Talk to Yes Please like its author wrote you back.
Get the ideas that fit your life — not generic summaries.
- Chat with the book
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What it argues
Yes Please is Amy Poehler's memoir-ish collection of essays about her life, career, and the things she's figured out along the way. It doesn't follow a strict chronology. Poehler jumps between her childhood in Burlington, Massachusetts, her years doing improv at ImprovOlympic and Second City in Chicago, her time at Saturday Night Live, the making of Parks and Recreation, and the messier personal terrain of divorce and motherhood. The book feels like spending time with someone smart and funny who is also still genuinely working things out.
The central recurring theme is the collision between ambition and self-doubt. Poehler is candid about wanting success badly and also being terrified of it. She writes about the exhausting performance required of women in entertainment — looking a certain way, laughing at the right things, not being "too much" — and how she navigated it mostly by committing so fully to the work that the other concerns became secondary. The improv chapter is one of the best in the book: she argues that the discipline of saying yes, building on what others give you, and not protecting yourself from failure is the same discipline you need for most of life.
What it gets right
- 1.
The improv rule 'yes, and' — accept what you're given and build on it — applies beyond comedy. It's a posture toward life that keeps you engaged rather than defensive.
- 2.
Ambition and self-doubt often coexist in the same person. Treating them as opposites that need to be resolved misses how most people who do good work actually operate.
- 3.
Women in entertainment are asked to manage other people's comfort constantly — their appearance, their volume, their hunger. Poehler's response was to focus so hard on the work that those demands lost their grip.
What it covers
Who wrote it
Amy Poehler is an American actress, comedian, writer, and producer best known for her nine seasons on Saturday Night Live and for playing Leslie Knope on NBC's Parks and Recreation. She co-founded the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre in New York and has co-hosted the Golden Globe Awards multiple times with Tina Fey. Poehler is also the founder of the Smart Girls organization. Yes Please, published in 2014, was her first book and spent months on the New York Times bestseller list.
