It is interesting to note that I wrote this before the runup on gas prices and before we had any idea of the impending financial crisis. It’s now a year and a half later. Back then the fear of the widening income gap reminded me of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.

In Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel we saw a glimpse of pre-Depression society, where the rich were very, very rich and could afford to live by different rules. Tonight, I’ve still got Fitzgerald on my mind, but rather than revisit Jay Gatsby, I think I’ll turn in with a copy of Tender is the Night.

I’d be curious to hear your thoughts on this below!

********

[Excerpted from earlier post dated March, 2007]

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

F.Scott Fitzgerald.

I don’t know about you, but this New York Times article about the income gap widening kind of worried me:

Income inequality grew significantly in 2005, with the top 1 percent of Americans–those with incomes that year of more than $348,000–receiving their largest share of national income since 1928, analysis of newly released tax data shows.

The top 10 percent, roughly those earning more than $100,000, also reached a level of income share not seen since before the Depression.

Let me say that again–A level of income inequality not seen since 1928. Now, I’m woefully lacking in my knowledge of historical economics. But this stopped me cold and caused me to go read a bit about what was going on with the economy right before the Great Depression. According to the info on Paul Alexander Gusmorino III’s site (seems to be an authority on the Great Depression), the following was going on:

• There was a huge inequity of incomes.
• There was a large increase of output from workers, and wages were increased at only one-quarter the rate of production.
• Calvin Coolidge’s administration (and the conservative-controlled government) favored business and, as a result, the wealthy who invested in these businesses.
• Three-quarters of the U.S. population would spend essentially all of their yearly incomes to purchase consumer goods such as food, clothes, radios and cars.
• Through such a period of imbalance, the U.S. came to rely upon two things in order for the economy to remain on an even keel: credit sales, and luxury spending and investment from the rich.
• Between 1925 and 1929 the total amount of outstanding installment credit more than doubled, creating artificial demand for products that people could not ordinarily afford.
• Much of the wealth and economic dependence was in only two industries: automobiles and radio. This was a problem when the 75 percent of the population could no longer afford the gas for the automobiles and had to return the radios purchased on credit, which was now due.
• Add to that bad international debts, the stock market crash, and the run on the banks . . . well, we all know what happened next.

Flash forward to 2007:

• We have an inequity of incomes.
• Technology has brought us increased output for workers at a rate higher than increases in income.
• George Bush’s administration (and the formerly conservative-controlled government) favors business and, as a result, the wealthy who invested in these businesses.
• Three-quarters of the U.S. population spend essentially all of their yearly incomes on rent/mortgages and to purchase consumer goods such as food, clothes, computers, and cars.
• We are becoming dependent on credit sales, and luxury spending and investment from the rich.
• Credit card debt is expanding, creating artificial demand for products that people could not ordinarily afford.
• While we’re not dependent on just two industries, many of our largest businesses: oil, auto companies, finance, retail, technology may have a problem when 75 percent of the population can no longer afford the gas for the automobiles or games for their playstations.

This is why I started this post with a Fitzgerald quote: The more we change, the more things stay the same. But perhaps there is another Gatsby quote that may be applied to the situation:

“They were careless people, . . . they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”

Top Shelf Bottom Line: No advice for entrepreneurs this week. Sorry. I’ll be back with a bunch of reviews starting next week. But I think we all need to step back and take a deep breath. Let’s all put the business books aside (how many of them actually deal with leading a business through what could be a second great depression, anyhow?). Instead, try reading a classic. There’s a reason we studied Fitzgerald in high school, even though clearly we couldn’t read it with the life’s experience we can now. I highly recommend giving Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Maugham a second look if it’s been a few decades since you last read a classic.

The following is an abbreviated review of American Wife: A Novel by Curtis Sittenfeld. I’m including a fiction pick as 1) it was the best non-business book I read this summer; 2) it’s controversial; and 3) it’s a behind-the-scenes look at the role of a first spouse–something that has been much in the forefront of the media and relevant to the topic of leadership. The full review can be found at www.womensdish.com.

Let’s start off this review by laying all the cards on the table.

First, the opinions expressed in this review are solely that of blogger Diane K. Danielson, individually and personally, and do not reflect those of Entrepreneur magazine, WomenEntrepreneur.com, or their management. Thus, if you are an avowed Bush fan, you might not want to continue reading this particular post. However, if you can put politics aside and find this book review of interest, note that on Sept. 3, we’ll be announcing in our Downtown Women’s Club Dish Newsletter how you could win one of 10 free copies that Random House is giving away. Visit DowntownWomensClub.com to register for the DWC Dish. Thanks, Random House!

[Note to readers: If the forces behind Obama Nation or any unauthorized bio of Hillary Clinton had sent us an advanced review copy PLUS books to give away, we’d likely be doing that, too! I've always believed in reading different perspectives.]

Second, American Wife: A Novel is a fictional portrayal of the life of Laura Bush by Curtis Sittenfeld, the author of Prep: A Novel (after reading that I vowed never to send my child to boarding school) and The Man of My Dreams: A Novel (haven’t read, but will now). Sittenfeld is an avowed liberal despite having a professed fascination (and appreciation) for Laura Bush.

Third, there’s been a bit of controversy over the book, due to be released on September 2, during the Republican National Convention. Some people believe that the book is an attack on the Republican Party. In addition, there’s a faction out there that believes that Laura Bush is sacrosanct and no one should write about her. I noted that most of the critics, as usual, had not read the book and focused on the fact that the book includes some “steamy sex scenes.” Now, clearly those folks have never read a Jayne Ann Krentz novel, because the sex scenes in American Wife were not all that steamy or significant. And I don’t buy the argument that any public figure is too sacred to be the subject of a novel.

Fourth, the novel does incorporate some events that parallel those in Laura Bush’s life. The main character, Alice Lindgren (later Alice Blackwell), like Laura Bush, ran a stop sign at age 17 and killed a classmate. She later becomes a librarian and, when she is in her early 30s, marries Charlie Blackwell of the rich and powerful Blackwell clan. Charlie is an overgrown child, with a bit of a drinking problem, who later in life finds religion and goes on to become the president of the United States. Other than that rest is purely imagined.

Fifth, I am a liberal democrat who has always been rather annoyed by Laura Bush and assumed that she was majorly medicated, because I couldn’t fathom how anyone could possibly raise daughters around her husband’s beliefs.

With all that being said, I was a bit apprehensive and unsureabout why I wanted to read about anything related to the Bush administration. However, I’ll cut to the chase. I loved the book. It was the best read of the summer. And I would like to believe some of it is true because then I would understand and–yes–appreciate Laura Bush.

*** Click here to read the complete review, or see below for the Top Shelf Bottom Line***

The Top Shelf Bottom Line: American Wife: A Novel was the best fiction I’ve read in a long time. And I wonder if this is even close to what the real Laura Bush is like? I’d like to think so. But we’ll never know (in fact, I’m starting to see that as some of her charm). As for George W. Bush, if even 10 percent of this is based on reality, and this is truly what the leader of our country is like behind the scenes, we need to rethink how we elect leaders in the future.

Because the book touches on leadership, and because I’d like to make it relevant to this blog, I’m wondering whether it could serve as sort of an anti-leadership guide. Despite my new leniency toward Laura, she may still not be the right First Lady for a country as troubled as the U.S. To be an effective leader, you cannot surround yourself with only “yes men or women.” It leads to unhealthy narcissism, and often ideas getting too far along to pull back. American Wife gives us a glimpse into how much power a first spouse has, as they act almost as an informal member of the cabinet. (Note the contrast of Eleanor Roosevelt and FDR where she openly disagreed with him while he was in office. FDR handled it by assuming the public understood that she could have her own opinions that were not his. He also used her as a testing ground for some of his more liberal ideas.)

Could a stronger first spouse have reigned in the excess? Or even prevented an ill-fated presidency from happening in the first place? We won’t ever know, but I hope we’ll have an opportunity to find out.

*** Sign up for the Downtown Women’s Club e-newsletter ASAP at www.downtownwomensclub.com and find out in the Sept 3 issue how you can win a free copy of American Wife. We’re giving 10 copies away courtesy of Random House.

Life’s a Campaign: What Politics Has Taught Me about Friendship, Rivalry, Reputation, and Success by Chris Matthews was one book I expected to be trashing on this blog. At first glance, I found the idea of applying political campaign strategies to your life a tad bit Machiavellian, and figured it was meant to spawn another generation of Richard Hatch-like “survivors� (minus the naked dance).

So why read it? Because politics and business are interconnected. The most successful entrepreneurs have benefitted from political alliances, so perhaps there was something to be learned here. Moreover, it’s hard to avoid politics in any work environment. This was best described in one of my favorite quotes from Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist:The New Rules for Success.

Here is a message for people who say they can’t stomach office politics: you will die a slow, painful career death. That’s because there’s no getting around office politics, and mastering it is essential to being able to steer your own career because the out-of-office corollary to office politics is networking.

Despite my original misgivings, I really enjoyed Life’s a Campaign. Perhaps because it’s similar to my last political pick, JFK on Leadership, which took lessons from a presidential campaign and applied them to business. This book, expands on that theme by having lots of lessons from lots of political figures with a little bit of Chris Matthews’ background thrown in. (By the end of the book, I have to admit I was starting to really like the guy. His life’s anecdotes were often as interesting, or more interesting, than the Presidential examples.)

Here are a few of the highlights that all entrepreneurs could use:

• From Bill Clinton – “He survived because he learned early how to take a punch.â€? He didn’t let what people said define him. He had an innate ability to accept that people will both like and dislike him. Clinton embodied the idea that not everyone was going to like him, and he didn’t waste efforts on those who would never like him.

• From Tip O’Neill – People don’t mind being used, they mind being discarded. Matthews’ inclusion of a favorite poem of Tip’s was schmaltzy but it worked.

• From Joe Biden – Keep good company. Early on, Biden successfully used his associations with some high ranking politicians to convince people that he belonged there.

• From Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama – People want to hear upbeat information and messages of hope.

The Bottom Line: As I read the book, I was focused on how these lessons would be applied to business or local politics where competition comes with the territory. It’s up to the reader to decide if they should apply these to their non-work life. But I’d like to think one would focus more on fun and enjoying the ride and tone down the campaigning when not focused on business.

*****

Bonus books: Want to have some fun with politics? Here are a few White House stories (notably with a chick lit twist), I’ve read over the past year. While novels, they do offer insights into the political process, so you can actually learn a few things.

• The Washingtonienne by Jessica Cutler. Based on the blog that rocked Washington, the concept and the story (and subsequent lawsuits) may be more interesting than the book itself.

• Sammy’s Hill by Kristin Gore. Liked this first effort at political chick lit.

• Boomsday by Christopher Buckley. I LOVED this book, which at times was laugh out loud funny.

• Sammy’s House by Kristin Gore. Just started, not digging it so much, but maybe because Boomsday just blew it away.

Mamah endures a difficult life faced with difficult choices that result from her loving a man so bent on changing the world of architecture and so flawed as to be his own worst enemy. SPOILER ALERT:  Before the tragic ending (the ending is true, so not really a spoiler if you know anything about FLW; but this is a part of his life that until now wasn’t talked about much), the story incorporates bits of FLW’s rise to prominence (and intermitten falls from grace) as well as Mamah’s interest in the early roots of feminism.

I actually hadn’t thought about reviewing this here, but as I was about to finish, the following passage jumped out at me. This excerpt comes from a chapter near the end of the book where Mamah is trying to talk with FLW just before the opening party for the Midway Gardens, his first “public” building in Chicago.

She knew he didn’t need her advice.  It took immense ego to build an enormous structure the likes of which had never been seen before, all the while assuring doubters that it would turn out brilliantly.  But it took courage and vision, too.  What he needed was her support, and she gave it without condition.

Sounds like an entrepreneur to me. So, my first thought on this was where I draw the line between business owners and entrepreneurs. If you leave a law firm to start your own practice, you are a business owner. If you leave a law firm and completely reinvent how law firms do business (like that firm in Boston banning hourly fees!  It’s about time that somebody realized the billable hour structure benefits neither the firm, the attorneys or the clients – but I digress) then you are an entrepreneur. So, FLW who turned the world of architecture on its head – working with nature, not against it - qualifies as a bonafide entrepreneur.

Next thought – how tough it must be to love someone so focused on such a great quest. Any entrepreneur is going to spend a lot of time fighting the doubters and nay-sayers. My favorite response to people who tell me “I don’t see how you are going to make this plan work,” is “If it was so easy that someone like you could see it, then it would’ve been done already.” Which leads me to conclude that being an entrepreneur is really, really hard. And, I agree with Mamah’s statement in the book that it takes an immense ego to withstand the constant negativity.

Which brings me to my third thought. Perhaps the only thing tougher than being an entrepreneur is being the partner of an entrepreneur. Maybe it’s more than a coincidence that this topic came up in my post on How to be a Billionaire (where I noted that the author said one commonality between the billionaires was that they neglected their families) as well as in another Top Shelf review book, Rules for Renegades, where the author recounts a date with a very single-minded Bill Gates. Makes one wonder what Melinda must go through.

Hmmm. Maybe this is why I tend to keep my dance card empty. I actually had a life coach pal point out to me a few months ago that my work schedule (while my son’s in school and then late at night and on weekends) didn’t really allow for time to date. Assuming that I may have been missing out on something, I tried to go on a few dates. But the whole time I was thinking, “I could have been getting so much work done right now …”

So, what do you all think – what’s life like dating/marrying entrepreneurs?  Does it work better if entrepreneurs date entrepreneurs? If so, has anyone launched a website for that yet? Just imagine. We could meet for coffee in Starbucks and share business plans. The only problem might be trying to determine whether you like the person or the business plan better? 

The Bottom Line: Loving Frank is a wonderful book with insights into a great American legend, seen from the eyes of the woman who loved him. However, Mamah is not your average woman of the time period as she was an early feminist who frequently called FLW on his weaknesses, and that was what he loved most about her.

 ** Addendum — Seems I’m not the only entrepreneur with dating issues.  Here’s an article from the Entrepreneur website that answers my question about dating sites for entrepreneurs! 

For the Francophiles in the crowd, Stephen Clarke’s novel, A Year in the Merde, may read like the anti-Peter Mayle as it follows a young English marketing executive on assignment in Paris to launch a chain of high-end English tea shops. The “merde� in the title refers to the “doggie droppings� that litter the streets of Paris (and I can attest to other parts of France as well).

Throughout the story, issues arise from language barriers in conversation, but also in “branding.� The fictional French company’s name began with the letters “V� and “D,� so their new logo was a big red VD. O.K. in French, but not so great for anyone of the English persuasion. Then there was the struggle to name the tea shops. The French team members want to name it “My Tea is Rich,� which is apparently very funny to the French. The Englishman heading up the project didn’t get it and spent most of the book trying to change it.

Plenty of misunderstandings arise on both personal and professional fronts, some of which are pretty amusing. Many are language related, but most stem from major differences in cultural values, which become apparent in everything from team meetings to dealing with bureaucratic red tape and ordering in a restaurant. Now I’m fortunate to spend a bit of time in the South of France and have personally witnessed many instances where Anglo capitalistic tendencies run counter to the more “laissez-faire� French attitude. 

In fact, just last month I was enjoying a fabulous lunch on the roof of a hotel overlooking the beaches of Nice. An American businessman came in and was very annoyed that all the best tables were reserved for others, and that the only available seat was next to a broken window panel that couldn’t be opened to enjoy the breeze/view. He of course started complaining loudly and berating the waiters (who I’d learned earlier only spoke English when they wanted to, and now was not one of those times). They were completely nonplussed by his ranting.  In their view, they couldn’t control the fact that the window was broken or that the tables were reserved, and they clearly couldn’t see why he was upset over something beyond his (and their) control. 

Unfortunately, they didn’t understand the “control freakâ€? American mentality. For better or worse, we generally think we can control our destiny. Now, I’m no French scholar, or cultural expert for that matter, but it seems to me that part of the French “laissez faire” attitude may be the result of having two World Wars fought on their doorstep. As 9/11 showed us, the human capacity to unleash such atrocities on unsuspecting innocents is humbling and can teach generations of people that there are some things simply beyond one’s control.

I mention this because the bombing of Paris and life under occupation are brilliantly depicted in another novel I read this summer, Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. Is this why the French are more accepting of things they can’t control? I don’t know, but it may have more to do with their lower blood pressure than red wine … or was that cholesterol? Either way, they’re doing something right. 

Personally, my own Anglo/French culture conflict arose on my trip to France last summer while trying to connect my parents’ new high speed internet service. It just wasn’t working. I went through all the steps over and over and translated and retranslated the manual, until I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at the sentence I found under “troubleshooting.�

“Attendez quelques heures, essai encore et peut-être cela fonctionnera.�

Translated to English: “Wait a few hours, try again and maybe it will work.�

Say what????!!! I tried another translating service. Yep, same thing. I couldn’t believe that a company would actually put that in writing. My first instinct was to throw the manual off the balcony and into the Mediterranean. However, I decided when in France, do as the French. So, I poured myself a glass of rose champagne, had some smelly cheese and olives and waited. And, yes, a few hours later, I tried it again, and it worked.

The Bottom Line: This is a light fun read, and probably does not require the amount of deep thought I put into it. However, I thought it provided two very good lesson for Entrepreneurs. First, every country, city and neighborhood has its own culture. Prior to launching a business, you might want to understand the local culture of your marketplace before pushing your ideas on them. Second, in the era of globalization you might want to translate your branding ideas into a few different languages to make sure not to offend.

Bonus reads: Here are a few of my other favorite novels (from the classy to the trashy) about non-French natives adapting la vie en France:

Marie Antoinette by Antonia Fraser
A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle
Paris Hangover and French Trysts by Kirsten Lobe

Anonymous Lawyer is for any of you former lawyers out there, who, like me, have escaped for a much more entrepreneurial life, here’s one to help reassure you that you made the right decision! This novel is based on the Anonymous Lawyer blog that gained some notoriety a few years back, where Jeremy Blachman, posing as a hiring partner in a NY law firm, wrote a blog about life in a law firm. The fictional “hiring partner” he creates is such an amoral, antagonistic, self-promoting son of a b*tch, that you actually end up being charmed by the guy and almost root for him in his quest to be managing partner. Sort of like Survivor’s Richard Hatch without the naked dance.

It’s hard to describe what’s so funny, but there are some insights that Blachman slips in there that ring true through the satire:

• Law firms are a bit like extended adolescence, except without the popular kids and the jocks, which means that the individuals must recreate society to their liking and the result is sort of a Lord of the Flies with leather furniture, secretaries and computers. (I always felt law school was more like middle school with the mean kids and all, rather than high school or college where you could find your own group of seemingly normal friends.)
• Part-time means that you still do 100% of the work, just at 80% or less of the salary.
• It’s nearly impossible to have a life outside of the office and meet the billable hours requirements of the larger firms.

I’m afraid the book did bring back a few repressed memories for me. For example, we used to joke at my firm that the elevators talked to us more than the partners (although the elevator dialogue was limited to what number floor we were getting out on).  There was also a partner who didn’t like “binder clips” and if you didn’t hand in your 50 page memo stapled, he would take off the binder clip and toss it in the air causing you to have to pick them all up. (Word to the wise, if you were nice to his secretary, she gave you this valuable information before you walked into his office.)

And, after reading Anonymous Lawyer, my first attempt at a novel doesn’t seem so strange in retrospect — a new associate working late accidentally sees a junior partner watch passively as a senior partner chokes to death on his takeout Chinese, and then spends the rest of the novel trying to convict that junior partner, who’s benefitting from taking over all of the dead partner’s cases.

“‘after all we aren’t savages really…’”
- William Golding, Lord of the Flies

The Bottom Line:  Great beach read for any attorneys (former or existing!)