“You Are Not Special” speech lands speaker a book deal

If you want to draw a crowd, start a fight, P.T. Barnum said.

Yet most speakers compile frequent flyer miles in search of friendly audiences, or say things so innocuous that the most incorrigible contrarian could not disagree.

But you know David McCullough, Jr.? The guy who gave that prickly commencement address, “You Are Not Special”?

It got 1.6 million hits on YouTube, and now it has landed the previously obscure McCullough a book deal with HarperCollins.

Let’s repeat the instructions: To draw crowd, start fight.