A Tale of Two Biographies #
As part of my most recent reading strategy I’ve been reading a lot of biographies. I finished the Power Broker in early April, and started reading Isaacson’s biography about Elon Musk more recently. I’d heard excellent reviews about the latter, but halfway through it, I’m sorely disappointed.
What strikes you when reading the Power Broker is the depth of research, the coherence of story and the intensity of feeling that Robert Caro has managed to put into words. None of these exist with the Musk biography. Chapters are short, out of chronological order and feel woefully under written and under researched. For example:
(Chapter 35: Marrying Talulah) … It’s actually funnier than I made it sound …
Why not just make it sound.. funnier? I’m not saying it’s easy, but its definitely something I’d have expected of Isaacson.
(Chapter 6: Canada: 1989) … most jobs paid $5 an hour. But there was one that paid $18 an hour, (… describes job).
Did he take the job? We never find out. Presumably yes, based on the description, but it was ambiguous enough while reading it that it stood out to me.
Setting aside individual nits, the biggest disappointment is how uninteresting the story feels (despite how interesting the story actually is). When I read Jobs, I was much more motivated to find out what happens next. Here, it’s as though I’m reading through an extended Wikipedia entry.
Admittedly, I am only halfway through the book, but I am skeptical that the style of writing changes significantly in the latter half of the book. Perhaps this is too harsh of a review, and my biography fatigue might be partly to blame for it, but there’s definitely something missing in this book.