Born Standing Up - by Steve Martin

ISBN: 1416553657
Date read: 2010-01-09
How strongly I recommend it: 2/10
(See my list of 360+ books, for more.)

Go to the Amazon page for details and reviews.

A simple autobiography of his early years. Interesting tale, though no usable lessons for me.

my notes

There is no harm in charging oneself up with delusions between moments of valid inspiration.

Any new social philosophy is good for creativity.

Philosophy of dressing for the stage: “Always look better than they do.”

It was easy to be great. Every entertainer has a night when everything is clicking. These nights are accidental and statistical: Like lucky cards in poker, you can count on them occurring over time. What was hard was to be good, consistently good, night after night, no matter what the abominable circumstances. Performing in so many varied situations made every predicament manageable,

What my last year of stand-up was about: I had become a party host, presiding not over timing and ideas but over a celebratory bash of my own making.

Moving on and not looking back, not living in the past, was a way to trick myself into further creativity.