Source of motivation : 5 Biographies

Titan: The Life Of John D Rockefeller Sr by Ron Chernow

This definitive take on history’s first billionaire tells how the mogul rose from humble roots by creating the US’s most powerful monopoly, Standard Oil, which controlled 90 per cent of the domestic market. Despite his reputation as a “robber baron”, Chernow’s book portrays Rockefeller as stoic and compassionate.
Key details: His journey from ruthless tycoon to lovable old codger, donating millions to charity, while handing dimes to adults and nickels to children wherever he went.

Muhammad Ali: His Life And Times by Thomas Hauser

In the ring, Ali was indisputably The Greatest, bringing his unprecedented combination of speed and grace to the boxing world. Outside of it, he was The Louisville Lip, whose wit, charm and principled beliefs formed a new blueprint for the world’s expectations of a champion sportsman.  This heavyweight biography from Hauser – a leading US boxing writer – does the late hero justice, and won the 1991 William Hill Sports Book Of The Year.
Key details: The particularly evocative account of the Thrilla In Manila – written in such sweatily brutal detail, you can almost hear the punches and see Joe Frazier’s gumshield flying out of the ring.

 

Darwin: The Life Of A Tortured Evolutionist by Adrian Desmond and James Moore

 

The biologist was a controversy magnet, but his theories of evolution and natural selection went from heresy to accepted wisdom in a single generation. This almost novelistic account depicts Victorian society, Darwin’s five-year research voyage on the HMS Beagle and the discoveries that nearly killed him through overwork.
Key details: Darwin’s gambling and gluttony at Cambridge, plus how he used his work in the fight against slavery.

The Life Of Samuel Johnson by James Boswell

 

Claimed to be the greatest biography ever, Boswell’s tale of the mighty lexicographer is the result of the pair’s 20-year friendship and brings an era to life, like a Blackadder novelisation.
Key details: The sinking of countless bottles of port, plus Johnson refusing to go backstage at a theatre, because “the actresses’ silk stockings and white bubbies excite my genitals”.

Oscar Wilde by Richard Ellmann

 

US literary critic Ellmann’s impressively in-depth look at the life of the legendary Irish wit was 20 years in the writing, and won a Pulitzer Prize. It crackles with a humour and warmth worthy of Wilde himself.
Key details: Wilde’s many one-liners and gradual self-destruction, all in the pursuit of pleasure. The two collide in this declaration: “Nothing is good in moderation. You cannot know the good in anything until you have torn out the heart of it by excess.”