a list of his advice is found at the end of each chapter. This particular way of presenting his advice is more of a textbook style format, which isn't fun to read. He does have a chatty, enjoyable style of writing. However, it's not enough to save this book.

I'll give it a 1/5. Flip to the back (where he has all of his hints in a list) in the bookstore, read and take what you like from it, put it down, and don't even bother reading it.