Outliers: The Story Of Success

Many people believe that success correlates with talent and hard work of an individual person. Contradicting this belief, Malcolm Gladwell states in his book Outliers: The Story of Success, that success is seized opportunities and advantages that only certain people get. Gladwell claims that advantages like social class, date of birth, family background, and luck is what determines the likelihood of success. Despite that he has strong evidence that supports these claims he overlooks the importance of hard work and dedication. In the memoir The Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls, she describes how she grew up in poverty and in a dysfunctional family that constantly moved around. Yet through all of that hardship, she managed to move to New York, …show more content…
She had to be hardworking because no one else in the family was and she wanted to work hard to be able to get out of poverty. Various examples include, when she was thirteen she had to lie about her age to get a job at a jewelry store just to be able to bring food home so she could feed herself and her siblings, or when they moved into their house on Little Hobart Street and she started digging the foundation and painting the house so she could help make the Glass Castle a reality. She also proved this when would work on The Maroon Wave. She was so dedicated to writing articles and reports and taking pictures. In the book she says,” Even though the Wave came out only once a month, I worked on it every day”. After all those years of working hard to help her family she decide it was time to help herself and get out of welch and move in with Lori in New York City. She was so determined to get to New York that she saved up money to go live with her and created a plan on how she would finish high school there and attend college. With all her determination she made it to New York with Lori and started working at a hamburger joint to help pay the rent and buy groceries. To finish schools Lori helped her find a school where she was able internship at The Pheonix. In Outliers Gladwell states in the epilogue that history and community are key factors in becoming successful but Jeannette Walls challenges that because rather than her community and history helping her in her path for success they put her more at a disadvantage. Her history was from a family that was selfish, drunk, and poor and she moved around too much to have a steady, supportive community. She took that fact that she was poor and didn't have any support and turned that into fuel for her ambition. To be better than her parents were and actually succeed in