Optimism

Still feeling as if bits of me are falling apart (housemaid's knee, tennis elbow, a left hand that has stopped working in sympathy with the mail workers, neck a bit troublesome, and the recently done dental work beginning to come apart), but, as the song goes "always look on the bright side of life ... tee-tum, tee-tum"!

Yes, I've been trying to figure out ways of marketing a rather handsome little book on optimism to the widest UK market. Word-of-Mouth is the key phrase in any book's marketing campaign, so the first thing to do is to blog about it.

Every year something comes along (usually a book, or a film, or something on TV) that makes you "think", something that stirs the grey cells, and which leaves something of a mark. This year's "something" for me was actually a radio broadcast (or at least the bits that I heard) that comprised the annual BBC Reith Lecture - Jeffrey Sachs' four-part Bursting at the Seams. Here was an extremely intelligent man talking positively about the world's problems, rather than negatively. I was thus pretty impressed to find that Nick Inman's 'The Optimist's Handbook' acknowledges and quotes Sachs extensively.

That said, it's a pretty difficult book to market. For a start "optimism" is not a bookshop category, it is not an Amazon category, there is no convenient pigeon-hole in library or bibliographical subject indexes, indeed the very idea of "optimism" would be rather frowned upon in many bleak university bookstores. The book cannot be classified as humour (it is serious, intelligent and above all interesting) and has little to recommend it as being news-worthy, or controversial (unless you are a born pessimist); it has no Richard-and-Judy endorsement, the author lives in France and is not a famous personality (so no Parkinson or Jonathan Ross), and it does not have a publishing leviathan's sales force to get it stacked high in Tesco. But on the other hand ... "always look on the bright side of life ... tee-tum, tee-tum"!

If Ben Schott's Almanac can do it (spectacularly), then Nick Inman's book must be given every chance. Tomorrow I'll see if I can get it into art gallery and museum shops as a Christmas pick-up, ditto the National Trust. I'll press forward with production of a bookmark for free distribution in bookshops -using some of the great quotes included in the book:

'Twix the optimist and the pessimist
The difference is droll;
The optimist sees the doughnut
But the pessimist sees the hole.
- McLandburgh Wilson


Trust Allah! But always tie up your camel.
- Arab Proverb

I'm an optimist, but an optimist who always carries a raincoat.'
- Harold Wilson

So, rather than complain about the "housemaid's knee, tennis elbow, a left hand that has stopped working in sympathy with the mail workers, neck a bit troublesome, and the recently done dental work", maybe I'll take the Robinson Crusoe approach to life this week:

Evil: I have a bad knee, a painful hand, and a dental repair job that's gone pear-shaped.

Good: But your other knee works just fine, ditto with your hand, and all the other dental repair work is in excellent shape.