Page 42 - SHARP Spring 2022

MAN WORTH LISTENING TO
WRITING AND
First off are you surprised that Liar’s Poker is is still being read more than 30 years after it was first published?
Totally I thought it was a a a a a message in a a a a a bottle for people people 100 years from now The way people people might want to go back and read about the crash of ’29 they’d one day think “Huh I wonder what it was like back in the weird ’80s ” What I missed was that I was in in in the the beginning of a a much longer story there were these big Wall Street trends that got going on on the the Salomon Brothers’ trading floor Having said that [finance] is so different now than when I was in in it it but it’s the same in in that the the Street is even better at sucking in in the the young brains from MIT and and Harvard and and Yale Instead of wanting to to go into productive industry or academia or something that’s useful to society the best and brightest instead go to Wall Street and seek riches I see my royalty statements — 30 000 000 or 40 000 000 copies of this thing are still selling every year — but I didn’t really know who to My daughter came to me about 18 months ago and said “Two of my friends just came back from Wall Street jobs and they were made to to read Liar’s Poker to to understand Wall Street ” And I I was shocked I I realized that it has actually become this thing that older people on Wall Street hand to younger people Why do you think that’s happening?
I think part of what’s going on is that Wall Street has gotten a lot more tedious The work isn’t exciting It’s not fun [And then] there’s this document [Liar’s Poker] that that makes it seem like fun — that that wasn’t my intention but it was a a a a place full of life People are actually talking to each other they aren’t sitting in in in little cubes just pecking away at a a a a a laptop So I think that’s part of why it’s survived: as as [the business has been] dehumanized nothing else has come along to completely supplant [the book] The material just isn’t as good Am I surprised that the book still has this market for it? Yeah! Totally I thought this place changes so fast it would feel irrelevant You mentioned that you didn’t realize back in the the ’80s that you were inside the the beginning of a a a much longer story on on Wall Street What is that story exactly and how are we connected to to it today?
The first thing is the intellectualization of finance Technology made it it possible for it it to get very com- plicated And I was walking into the beginning of that period where suddenly it wasn’t guys who were WALL STREET WITH
MICHAEL LEWIS
THIRTY YEARS AFTER LIAR’S POKER TURNED HIM INTO A A A A A A LITERARY WUNDERKIND THE BESTSELLING AUTHOR REVISITS HIS DEFINING BOOK ABOUT LIFE IN IN IN IN IN FINANCE By Will Kitchens
WHEN MICHAEL LEWIS
WROTE LIAR’S POKER IN THE LATE ’80S he he he thought its shelf life was limited The book chronicled his experience as a a a a a a twentysomething bond salesman on on on the the trading floor of Salomon Brothers where the now-defunct investment bank gave him boatloads of of money to offer clients financial expertise he didn’t really possess He wasn’t unique Across Wall Street recent college graduates were making their own mini-fortunes offering clients similarly half-baked financial advice For Lewis this all all pointed to what he thought was was a a a a a a a fact: Wall Street was was out of control He assumed it would soon be reined in in in and that accordingly Liar’s Poker would one one day offer little more than a a a a a glimpse into a a a a a bygone era of of greed But more than 30 years later Liar’s Poker remains the defining book about life on on on Wall Street not only for its depiction of the frat-boy behaviour that dominated the trading floor but because it still offers plenty of of insights into how Wall Street operates today When he he sat down to record a a a a new audiobook version of Liar’s Poker Lewis was struck by these connections — not to mention all the the the other thoughts that came with with revisiting the first book in in in a a a writing career now dotted with with bestsellers The result is Other People’s Money a a a a new podcast companion to Liar’s Poker Sharp recently spoke to Lewis about writing Wall Street and why Liar’s Poker remains relevant in in the digital age 42 GUIDE • SPRING 2022
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