David Brooks
David Brooks was born in Toronto, Canada, in August 1961, and later became a citizen of the United States. His early schooling took him through Grace Church School and Radnor High School, and he subsequently pursued undergraduate study at the University of Chicago before entering professional life in American journalism and public commentary.
Brooks has worked across several roles within English-language media, including those of journalist, foreign correspondent, editor, columnist, and pundit. He has described himself publicly as a "moderate Republican," a self-identification that has inflected the political and cultural commentary he has produced throughout his career as a writer and commentator.
As a book author, Brooks has produced seven non-fiction works since 2000. These include Bobos in Paradise; On Paradise Drive: How We Live Now (And Always Have) in the Future Tense; The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, published in 2011; and The Road to Character. Across this body of work, he has operated in the dual capacity of journalist working within periodical media and book author addressing broader readerships on questions of politics, culture, and character.
Brooks continues to work as a columnist and political and cultural commentator, roles that place him among the active voices in American public discourse. The facts available identify him as a living figure whose occupations span journalism, commentary, and non-fiction authorship, with his columnar work running alongside a book-writing output that has extended across more than two decades of publication since 2000.
Quotes by David Brooks
David Brooks's insights on:
People used to complain that selling a president was like selling a bar of soap. But when you buy soap, at least you get the soap. In this campaign you just get two guys telling you they really value cleanliness.
I wasn’t born with a tie or with Mark Shields stapled to my left hip. I have another life.
That same year Murray Barrick, Michael Mount, and Timothy Judge surveyed a century’s worth of research into business leadership. They, too, found that extroversion, agreeableness, and openness to new experience did not correlate well with CEO success. Instead, what mattered was emotional stability and conscientiousness – being dependable, making plans, and following through.
Souls are like athletes that need opponents worthy of them, if they are to be tried and extended and pushed to the full use of their powers.
Edmund Burke argued that people who have never looked backward to their ancestors will not be able to look forward and plan for the future. People who look backward to see the heroism and the struggle that came before see themselves as debtors who owe something, who have some obligation to pay it forward.
A dozen voices from across the institution told students that while those who lead flat and unremarkable lives may avoid struggle, a well-lived life involves throwing oneself into struggle, that large parts of the most worthy lives are spent upon the rack, testing moral courage and facing opposition and ridicule, and that those who pursue struggle end up being happier than those who pursue pleasure.