Creator Spotlight - Bryan Padrick
Interviewing an American living in the UK for two decades
Bryan Padrick writes and publishes The Bus, a regular in-depth exploration of a topic related to science, history, etc. as well as other writing based around a common theme. Bryan’s one of the first Substack authors I encountered and started conversing with this year and it’s a pleasure to interview him!
Here’s Bryan!
You've mentioned before that you're originally from the US but you've been living in the UK for close to two decades? How does an American wind up in the UK?
I’ve lived in the UK since arriving on a teacher exchange programme in 2002 - seven years of teaching in a US high school had become rather old, so I was looking for a new adventure. I only intended to stay a year or two - but ended up getting married, having a family and now I call it home.
Being an expat certainly affords an interesting view - I think my opinions about the issues in my homeland are better informed than they would be if I was still living there. We spent three weeks in the US in July - and the echo-chamber of news was appalling in its limited scope. Plus, being the only American I know, I get asked my opinions about the US a lot - and I like giving my opinions!
What's your take on the whole Brexit situation? Do you feel it bodes well for the UK in the long run?
Brexit is a disaster, disingenuously sold to an ill-informed population by individuals who just wanted to further their own political careers. I’ve seen nothing good come of it - and unless something is done to mitigate the damage it’s caused, I don’t think it bodes well for the UK - or the EU - in the long run.
It’s amazing how some people claim not to notice it - but that’s probably because they’re not paying attention. I’d say to just drive to Europe once via the Eurotunnel to France - what used to be smooth sailing is just horrible.
How/why did you decide to start publishing The Bus? How long have you been publishing it?
In December, my school decided to restructure and made my Vice Principal position redundant. I’d come across Substack earlier in the autumn and was interested in trying it out for myself and - having suddenly found a bit of time on my hands, I decided to launch The Bus - which I did with my first issue on 7 April. I’ve published twice-weekly even since (the scheduled posting feature was really handy when we in the US on holiday).
I'm particularly interested to know how you come up with subjects for The Stop (the first section of each of his newsletters) - it seems you have a wide ranging curiosity.
Topics for The Bus are basically things I’m interested in at the moment, which admittedly can be very random. I’ve always been curious about, well, almost everything - as a kid I loved rummaging through bookstores, reading encyclopaedias and watching documentaries. In middle school, I had a job shelving books at the local library - that was like a candy store of new things (not to mention access to adult books my parents would have never let me read) - and university and grad school were great for fuelling my interests, too. That was just at the transition between the card and digital catalogues when there was still the ability to just stumble across information rather than being sent directly to whatever it is you’re searching.
How did you come up with the format that you use for The Bus: The Stop, The Detour, The Book, The Sounds, The Thought, etc.?
There’s no great secret about the different parts of The Bus - they were just things I wanted to include! I liked the idea of the Detour being very different from the Stop, and while some of these diversions are more popular than others, it seems to work. I’m always talking about books, so The Book was going to happen regardless of the final format and music has been a very important part of my life, too - so that’s the genesis of the Sounds. These have become a bit more thematic than I’d initially planned, but it’s an organic endeavour! The Thought is just that - something to hopefully get people thinking.
Do you feel that people are losing their ability to think critically? Any answers?
Yes, unfortunately I do … Despite an overwhelming amount of information out there, it’s become so precise and atomised that’s it’s possible to never see outside the narrow band of personal interest - and without new thoughts, insights and discoveries we can’t really think critically. I’ve seen it for years in schools - even the brightest pupils struggle to critically engage the way they might have in a pre-digital world, largely because they don’t have a broad-enough background of information to draw from to inform themselves - and this has a knock-on effect for critical thinking. To fix this, I think we need to address how we access information more closely and come less specialized; also, the value of learning new things has to be reinforced so that a better, deeper understanding of more things can inform our thinking.
Pretend you wake up one morning and the Internet has been destroyed. What's the first thing that you do?
No internet? No emails? No constant notifications, news and whatnot? Bliss. I’d fix a cup of coffee and find a book to read.
Here’s some additional information from Bryan concerning his newsletter(s)!
I’m intending to make some changes to The Bus. Issue 50 is coming up on 26 September - and that’s the end of Volume 1. Volume 2 will be another set of 50 - I’m planning to keep the Stop the same, but instead of a Detour to an article I was thinking about links to a video of some sort. There’s enough out there to read already - and my analytics are showing the Detour links rarely get clicked. And perhaps a film recommendation at times instead of a book? But it’s all fluid - one of the great things about publishing yourself!
I have another Substack - Considered Opinions - which I’m planning to activate soon as a companion to The Bus. The Bus is all about information - opinion obviously informs the choice of topic and my thoughts about various things come out at times in the footnotes - but I try to present it as dispassionately/factually as possible. Considered Opinions will be different - facts will always be backed up and cited - but the content is going to be more personal and reflective. I’m looking forward to the exercise - and as soon as I’ve sorted out a few technicalities (mostly around the ‘when-the-hell-will-I-have-time-to-write-it’ variety) I’ll schedule the launch!
Thanks once again to Bryan Padrick for being interviewed - do check out The Bus!
I love The Bus as a lifelong learner, thanks for this great recommendation, Mark! Probably the same reason I enjoy How About This :-)
Great piece. I also agree that people are losing their ability to think critically due to the lack of information they're being given. This makes me very grateful that I read anything and everything as a child because it gave me a lot of information that made me a great critical thinker.