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Benjamin Franklin
An American Life
Walter Isaacson · 2003
biography
The first self-made American treated character as a lifelong project and prized the useful over the clever.
About the book
A complete life of Franklin across his many roles: printer, inventor, scientist, writer, diplomat, and founding father. Isaacson presents him as the most practical and accomplished American of his time, and looks honestly at his contradictions alongside his achievements.
About the author
Walter Isaacson is a writer and former editor of Time and head of CNN. His other biographies include Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, and Leonardo da Vinci.
Key ideas
- The original self-made American: a runaway apprentice who built himself into a printer, scientist, and statesman through constant self-improvement.
- He prized the useful over the theoretical, from the lightning rod to public libraries and fire companies.
- Self-improvement as a lifelong project, tracked against his own list of virtues.
- Tolerance and compromise were civic skills, and they made him the diplomat who could hold coalitions together.