A disciple of the angry young men

35. David Mamet "Writing in Restaurants"
Mamet is an uber-successful playwright, author, screenwriter and director. "Writing in Restaurants" is a collections of essays, mostly about the theater and what needs to be done to keep it alive. I'm not in the theater and don't have much of a desire to immerse myself, yet I still enjoyed each of the pieces in this collection.

Mamet is a Chicagoan. He writes about his time working at Second City and developing plays at the Steppenwolf. He reminisces about long gone pool halls. Anecdotes about a Chicago childhood run through most of the book. He paints Hollywood and the theater through a Midwestern, cynical lens. Though it may seem like it would be hard to take so much negativity in such small doses (most pieces are 4 pages long), Mamet writes in a conversational way that makes it seem natural.