The Fun of Getting Thin: How to Be Happy and Reduce the Waist Line

In Short

Samuel G. Blythe writes a frank, humorous account of his middle-aged battle against severe weight gain. After hitting two hundred and forty-seven pounds, the forty-three-year-old journalist rejects expensive diet fads, mechanical contraptions, and grueling exercise regimens to pursue a simple, self-devised plan. By cutting his food intake by sixty percent and completely eliminating alcohol, Blythe successfully sheds fifty-five pounds over five months. Written in a plain-spoken, conversational style, the book has endured as an early, unvarnished classic of popular health literature, offering common-sense observations on self-discipline, vanity, and the psychological agonies of curbing a lifetime of overindulgence.

The Story

The arc of Blythe’s narrative begins with a blunt recognition of his own physical decline. For two decades, he carried excess weight under the comfortable delusion that his broad shoulders and forty-six-inch chest concealed his growing abdomen. Having spent ten years tied to a desk while maintaining the enormous appetite of his youth, he gradually accumulated forty pounds of excess baggage. He made sporadic, half-hearted attempts to trim down—riding bicycles, trying commercial diets, and experimenting with physical culture routines—but every effort ended in failure, with the weight returning as soon as the regimen lapsed.

The turning point arrives on New Year's Day, 1911. Stepping onto a scale for the first time in years, Blythe discovers he has reached two hundred and forty-seven pounds. Alarmed by his shortness of breath, pounding heart, and the realization that he is headed toward three hundred pounds, he sits down to confront his habits. Discarding the complex theories of food faddists and high-priced specialists, he reduces the problem to its absolute foundation: fat is formed by an excess of food and drink, and it can only be eliminated by consuming less of both.

His execution of this principle is immediate and uncompromising. He abandons his heavy breakfasts of hot bread, sausages, and waffles in favor of fruit, dry toast, boiled eggs, and black coffee. He eliminates lunch entirely and cuts his dinner portions down to less than half of what he previously consumed. Crucially, he refrains from depriving himself of specific foods; he continues to eat whatever is served—including meats and desserts—but strictly limits the quantity. At the same time, he cuts out alcohol completely, recognizing that liquor and beer act as heavy fat-producers.

The middle section of the narrative details the severe physical and psychological toll of this discipline. For three months, Blythe endures continuous, agonizing hunger, describing the experience as a relentless struggle between appetite and willpower. Despite the discomfort, the results manifest rapidly: his waistband loosens, his double chin disappears, and the weight steadily drops. By the fifth month, he reaches one hundred and ninety-five pounds—a total loss of fifty-five pounds—where his body naturally stabilizes. He alters his clothes, recovers his physical agility in the high mountains, and concludes his experiment with a clear mind and restored vigor, committed to maintaining his reduced eating routine indefinitely.

How It Unfolds

The weigh-in on New Year's Blythe steps onto a scale after years of avoidance and is shocked to discover his weight has climbed to two hundred and forty-seven pounds. Realizing his health is actively declining, he resolves to find a permanent solution to his obesity.

Stripping away the fads Reviewing past failures with exercise machines, specialized diets, and physical trainers, Blythe rejects the medical establishment's complex theories. He concludes that fat is caused solely by overeating and overdrinking, making the solution purely a matter of restricted intake.

The brutal new regimen He cuts his overall food intake by sixty percent, eliminates lunch, shrinks his breakfasts and dinners, and gives up alcohol entirely. Rather than adopting an unpalatable specialty diet, he eats tiny portions of normal food.

The ordeal of appetite For three straight months, Blythe suffers constant physical hunger, forcing himself to grip his chair at dinner to avoid overeating. He perseveres through the acute temptation, treating the struggle as a grim test of willpower rather than a light experiment.

The shift to stability As fifty-five pounds drop off, his face clears, his energy returns, and his clothes hang off his shrunken frame like sacks. Reaching his ideal weight of one hundred and ninety-five pounds, he adjusts his wardrobe and settles comfortably into his permanent lifestyle.

The People

Samuel G. Blythe serves as the sole central figure and narrator of the text. At the start, he is a broad-shouldered, forty-three-year-old journalist who loves rich food, Pilsner beer, and highballs, hiding his growing girth behind the excuse of a big frame. What stands in his way is his own powerful appetite, ingrained eating habits, and the temptation of table luxuries, alongside a deep-seated cowardice regarding physical self-denial. Through sheer stubbornness and a refusal to follow commercial fads, he ends up completely transformed: fifty-five pounds lighter, physically active, free from breathlessness, and firmly in control of his daily consumption.

The secondary figures in the text exist as types that shape or test Blythe's resolve:

• The diet specialists and physical trainers, whose costly, restrictive, and overly technical regimens Blythe tries and ultimately rejects as unsustainable for working adults.
• The medical doctors, whose prescriptions and advice he views with humorous skepticism, preferring to manage his own body.
• His well-meaning friends, who initially treat his struggle as a joke and later warn him that rapid weight loss will ruin his health, only to marvel at his youthfulness once he succeeds.
• An unnamed, modest acquaintance, who advises him to replace hard, grueling exercise with leisurely, strain-free walking.

In Its Own Voice

"At that, the human race is divided into but two classes--fat people who are trying to get thin and thin people who are trying to get fat."

Blythe opens his reflection on body image by classifying humanity's universal obsession with weight.

"The theory of taking off fat is the simplest theory in the world. It is announced, in four words: Stop eating and drinking."

He strips away all medical jargon to define the core mechanic behind his personal experiment.

"There wasn't a minute for more than three months when I wasn't hungry, actually hungry for food; when the sight of food did not excite me..."

He describes the unvarnished physical torment that accompanied his initial reduction in daily portions.

What It's Really About

At its core, the book is an inquiry into personal responsibility, willpower, and the psychological illusions people construct to excuse physical self-indulgence. Blythe exposes how vanity drives early attempts at self-improvement, whereas middle-aged reduction becomes a urgent matter of survival and physical comfort. He mounts a sharp critique of the commercial wellness industry of the early twentieth century, arguing that complex diets and artificial exercise routines fail because they ignore human nature and daily working life. Underneath his practical health advice lies a broader argument about self-knowledge: real change requires stripping away self-deception, accepting severe short-term discomfort, and establishing an individual routine based on results rather than expert authority or societal expectations.

Why Read It Today

Modern readers looking for a refreshing, anti-hype historical perspective on wellness will find Blythe's memoir surprisingly modern and entertaining. It reads less like a formal self-help book and more like an animated conversation with a straightforward uncle who has no interest in selling a brand or building a following. The text offers a fascinating cultural snapshot of early 1900s American life, detailing heavy table menus, popular drinking habits, and the emerging fitness crazes of the period.

Readers should note the period's plain, occasionally blunt phrasing, as well as minor archaic idioms (such as referencing a "coon song" of the era or using dated slang). The book's strength lies in its relentless candor. Blythe does not pretend that discipline is easy or enjoyable; he presents weight loss as a difficult, unpleasant battle of nerve. His clear, lively prose and refusal to sugarcoat the process make the book a memorable, highly readable treatise on human habit.