Walter Isaacson, who has written critically acclaimed biographies of Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin and extra, will launch his subsequent tome, centered on Elon Musk on September 12.
Simon & Schuster has began taking preorders for the 688-page e book that, based mostly on the preview the writer supplied, appears to supply a sympathetic have a look at the controversial proprietor of Twitter, Tesla and SpaceX.
“When Elon Musk was a child in South Africa, he was frequently crushed by bullies,” the e book’s Web site reads. “Someday a gaggle pushed him down some concrete steps and kicked him till his face was a swollen ball of flesh. He was within the hospital for every week. However the bodily scars had been minor in comparison with the emotional ones inflicted by his father, an engineer, rogue, and charismatic fantasist.”
That childhood, the writer says, left an enduring impression on Musk’s psyche, turning him into “a tricky but susceptible man-child, liable to abrupt Jekyll-and-Hyde temper swings, with an exceedingly excessive tolerance for threat, a longing for drama, an epic sense of mission, and a maniacal depth that was callous and at instances damaging.”
Musk and Isaacson agreed to work collectively on the bio in 2021—and Musk Tweeted information of the e book roughly 20 minutes after that they had spoken, earlier than Isaacson’s agent was even conscious. (In that very same thread, Musk didn’t rule out writing his personal autobiography in the future.)
Isaacson spent the following two years attending conferences with Musk, talking together with his pals, household and rivals, and shadowing him as he went about his day.
In the beginning of final yr, Simon & Schuster says, as he was secretly shopping for shares of Twitter, Musk informed Isaacson: “I must shift my mindset away from being in disaster mode, which it has been for about fourteen years now, or arguably most of my life.”
Isaacson beforehand previewed the e book in an interview with Kara Swisher and indicated Musk’s childhood could be an overriding them in his exploration of the entrepreneur.
“We begin the e book with this astonishingly tough childhood in South Africa with a father who’s Darth Vader and who nonetheless remains to be alive, however haunts Elon each day,” he mentioned.
He additionally indicated he was braced for criticism about how Musk is portrayed.
“[He’s] probably the most fascinating individual on the planet proper now doing probably the most fascinating issues and driving individuals loopy within the course of,” mentioned Isaacson. “And I’m simply there to inform a story story that helps you perceive it. It explains why issues occurred. And there’ll be individuals who say, ‘Oh, you defined it, so you might be justifying this or that or the opposite.’ … I’m gonna get loads of that.”
