Leonardo da Vinci

Okay, truth time. I first wanted to pick this book up because of the cover.

But can you really blame me? This is one of those covers that looks good and helps to set the tone of the text. Leonardo was one of those men who helped to launch the idea and ideals of the Renaissance, with his emphasis on studying all that interests you. This philosophy made him study everything from battlefield projects, to human anatomy. His art also brought him fame and recognition, with his works being some of the firsts to use aspects of depth of field and human anatomy to make faces appear life like. With this in mind, I suppose it was inevitable that I would read a biography of him at some point, it was just the cover that attracted me to this book in particular. When it comes to Walter Isaacson, I own his works on Ben Franklin, Steve jobs and Albert Einstein, but this is the first book I have read. This is not such a bad thing, as I am able to look at this book with fresh eyes and see that, for all the heft this book promises, I found it to be very underwhelming.

Before we get to the problems with this book, lets discuss the good, of which there are many. Isaacson takes a different approach than previous biographies, by sending the message in both the introduction and the conclusion that we all can become Leonardo. That is, use our curiosity to study anything we like, and then use that knowledge in our professional working life. In an age where information is more accessible than ever before, this is a timely and appropriate message for the reader. It could very well drive a more reluctant reader to continue down a path of study that they had never before believed possible, and no matter my feelings on this book, that is a positive that I must acknowledge. Also, Isaacson does not praise Leonardo too much, as he may be tempted to do. Leonardo, for all of his brilliance, rarely got anything done on time, hardly ever sticking to a consistent work schedule. Instead of brushing over this fact, or dismissing this, Isaacson shows how this often caused Leonardo trouble, makes a cautionary tale for the reader to bear in mind. Another added benefit is the printing of Leonardo's works and folios right in the text itself. This saves the reader the trouble of looking them up and breaking the immersion of the text.

Yet, for every positive that I saw a few problems kept consistently appearing, lowering the quality with their cumulative effect overall. One of the biggest problems with this book is how Isaacson is not an art historian. Many of the art descriptions in this book have to be described for the reader in order to understand what is so revolutionary about them, and how they are different to works of the time. Isaacson tries to show these ideas, but for all of his experience writing biographies of other people who made amazing technological and scientific discoveries, he seems inexperienced when it comes to describing art. This comes through in the writing, with repeated phrases and words that amount to reading what feels to be the same passages half a dozen times. If an actual art historian would have co-authored the book with him, then this would have made these passages stronger overall, but instead we got pages that I wanted to skip rather than read.


A second problem is how he tries to establish a narrative of Leonardo's life. Perhaps this is because so many other people Isaacson has studied lend themselves to this kind of writing. One can easily see what Ben Franklin did, particularly his assistance with the American Revolution, and how this could lend itself to a narrative structure. Then there is Steve Jobs. Founding Apple and helping to start a home computer revolution in the 80's, all the way to the smartphone revolution in the 2000's lend themselves well to telling what is essentially a well-researched story. Yet, this format, as much as Isaacson tries, does not work for Leonardo. He studied many different things at different stages in his life. He would pick up some skills and abandon them in a few years, only to pick them up again later. Couple this with his inability to finish a project, and it can become inconsistent to see the book chapters shift from math to anatomy, to math again and then to engineering in between tedious repeated descriptions of famous Leonardo artworks. Isaacson also attempts to describe famous characters in Leonardo's life, but this also falls flat. Many of them seem to have little outside influence on his character other than being the catalyst for a famous painting. This means that we get a good two pages of text on their background, then describe the work in question, all to have it end by saying that Leonardo, of course, did not finish it in time to be sold. Yes, this may be more of a problem of Leonardo's life and the writings than Isaacson himself, but I still feel it could have been better outlined overall.

So this leaves me with a impression that this book is fine. Not anything terrible, but nothing that astounds me either. Unlike many other reviewers, who seem to love Isaacson no matter what he writes, coming at this with a fresh perspective can make me see that this biography is nothing special, despite all my hopes otherwise. I give it a three out of five.

Isaacson himself narrates the introduction and conclusion, with the rest narrated by a Britsih-accented reader. An odd choice, I thought, although maybe he won the job based on his Italian, which sounded quite good. In any case, the book was fascinating, and I learned a great deal about both Leonardo and the Italian Renaissance. Not surprisingly, though, given that the subject died 500 years ago, there is a lot that is uncertain about Leonardo and his work, but that doesn't prevent Isaacson from speculating. While the speculation is always credible, it's still unsettling.

Listening to the audiobook, one doesn't have at hand the wonderful illustrations. There is a pdf of the illustrations available for downloading, but still if you're listening on the go you can't consult that document. I also borrowed the physical book from the library so I could see the illustrations there.

Walter Isaacson never disappoints. Although I had to be especially concentrated with the amount of detail described in each page.