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Walter Isaacson

Biography

Walter Isaacson

Walter Isaacson, University Professor of History at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chairman of CNN, and editor of Time magazine. He is the author of LEONARDO DA VINCI; THE INNOVATORS; STEVE JOBS; EINSTEIN: His Life and Universe; BENJAMIN FRANKLIN: An American Life; and KISSINGER: A Biography, and the co-author of THE WISE MEN: Six Friends and the World They Made.

Walter Isaacson

Books by Walter Isaacson

The Code Breaker
by Walter Isaacson - Autobiography, Biography, Science, Technology
Driven by a passion to understand how nature works and to turn discoveries into inventions, she would help to make what the book’s author, James Watson, told her was the most important biological advance since his co-discovery of the structure of DNA. She and her collaborators turned ​a curiosity ​of nature into an invention that will transform the human race: an easy-to-use tool that can edit DNA. Known as CRISPR, it opened a brave new world of medical miracles and moral questions.
Leonardo da Vinci
by Walter Isaacson - Biography, History, Nonfiction

Based on thousands of pages from Leonardo da Vinci’s astonishing notebooks and new discoveries about his life and work, Walter Isaacson weaves a narrative that connects his art to his science. He shows how Leonardo’s genius was based on skills we can improve in ourselves, such as passionate curiosity, careful observation, and an imagination so playful that it flirted with fantasy. He produced the two most famous paintings in history, The Last Supper and the Mona Lisa. But in his own mind, he was just as much a man of science and technology.

The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution
by Walter Isaacson - History, Nonfiction, Technology

What were the talents that allowed certain inventors and entrepreneurs to turn their visionary ideas into disruptive realities? What led to their creative leaps? Why did some succeed and others fail? In THE INNOVATORS, Walter Isaacson begins with Ada Lovelace, Lord Byron’s daughter, who pioneered computer programming in the 1840s. He explores the fascinating personalities that created our current digital revolution, such as Alan Turing, John von Neumann, Doug Engelbart, Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs and Larry Page.

The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made
by Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas - Biography, International Relations

These are the leaders whose outsized personalities and actions brought order to postwar chaos: Averell Harriman, Dean Acheson, George Kennan, Robert Lovett,  John McCloy,  and Charles Bohlen.

Einstein: His Life and Universe - Audiobook
written by Walter Isaacson, read by Edward Herrmann - Audiobook, Biography, Nonfiction

Based on newly released personal letters of Einstein, Walter Isaacson's book explores how an imaginative, impertinent patent clerk --- a struggling father in a difficult marriage who couldn’t get a teaching job or a doctorate --- became the mind reader of the creator of the cosmos, the locksmith of the mysteries of the atom and the universe. His success came from questioning conventional wisdom and marveling at mysteries that struck others as mundane. This led him to embrace a morality and politics based on respect for free minds, free spirits and free individuals.

Steve Jobs
by Walter Isaacson - Biography, Nonfiction

Based on more than 40 interviews with Steve Jobs and over 100 interviews with family, friends, business rivals and others, Walter Isaacson’s biography is a comprehensive portrait of the life of an American business icon.

American Sketches: Great Leaders, Creative Thinkers, and Heroes of a Hurricane
by Walter Isaacson - Biography, Current Affairs, History
Einstein: His Life and Universe
by Walter Isaacson - Biography, Nonfiction
Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
by Walter Isaacson - Biography, History, Nonfiction