I picked up Steve Jobs’ biography today and was not really sure what to make of it at first glance. Written by acclaimed biographer Walter Isaacson (who also wrote biography’s on Benjamin Franklin and Albert Einstein), this book covers pretty much everything in Steve’s live. Walter Isaacson is also the President and CEO of the Aspen Institute, a nonpartisan educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C.
I did have a few questions running through my head before I decided to pick this one up though. How can someone summarise the life of a man who was very closed off and secretive and who kept his cards very close to his chest? How do you write a biography about a man who never told anyone anything about his private life?
Well…the answers as I quickly found are given very quickly in the first few pages of the book. The prologue to the book actually goes into pretty great detail about how the book came to be and how Steve insisted Walter write a biography about him time and time again, unbeknownst to Walter of the health issues that plagued the last few years of Steve’s life.
The first few lines on the inside of the book jacket read:
Based on more than forty interviews with Steve Jobs conducted over two years – as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors and colleagues – this book chronicles the rollercoaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing and digital publishing.
I’ve been quite interested in biographies of interesting people for a while and pick up new ones and read them when I can, but so far this one as really got me hooked and one of those that’s difficult to put down. I’m not a huge Apple fanboy by any means. I don’t have all the latest Apple products and I won’t kill myself to get in line when they come out, but if you’re interested in the technology industry and want an inside peek into what life was like for one of the great pioneers of the business you really should check this one out.
