Steve Martin has been described as a comedian, actor, even reverse-mortgage seller (by Martin Short). He is less talked about for his ability to craft fiction on the page. His most recent book, Steve Martin Writes the Written Word, serves as something of a parallel chronology to his public-facing ventures. The humorous essays in the book mirror his career in stand-up, while the longer-form stories in the novellas Shopgirl and The Pleasure of My Company follow his breakthroughs into film. When read together, the full book reads like a memoir of Martin’s life as a performer separated into several distinct sections.’
Martin’s autobiography explores his falling out from stand-up and decision to pursue other artistic ventures, such as acting and directing films. Now, in the latest chapter of his life, he has turned back to performing, this time with his longtime collaborator and best friend Martin Short on the stage and small screen.
The book begins with a foreword by Martin describing the contents of the book in his highly sarcastic yet heartfelt manner. It is impossible not to hear his voice as he describes a yearning to correct or alter some of the older, previously published passages. The book showcases satirical essays from various literary publications, his two novellas and some never-before-seen musings included for good measure.
The transitions from one short essay to the next feel disjointed at times, with these beats functioning like setups and punchlines from a stand-up routine. Although they are silly on the surface, they hold a deeper truth. Martin is playing a character in many of these essays, confidently ignorant of his own stupidity. I found myself chuckling at too many passages to name as I was swept up in the expertly crafted irony he lays on almost every page.
These short essays serve as easy parallels to Martin’s stand-up career. They do not have much narrative. They are the “wild and crazy guy” he was at the time of writing. There is undoubtedly value and strong humor here, but they aren’t Martin at his peak. That’s where Shopgirl and The Pleasure of My Company come in.
Unlike the essay sections, here there are characters and narrative. Like 1987’s “Roxanne” and 1991’s “L.A. Story,” they showcase what Martin is best at: making the ordinary interesting.
In Shopgirl, the story is about just that, a shopgirl. Most of the chapters follow Mirabelle (depicted by Claire Danes in the 2005 film adaptation), as she navigates her daily life and whirlwind romance with Ray, a rich businessman. The story encapsulates what it means to grow and change. It is more serious than the other musings in the book, but still packs the famous Steve Martin wit and charm.
Nothing overly dramatic happens in the book, but I couldn’t help but read through the entire thing quickly. Martin’s work in comedy taught him to rope audiences in, so it’s unsurprising he is able to do so with such skill.
The second long-form story featured in the compilation is The Pleasure of My Company. It follows a young man named Daniel Pecan Cambridge as he navigates a lonely, O.C.D.-ridden life. The story is told in the first person, albeit from a future perspective, different from Shopgirl. Martin takes the time to introduce the reader not only to Daniel but also to the quirks and intricacies of obsessive-compulsive disorder. I felt Daniel’s pain as he struggles just to get around and find romance. Throughout the book, as Daniel grows out of his habits, you see him finally learn to escape from his constrained existence.
Similar threads and voices are evident in both novels. Both protagonists suffer from mental illnesses. (Martin has often described his own struggles with panic attacks and O.C.D.) Both grow and find love by the end of their stories. Both are also introverts.
Romance grounds and is a source of both characters’ highest and lowest points. The excitement of Mirabelle and Daniel finding love and escaping the loneliness that marks their lives is brought to bleak and dejecting lows from the heartbreak they feel when, as Daniel explains, “It is hard to discover that the person you love loves someone else.”
Like any great writer, Martin includes pieces of himself in these characters. In his many performances and films, Martin usually plays an extrovert, or at least someone unbothered by his quirky social interactions. These stories paint Martin differently. The way he writes about introverts leads me to believe Martin is an introvert himself, just one cursed with the desire to entertain.
The other fact of Martin’s personality made clear by his writing is his love of Los Angeles. Both stories take place in the city and are described with such vivid, specific detail that I felt multiple times as if I had stepped off a plane into the city. (It’s not something he hides either, with “L.A. Story” being a love letter to specificities of life there.)
The city is a character in itself in this book, as it emerges in the backgrounds of both longer pieces, from Daniel’s struggles maneuvering around Santa Monica to Mirabelle’s various attempts to enter the city’s bustling art scene. Martin takes deep care to present the city as living and breathing—but at times also suffocating and deeply isolating.
Like Mirabelle and Daniel, Martin himself is an undoubtedly quirky person. He is a collector of art. He is also a deeply thoughtful and subversive creator, at his best when he is untethered to the normal conventions of performance and writing. He challenges the reader to escape their perceptions of him when he writes in a more solitary and rarely humorous manner.
In the foreword, he describes the novellas as representing different points in his life. Shopgirl is a story of melancholy and heartbreak from a younger Martin, and The Pleasure of My Company shows an older, settled Martin. He describes the latter as a “presage” of his own life: “Its ending is my ending.”
The heart of the book is the evolution of Steve Martin himself. As he puts it in the foreword, “The works I present here are complete, but also represent the ghostly mechanics of a writer in process.”
Like the characters he creates in the narrative-driven sections, Martin is highly self-critical. It’s interesting to see him in this light, as it feels so antithetical to the “wild and crazy guy” persona he has become known for. In that way, he feels unique from other celebrities and comedians as someone who is extremely human. If even a portion of his true self is present in Daniel and Mirabelle, he is someone who faces strong doubts, anxiety and heartbreak. And ultimately that makes his ability to craft comedy in the face of these moments of depression even greater.
This article appears in February 2026.
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