The Scenic Route: On Following the Footnotes

There is a particular kind of reader I’ve always admired, one whose progress through a book is anything but linear. You’ll see them paused on page fifty, the spine of the book cracked wide to hold the place, while they’re hunched over some obscure volume referenced in a footnote. While most of us are content to race from chapter to chapter, chasing the central thesis like a commuter sprinting for a train, this reader is more of a flâneur. They are not just reading a book; they are exploring the neighborhood an author’s mind built, and they’re determined to peek down every alley.

This practice feels almost radical in an age of TL;DR and endless scroll. It is the editorial equivalent of choosing a dirt track over a six-lane highway. It’s not mere pedantry; it’s a declaration that the supporting beams of an argument are as worthy of inspection as the grand facade. The footnote is a whisper, a polite cough from the author saying, “If you have a moment, there’s a richer story over here.” It’s an invitation to a deeper conversation, one that acknowledges that no idea is born in a vacuum.

Lately, I’ve been trying to apply this reader’s patience to my own work. We’re so often told to write with a single, clear through-line, to shepherd our audience from point A to point B with minimal distraction. But what about the beautiful, odd detour? When I find myself reaching for a reference or an anecdote that feels tangential, I’ve started to ask a different question. Instead of “Does this serve the main point?” I’m asking, “Does this open a door to a more interesting room?” Sometimes the answer is no, and the text is cleaner for its absence. But sometimes, it’s a yes. That’s when a footnote, a parenthetical, or even a brief aside can become a gift to the curious.

The Grace of the Unessential

There’s a grace in crafting these unessential essentials. They are not the bold strokes of the headline or the sturdy logic of the argument. They are the small, deliberate touches that suggest a world beyond the margins. They say to the reader, “I have done the wandering so you can, too, if you wish.” It builds a different kind of trust, one based not on efficiency but on intellectual generosity. It assumes your audience is not just a passive consumer of conclusions but an active participant in a network of ideas.

Ultimately, it’s about building a relationship with the few, not just broadcasting to the many. The reader who follows your footnotes is the reader who stays. They are the ones who will write to you about the poet you quoted in passing, or the long-forgotten scientist you mentioned as a counterpoint. They see the work not as a monolithic pronouncement, but as a map full of “X marks the spot” treasures. In a landscape saturated with content desperate to be the final word, perhaps the most lasting thing we can write is an open invitation to look deeper. The scenic route, it turns out, is where the real discoveries are made.

Notes & further reading

A few pages I came back to while writing this: