Gabe Henry: I Think of Writing As Excavation

Gabe Henry is a New York-based writer, editor, and former manager of the Brooklyn comedy venue Littlefield. His books include poetry anthology Eating Salad Drunk (Vulture's Best Comedy Books of 2022), a humor collaboration with Jerry Seinfeld, Margaret Cho, Ray Romano, Mike Birbiglia, Janeane Garofalo, Roy Wood Jr., Michael Ian Black, Bob Odenkirk, George Wallace, Maria Bamford, and other titans of comedy. Follow him on X (Twitter), Facebook, and Instagram.

In this interview, Gabe discusses the 15-year process of his new history book, Enough is Enuf, how he sees writing as excavation instead of an act of creation, and more.

Name: Gabe Henry
Literary agent: Katherine Latshaw
Book title: Enough is Enuf: Our Failed Attempts to Make English Easier to Spell
Publisher: Dey Street (HarperCollins)
Release date: April 15, 2025
Genre/category: History, Language, Humor
Previous titles: Eating Salad Drunk: Haikus for the Burnout Age by Comedy Greats;  What the Fact?! 365 Strange Days in History
Elevator pitch: Enough is Enuf explores the fascinating and often absurd history of the Simplified Spelling Movement, which tried for centuries to transform through into thru, laugh into laf, love into luv, and enough into enuf (tu naim a few). From Ben Franklin to Mark Twain, Kool-Aid to Twitter, this quirky crusade sparked debates about identity, education, and the future of English itself.

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When I first learned about the Simplified Spelling Movement in college, it struck me as utterly ridiculous—this idea that people in Revolutionary times were walking around with their feathered quills writing “love” L-U-V and “laugh” L-A-F like some teenager with a cellphone.

It wasn’t until years later when I started digging into the movement earnestly that I realized how rich and complex it actually was. It’s a tale of grand ideals and radical failures, charming oddballs and pompous visionaries. Many of these so-called “simplified spellers” were brilliant. Others were clearly out of their minds. Yet they were all united by the shared belief that they could improve society simply by changing the way we spell.

I wanted to bring these characters to life—not just as kooky footnotes in history, but as real, flawed, and deeply driven individuals. And I wanted to explore how even the tiniest efforts to change the world—something as small as, say, removing the B from “doubt”or spelling “though”T-H-O—can ripple through history in surprising ways.

From the first spark of inspiration to the moment I held it in my hands, Enough is Enuf took 15 years to come to life. Not all that time was spent writing, of course. Most of it was spent thinking, planning, waiting—waiting for the right moment to withdraw from the world and commit. Writing a book isn’t just about having a good idea; it’s about finding the space in your life to actually write it. How many would-be authors start their book with enthusiasm, only to be pulled away by the demands of everyday life? A manuscript begins, stalls, lingers. A draft sits untouched on a hard drive.

Writing a book means rearranging schedules, reprioritizing goals, and sometimes (speaking for myself, here) transforming into an over-caffeinated, socially negligent troll for a couple years. There are stretches of time when it feels like the only conversations I have are with the words on the page.

This book evolved along the way, just like I did. It became deeper, broader, wiser. What began as a compendium of eccentrics turned into a study of progress, tradition, culture, and identity. In the end, the book I set out to write is not the book that I ultimately wrote.

I was surprised by how collaborative the process was. The first year of writing was a solitary (and often lonely) journey, but once the manuscript left my hands, it became part of a much larger team effort. From editors to designers to marketers, everyone contributed ideas that elevated it. It feels strange that my name is the only one on the cover. This book has many parents.

I hope readers gain a sense of wonder and curiosity about our language. I want them to understand how spelling evolves, and why people have been so passionate about trying to change it. But most importantly, I want readers to walk away with a sense of relief. You’re not bad at spelling—spelling is bad at spelling.

Many writers think of their labor as an act of creation. They’re building a house, and every morning they sit at their desk and add another brick. I prefer to think of writing as excavation. That perfect sequence of words, that sublime turn-of-phrase—all of it is buried underground somewhere, and your job as a writer is to find it. Every day, I dig. I remove a little more dirt, loosen a few more rocks. The process isn’t glamorous. It’s slow, often frustrating. But if I can commit to the daily excavation, then I’m doing my job. On days when the words don’t flow, when nothing seems to click, I remind myself: The treasure is there. All I have to do is dig it up.