A.J. Jacobs, author of several bestselling books, is a quiet, unassuming man. So unassuming that I didn’t even realize he was standing next me in the elevator as I went to meet him.
It’s surprising after reading his work, in which he portrays himself as quite the character, especially in his new book, The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment. The book is a collection of short essays each depicting his life as he tries different methods of living. In one section of the book, Jacobs practices “radical honesty,” readily telling everyone around him exactly what’s on his mind. In another, he tries to live by George Washington’s rules.
But on this Tuesday evening, Jacobs, an editor-at-large for Esquire magazine, sat slouched in front of a room of eager journalism students wearing a baggy, blue button-down shirt, which he nervously tucked into his jeans.
“My wife has total control over my clothes,” explains Jacobs. She has his wardrobe organized into three groups: home-only clothes, home or work clothes, and clothes that require permission.
“I don’t usually like to wear the clothes I have to ask for permission to wear anyway,” he says. “They are too tight.”
Jacobs says his wife, Julie, who he has been married to for ten years, usually has the last word over what he does, including his experiments.
“She usually lets me do whatever experiments I want, but in the end she does have veto power,” he says. Which is probably a good thing considering she often becomes a character in his writing. He likes to use her as a straight man to his antics, but he says he exaggerates the contrast a bit.
In his second book, A Year of Living Biblically, Julie is forced to put up with several outdated rules outlined in the bible, including one where he is not allowed to sit in a chair where a menstruating woman has sat.
“She sat in all of the chairs in the apartment,” he explains. “I had to stand in my own apartment for the rest of the year.”
The Brown University graduate started his experiments when he was working as a journalist at Entertainment Weekly in the late 90’s. He says the experiments are the only way he felt he could write about himself in the first person.
“My life is just too normal,” he explains.”I didn’t have drug-dealing parents or anything.”
One of his first undertakings was published in Entertainment Weekly and is also in The Guinea Pig Diaries. In it, he tries to find out what it’s like to be famous, posing as a real celebrity at the Oscars. An experience that he says was very surreal.
However, most of the other experiments are a bit more serious. Jacobs says his experiment with rational thinking, which he also says was one of his favorites, has been the experiment that has affected his life the most.
“I found out how quirky the brain really is,” he says. “And I realized how many of my decisions are based on laziness and inertia.”
He says he still tries to think as rationally as possible even though the experiment has long been over.
Another enterprise he says really changed the way he thought was his venture into the life of a beautiful woman, though it didn’t start out being an experiment. He originally just wanted to get his beautiful babysitter a boyfriend, so he set up, with her permission, an online dating profile for her which he maintained.
“I gained a lot of insight about my gender,” says Jacobs. “I saw a very different side of men and sometimes it was the sleazy side.”
But not all of the experiments he conducted were life changing in a good way. During his experiment with the radical honesty movement, he learned how bad speaking your mind could actually be.
“I had to do a lot of apologizing after that experiment,” says Jacobs. “The only good kind of radical honest is positive radical honesty.”
As his experiments have progressed, Jacobs has started to focus much more on the self-help aspect of his ventures. He says at the core, his experiments are really about improving himself as a person.
But many of his critics say the experiments are just a gimmick used to sell books. His books has been lumped in with many other current authors who do what critics such as Elizabeth Kolbert call “stunts.”
Jacobs doesn’t like being called a gimmick but does admit that part of the point of writing about these experiments is to sell books.
“Any writer wants to sell his work,” says Jacobs.
Although Jacobs includes a lot of discussion about his marriage and his relationship with friends and relatives, he says there is one topic that he tries to stay away from. His kids. Jacobs has three boys: Jasper, 5, and twins, Zane and Lucas, 3.
“I don’t want them to get caught up in my experiments,” he explains. “Their lives are private.”
Even though The Guinea Pig Diaries was just released, Jacobs isn’t taking a break from his experiments. His next project is to live a year as the healthiest man possible, and he has already started dieting, exercising, and meditating.
“I’m feeling healthier already,” says Jacobs. But he still has some worries about the new project. “If I die before the year is up that would just be an embarrassment!”
