best biography books of leonardo da vinci

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Nonfiction Books » Art » Art History

The best books on leonardo da vinci, recommended by martin kemp.

Mona Lisa. The People and the Painting by Martin Kemp

Every generation has its own Leonardo, and for many he remains a man of mystery. Martin Kemp , Emeritus Professor in Art History at Oxford and the author of Mona Lisa: The People and the Painting, helps us identify the non-mythical Leonardo. What might Leonardo be doing were he alive today, in our own digital age?

Interview by Romas Viesulas

The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso by Dante Alighieri

Art and Illusion: A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation by E.H. Gombrich

Leonardo da Vinci: i documenti e le testimonianze contemporanee by Edoardo Villata

The Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci by Jean Paul Richter

Leonardo da Vinci by Kenneth Clark

1 The Divine Comedy: Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso by Dante Alighieri

2 art and illusion: a study in the psychology of pictorial representation by e.h. gombrich, 3 leonardo da vinci: i documenti e le testimonianze contemporanee by edoardo villata, 4 the literary works of leonardo da vinci by jean paul richter, 5 leonardo da vinci by kenneth clark.

F irstly, congratulations on your Leonardo da Vinci book in collaboration with Giuseppe Pallanti. The press release announces boldly that we’re to learn the secrets at the heart of the world’s most iconic work of art. Of course, an air of mystery is perhaps fitting for a book with a subject like Leonardo da Vinci, whose life and work are suffused with myth and speculation. And yet, almost as a final punctuation in your closing paragraph, you state that “There is one Mona Lisa. It was painted by Leonardo. And it is in the Louvre ”. I love this passage! Which summarises so well the spirit of the book. The facts speak for themselves, and they lead us to some very grounded conclusions about the painting, and also about Leonardo.

There is also an important element of mystery which is embedded in the picture, that is to say the ultimate unknowingness of the beloved woman. There Leonardo’s technique induces a sense that we think we can see more than we can. We, then, as viewers, fill it in. There’s this genuine sense that he is leaving something intangible, ineffable, unsaid. So, there is a genuine element of mystery which he has contrived.

The fact that the Mona Lisa in some ways was the product of an unspectacular, almost mundane middle class Renaissance milieu, makes the cultural phenomenon of the painting that much more remarkable. This relatively humble soil was able to give root to this extraordinary flower. In reading the book, I found myself thinking that you could say something similar about Leonardo da Vinci himself.

The portrait is extraordinary because, at that time particularly, portraits were portraits. They were of interest inherently because of the value, status or public profile of the person who is being portrayed. So, to have this sort of painting of a bourgeois woman and for it to become famous almost immediately is extraordinary.

“There’s this genuine sense that he is leaving something intangible, ineffable, unsaid”

Let’s turn to the reading list for our discussion of a ‘non-mythical’ Leonardo. To set the stage, let’s begin with a compatriot of his. Why is Dante important for us to understand Leonardo’s art, and perhaps his scholarly and scientific work as well?

I think Dante  is of importance to Leonardo in two respects. One is a fairly obvious one in that he really set in train – not wholly individually but he gave a great impetus to – the standard Florentine poetic genre of the beloved lady. In his work, Beatrice is never really somebody he knows that well but she is idealised and sublimated into this extraordinary object of rarefied desire. He set in motion a tradition that goes through Petrarch and beyond, and one that was still thriving in the Leonardo courts.

As we know, poets wrote about Leonardo’s portraits using this language. So, that Dantesque figure of the beloved lady goes into a Leonardo portrait and then is extracted – as it were – by the poets who were writing about Leonardo. It’s not been noticed very much before but it is obvious to the close observer.

The other aspect to it is that Dante is the supreme poet-natural philosopher. We know about Dante’s imagination, we know his great storytelling abilities, but we tend to take into account rather less that in The Divine Comedy and in all his works – the Convivio (the Banquet) not least – there is an enormous amount of learning about objects, about physics, about the behaviour of things in the natural world and about light, above all. The Paradiso is about light. And also about the act of seeing.

Natural philosophy as a precursor to what we would regard as hard science ….That leads quite naturally to a discussion of E.H. Gombrich’s Art & Illusion: A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation  (1960) where he discusses art as a sort of experimental process – an iterative and improvised pursuit – that seems to echo what you’ve described as Dante’s marrying of poetry and science : the transformation of knowledge into poetic vision.

Absolutely. Gombrich was kind of mentor of mine; I never studied with him but he was always immensely encouraging. There are a number of people who are pressing on with art-science agendas and who are interested – both historically and in contemporary terms – with issues of seeing and knowing, which lie behind Gombrich’s The Story of Art . It’s the fact that you don’t just see things and know what they are; you have to have a hypothetical framework, you have to have an interpretive framework, to get leverage on the world. That was very important. I trained as scientist so, in a sense, I knew about hypotheses but less about the philosophical underpinnings which meant that the standard notion of empiricism wouldn’t do the job, that you need schemata models, you need a framework that you can then modify heroically.

“You don’t just see things and know what they are; you have to have an interpretive framework, to get leverage on the world”

For Gombrich, Leonardo was the historical embodiment of that process. He was somebody who had this amazing stock of schemas inherited from the art which he knew but an extraordinary ability to work with the grit of observation and the imagination to see that the old wisdom needed challenging, both on grounds of empirical testing but also on grounds of theoretical constructions. In Gombrich’s “making and matching” formula, there’s the idea that you basically have a way of portraying things; if I wanted to paint a portrait of your face, I have a series of pictorial motifs that I can use and combine to do it. “Matching”, then, is the process which is non-obvious and much more difficult than people realise: to make your eye look like your eye, rather than the general eye which I know how to draw.

If you read Gombrich’s writings – The Story of Art not least but other essays of his as well – then Leonardo is like the light cavalry. When Gombrich gets into a difficult area of argument, then the Leonardo light cavalry come racing over the hill towards the enemy to win the argument.

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Importantly for me, Gombrich also gave a sanction for looking at non-art as being as profound as high art in terms of its potential analysis. He would put an advertisement for a rotary shaver beside Raphael’s Madonna della sedia because they’re both using rounds. That sounds trivial but he makes a lot of it. So, that ability to fashion a visual history rather than more restrictedly an art history is of immense importance, and is very much in the spirit of Leonardo’s endeavour.

If we consider the way that the framework is deployed to make sense of and accentuate the aesthetic qualities of our experienced environment, some would argue that this is what sets Leonardo apart from a long lineage of extremely talented and extremely visionary artists. Would you say that’s one reason why he’s had such lasting influence and importance?

I think he tries to embed in painting all the knowledge – this extraordinary wide ranging encyclopaedic knowledge which he gleans. He wants painting to be a recreation of the visual world on the basis of this encyclopaedic understanding. Ultimately, it’s an unrealisable dream. Even film and moving images can’t do everything. One of the difficulties he had with finishing paintings, is that the ultimate ambition to make the painting into a universal picture, to carry all this immense baggage of knowledge and fantasy, is in a way unrealisable. There’s a kind of unrealistic aspect to the agenda which is always recognisable with Leonardo.

“He wants painting to be a recreation of the visual world on the basis of this encyclopaedic understanding. Ultimately, it’s an unrealisable dream.”

Under Gombrich’s rubric, the culture informs artistic production. So we stand to learn a lot about Leonardo’s milieu in reading from primary sources. The books you’ve chosen are Jean Paul Richter’s  The Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci (1883) , and Edoardo Villata’s Leonardo da Vinci – i documenti e le testimonianze contemporanee (1999) . Why these two compendia specifically, when the Leonardo scholarship is so vast? Even the primary source material is sprawling, and not even all of Leonardo’s notebooks have survived.

I always emphasise primary sources. If you teach Leonardo, you are faced with this enormous amount of material. My Leonardo library is too big for my house; it’s in the research hall of the history faculty, and there are bigger libraries than that obviously in professional libraries. So, what do you do? The answer, for me, is go to the primary sources as your first port of call: get a sense of them, naturalise yourself in this extraordinary ability he has to cross boundaries, to move fluidly from the motion of hair to the motion of water and so on, and get a feel for that.

Obviously, you need to have an interpretive framework. Historians and accounts that one can recommend range from something like Kenneth Clark’s very beautiful biography which is about Leonardo as an artist – it doesn’t do more than that – to works which tackle different aspects of his intellectual legacy. What has tended to be missing, at least when I did my first synoptic book on Leonardo da Vinci, was a synthetic gathering together of all these things.

Are there particular segments or chapters or letters that provide a unique insight or summary understanding of who Leonardo was and what made him tick?

It is a tough one but let’s do three passages from the Richter book. One is the letter Leonardo wrote to Ludovico Sforza – Ludovico il Moro, the ruler of Milan – and he’s selling his services. This is a draft letter, it presumably went in a fairer copy to Ludovico, but he details all the military things he can do. He can build bridges for crossing moats and he can dig tunnels and he can construct weapons the sort of which are outside the common usage, as he puts it. It gives an idea of this slightly crazy ambition that he has.

At the end, he says by the way, also in sculpture and painting, I can do things as well as anyone else can and will be happy to do the equestrian memorial – the rider on the horse – for your father which I happen to know you want doing . That’s a flavour of the man who was insanely ambitious, very willing to promote himself and recognised he was special. But it’s endearing, this sheer enthusiasm of listing all the different things that he can do, as though he can’t get it out fast enough.

“What is the core of this person’s artistic personality? And how far is it common across all this enormous range of diverse pursuits?”

The second one would be something from the “Paragone” – the comparison between the arts. This was a set piece debate he indulged in at the court of Ludovico il Moro in Milan. It was a kind of courtly knockabout dispute between poets, musicians, sculptors, painters, and writers more generally. And he was very rude about poetry. It was a serious challenge: they were challenging for the attention of the duke, challenging for prestige in the court, and they were challenging for salaries. And Leonardo is determined to give poetry a tough time.

He parades these arguments – some of them really pretty tenuous – and ultimately comes down to the assertion that the ear is not as good as the eye. The eye is the great vehicle through which we see the world and it’s the primary sense. He then assigns a descriptive role to poetry and says that poetry cannot describe a battle as well as a painting can. Which if taken as a visual description, is undebatable. But is poetry really about visual description? So, that gives you a sense of Leonardo in a court: very brilliant, very agile, and willing to bend the evidence rather creatively in his direction and to his advantage.

The other passage would be one of the later writings ‘On the Eye’ from Manuscript D which is the in the Institute de France. I’m not going to give you a specific passage – they are quite a number of them – and the Richter volumes have very brilliant indices, so you can go and see where the Manuscript D Dell’occhio (‘On the Eye’) is. That is relatively well into his career, it is around 1507-1508, and he was to die in 1519. It deals with the complexities of seeing. There is geometry out there, and he is in thrall to geometry. Mathematics , but above all geometry, is the key to understanding the universe, much like Galileo said “the book of nature is written in mathematics”.

For Leonardo, it is written primarily in geometry. So, there’s enormous attention to working out the reflection, refraction, aerial perspectives of objects, and how the atmosphere works and so on. But he says, and this is relatively later in his life, that we have to understand how the eye works in how we see things. The eye, he observes, is optically a very complicated instrument. He doesn’t have a focussing lens which limits what he can accomplish with his explanation. Before Kepler in the early 17th century, there’s no sense of the lens as an active focussing device. So, he tries to work out how the components of the eye –  the humours as they were called: the aqueous humour, the liquid stuff, and the crystalline humour or more gelatinous stuff like the lens in particular – how these combine to create the optics to get an image.

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Most people would think of Leonardo principally as an artist – famous for the Mona Lisa amongst other works – but he seemed to have been quite scathing not only about poets but also his painterly rivals. While most praise was reserved for architects who, I suppose, were the civil scientists of the age. Your own research has been about the relationship between scientific visions of nature and how these are applied to art in practice. In the book  Leonardo da Vinci Kenneth Clark describes at length and in very graceful language Leonardo’s constant negotiation between science and symbolism. This monograph was first published in 1939. This is still a canonical work for you in Leonardo studies?

Yes. Leonardo da Vinci is a beautiful book. And Leonardo has been fortunate in some of the writers who have tackled him, like Walter Pater and like Théophile Gautier in France. He has attracted some fine pens to write about him. Kenneth Clark is up there with them. In terms of art history, Clark is rather sniffily regarded by academics. He’s been called Lord Clark of Civilisation because of his famous television series. He has also written Landscape into Art and The Nude which he saw as very much about the intellectual history of art. They’re regarded as popularising. Now, for me, communicating in a broader framework is terrific and to do it as well as Clark is wonderful. But there is a natural sniffiness amongst  academics when he rides roughshod over some beloved subtleties that they hold dear.

The book as a whole conveys wonderful shape to Leonardo’s art and life. And Clark is more right about aspects of his science and engineering than he has any right to be. He kept clear of the science, he didn’t really tackle it head on, yet via the art and via the drawings, he gets an enormous amount right about Leonardo’s scientific opus. There’s also his great catalogue, which he did before the monograph, of the drawings at Windsor Castle which holds the greatest set of Leonardo drawings. Most of the anatomical drawings for example are at Windsor.

If you look at what he says about them, even when he doesn’t really deal with the science, he gets things extraordinarily right by intuition. Clark had that instinctive penetration into how Leonardo worked even when he was short of detailed knowledge of the area that he was looking at. To me, that’s a testimony of a certain kind of intuitive insight; having got a toehold Leonardo’s art, he was able to make more of the rest of Leonardo’s work than he really should have been able to do.

At one point, he writes that “there is a Leonardo for every generation”. In Leonardo’s approach to science and art, and the interrelation of the two, could Leonardo’s oeuvre be seen as an antidote to some of the very reductionist thinking that characterises many disciplines, compartmentalisation in the academy, and even in the ways that our daily lives seem to have become hyper-specialised? Do we need to recover this Renaissance notion of the interconnectedness of human knowledge, be it scientific, aesthetic, or otherwise?

Absolutely, yes. He was a lateral thinker to a kind of pathological degree. He couldn’t be contained in an area without seeing its implications for other areas. But it has to be done on a different basis now. In Leonardo’s era, though you couldn’t know everything about everything, this universal knowledge – that is to say, understanding the rudiments of physics, optics, anatomy and so on – could potentially be understood to an effective level by someone with Leonardo’s ambitions. And he wasn’t the only person who aimed at universal understanding. Roger Bacon in the middle ages was the Doctor Mirabilis who aspired to universal wisdom.

A theory has been advanced that the last human to have known everything – to have grasped all knowledge – was Goethe . Since then, the production of knowledge has outstripped our ability to digest and retain it.

Yes, Goethe is a supreme manifestation of that ability to work across boundaries and, indeed, to make your understanding of one area stronger because you’ve really got a sense of what is analogous elsewhere. Hermann von Helmholtz, the nineteenth-century physicist and physiologist is rather good as well and rather underrated. We should at least be able to understand what is going on in other areas, even if we can’t be experts on them.

“Leonardo was a lateral thinker to a kind of pathological degree. He couldn’t be contained in an area without seeing its implications for other areas”

I reviewed a book on quantum mechanics for the Times Literary Supplement which, in a sense, is barmy but it was about the beauty of quantum mechanics. Could I teach students about quantum mechanics? Perhaps not in ways that would be conducive to work in the laboratory. However, I would argue that whatever the discipline, we should know the nature of the enterprise: what kind of thing is going on, what criteria are being used, and so on.

Above all, in terms of Leonardo’s search for universal knowledge, he relies upon a profound respect for the orders of nature and how nature works. He doesn’t see us as separate from that natural world. We are in our bodies. As a microcosm, we embody the nature of the wider world. We are locked into its imperatives, and into how nature works. If you’re a canal engineer and you’re trying to alter the flow of rivers, the way to do it is to work in a friendly and cooperative way with the nature of water, rather than trying to push it around.

Leonardo has a profound respect for the order of nature and the human being’s integral place in that. There is a big message here, which is embedded in that notion of trying to get a universal understanding of how nature works.

In an age where our access to and perception of the world is increasingly being mediated by silicon and glass and software, what place is there for a da Vincian method?

Since we did Leonardo show at the Hayward Gallery in London in 1989, I’ve been immensely interested in getting Leonardo to talk to computers, not just as a database but in thinking how can we effectively put computers in dialogue with Leonardo. If you look at Leonardo’s drawings, he clearly wanted them to move. There’s a clearly an inherent sense of animation. For our show at the V&A, I worked with a very brilliant animator called Steve Maher and we animated some of Leonardo’s drawings to tremendous effect. We found that some of his serial drawings – drawings of serial movement – just needed smoothing out; he got the key stages.

“If you look at Leonardo’s drawings, he clearly wanted them to move. There’s a clearly an inherent sense of animation”

For 2019, I’m talking further to Steve for the five hundredth anniversary of Leonardo’s death about doing a virtual reality reconstruction of aspects of Leonardo. Now, that doesn’t mean to say that he anticipated computer graphics or whatever, but it’s a question of what is inherent in his work and how it can be put into a dialogue with the new media, which he would have been completely sold on. This is not – I hope – an anachronistic enterprise. We are always looking back. We also have to be careful as historians that we’re not manipulating the historic Leonardo and coming up with something which is simply a mirror of our own time. But, provided we’re responsible about that dialogue, then I think it can be immensely stimulating and good public communication as well.

So, very much a Renaissance man for the digital age as well?

People often ask me what would Leonardo be doing if he were around at the moment? which is unanswerable in a way. I say he would certainly be in moving media. He would be doing something with images that move and with virtual reality. He would have been spectacularly impressed with that.

June 8, 2017

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Martin Kemp

Martin Kemp FBA is Emeritus Professor in the History of Art at Trinity College, Oxford University. One of the world's leading authorities on Leonardo da Vinci, he has published extensively on his life and work, including the prize-winning Leonardo da Vinci: The Marvellous Works of Nature and Man (2006) and Leonardo (2004), La Bella Principessa (2010), written with Pascal Cotte and, most recently, Mona Lisa: The People and the Painting , with Giuseppe Pallanti (2017).

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5 definitive books on Leonardo da Vinci

• Over 7,000 pages have survived of Leonardo da Vinci’s personal notebook collection.
• Leonardo da Vinci’s sketches, ruminations and theories make for a thrilling read.
• Many biographers have attempted to figure out what made da Vinci such a great artist.

Centuries have passed and yet we still sing the praises of the quintessential Renaissance man , Leonardo da Vinci. The historic figure, the legend and the man fits the bill for our reverence, intrigue and near worship at times. Da Vinci was an intelligent, creative and complicated figure. Within just the past century alone, a countless numbers of books have been written about him.

Those who wish to learn more about him and about the time period in which he flourished would do well to dive into these five select books on Leonardo da Vinci.

Da Vinci’s Ghost: The untold story of Vitruvian Man

The Vitruvian man is a world renown sketch found in one of Leonardo’s notebooks. The image is named after the famous Roman architect Vitruvius. While this image has been parodied a million times over and stamped on trinkets galore, the true genius and history of this piece eludes most people. Historian Toby Lester scours the historical record and recounts the many figures and forces that made this image a reality in 1490, when da Vinci first drew it.

The history is fascinating, as the roots of the picture go back to proto-Christian imagery in which the author finds compelling evidence that the Christ figure owes its prestige and presentation from how statesmen originally presented a godlike Augustus Caesar to the Roman populace. Vitruvius was an instrumental force in ancient times and would come to greatly influence Leonardo, as he also drew on ideas such as the microcosm and macrocosm.

Da Vinci’s Ghost is at once both an intimate personal story of da Vinci and a far-ranging historical tale which contextualizes his greatness and creative mind.

Leonardo da Vinci, A Memory of his Childhood

In typical Freudian fashion, Sigmund Freud goes to work on his most famous attempt at a psychoanalytic biography. Reconstructing da Vinci’s early life from a few references in his journals, Freud argues the point that, from a psychoanalytic perspective, da Vinci’s greatness stemmed from sexual repression. No surprise there, considering this was Freud’s modus operandi.

“Observation of men’s daily lives shows us that most people succeed in directing very considerable portions of their sexual instinctual forces to their professional activity. The sexual instinct is particularly well fitted to make contributions of this kind since it is endowed with a capacity for sublimation.”

Freud wrote this book in 1910. Rather than putting this book off as outdated, there are a number of keen observations and thought-provoking ideas that Freud puts forth. Like the many biographers that came both before and after him, Freud is desperately searching to understand where Leonardo’s otherworldly artistry and genius stems from. Freud also concedes the point pretty heavily throughout the book that, in the end, these are just simply his own observations. This is by no means a definitive answer on the enigmatic figure da Vinci still evokes.

Leonardo’s Notebooks

What better place to learn about a man than from the words written in his own hand. These are the personal notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci – the books he poured the contents of his mind into, so that he could both be understood and understand himself. The authors have organized this remnant of his writing into a cohesive and categorical layout, so that you can glide from his thoughts on painting, sculpting and anatomy to his interests in philosophy, natural science and much more.

“The mind of a painter must resemble a mirror, which always takes the color of the object it reflects and is completely occupied by the images of as many objects are in front of it.”

These books give you the privilege to embark into the mind of the Renaissance master and experience something incredible. Nearly all of these pieces of writing are accompanied with some kind of artwork.

Professor Martin Kemp is considered to be the world’s leading expert on Leonardo da Vinci. This treatise offers us an incredible amount of insight on what made him such a great artist and scientist. Kemp goes on to explain in great detail the artistic merit within masterpieces such as the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper.

The book is both a journey on the winding and disparate career path da Vinci would take throughout his life, his many dreams left undone and a who’s who of the cultural milieu of 15th century Florence and Italy. Kemp draws heavily from da Vinci’s notebooks to paint a full picture of the genius behind the creations.

Leonardo da Vinci: The Flights of the Mind

Charles Nicholl’s book paints a rich picture of the Italian Renaissance worldview, one da Vinci existed in and shaped while he was alive. He expertly traces da Vinci’s birth as an illegitimate child in Tuscany to his infamous ties and time with the ruling families of Renaissance Europe.

Nicholl also manages to write an even-keeled portrait of da Vinci the man. He doesn’t spend too much time pouring his energy into psychological analysis or going deep into art interpretation. Utilizing his notebook entries, as many biographers before, he fleshes out a general day-to-day life of the master, which makes for an intimate portrayal of the man. While the mystery is still there, reading Nicholl’s work is a humbling admission into the daily minutiae of man who affects us all.

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Books about Leonardo da Vinci: my favorite ones

Leonardo da Vinci is an inspiration for people all over the world since 500 years . So many books were written about him, and many others were made publishing his notes, drawings and paintings. I am often asked what are my favorite or the best books about Leonardo da Vinci and which ones I would recommend. So I have put together the best titles about him that you can find around in English language .

Books about Leonardo da Vinci

I picked some biographies, some art and photo books and a couple of children’s books.

You can buy them on Amazon by clicking on the links in this post. Or ask them to your local bookshop !

Biographies about Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da vinci – by walter isaacson.

From the bestselling author and biographer Walter Isaacson, this book is an intimate and historically accurate portrait of Leonardo da Vinci. His childhood, family, passions and troubles come alive from the pages of Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson .

No need to say that Isaacson knows how to turn people’s lives into fascinating adventures, but the life of Leonardo was really adventurous and interesting so there was no need to spice it up. It deserved to be told with every detail!

Oil and Marble – by Stephanie Storey

Oil and Marble by Stephanie Storey is a fictional biography, but the story really happened and the way that the author tells it is very plausible. The story revolves around the competition and rivalry between Leonardo and the younger Michelangelo, both busy painting the walls of Palazzo Vecchio in Florence in 1503.

• Here you can find also the best books about Michelangelo !

Art and photography books

Complete paintings and drawings – taschen.

I love Taschen’s art books, so full of beautiful images, and the one on Leonardo is no exception. Complete Paintings and Drawings by Taschen it’s a book to leaf through often and to show to friends.

As the title says, it collects all the paintings and drawings of Leonardo da Vinci, thus offering a complete picture of the artistic work of the Renaissance genius.

Leonardo’s Notebooks

A collection of all the known papers that Leonardo wrote during his life. Hundreds of pages of his notes, jottings, sketches, doodles, and musings, including lists of books he read and even scraps of financial records.

Lenoardo’s notebooks doesn’t includes the drawings. You can find those in the Taschen’s volume mentioned above.

Leonardo da Vinci. The 100 Milestones. By Martin Kemp

Author Martin Kemp is a world renowned da Vinci expert . In this book he explores 100 of the master’s milestones in science, art, engineering, anatomy and architecture.

Leonardo da Vinci. The 100 Milestones is beautifully illustrated, and to me is definitely one of the best books about Leonardo da Vinci . Highly recommended!

Children’s books about Leonardo da Vinci

The story of leonardo da vinci: a biography book for new readers.

I love giving this book to children, they always enjoy it. This humorous biography has colorful illustrations, a lot of fun and less known facts , and it’s highly engaging.

Children will be surely inspired by The Story of Leonardo da Vinci – a biography for new readers , learning how he turned from a curious kid to a full grown genius.

Leonardo da Vinci. Extraordinary Machines – Pop-up book

Pop-up books are a perfect gift both for kids and for grown-up kids. The pages of this one brings up to tridimensional life some of the most extraordinary and futuristic machines that Leonardo designed, giving an insight on how they work. Leonardo da Vinci Extraordinary Machines pop-up book .

I hope that you found some useful reading tips here, I wish you happy reading!

Searching for more books? Here are some of the best books about the Medici of Florence !

If you want to know more about the Renaissance genius read also:

• Fun facts about Leonardo da Vinci
• Leonardo’s Flying machines
• Leonardo’s first painting
• What to do in Vinci

• books and movies
• What to do in Florence and Tuscany

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The best books about Leonardo da Vinci (from an art lover)

Picked by Ben Lewis

What did I love about each book?

Why am i passionate about this.

I fell in love with art when I was 14 on a trip to Florence with my parents. From that moment on there was hardly an exhibition in London I didn’t go and see. Over the last 20 years, I have made scores of documentaries ( Art Safari ) and podcasts ( Art Bust ) about art and written books that explore how the arts and culture intersect with economics, society, and politics. I love to research and tell stories about art: behind the most beautiful objects there often lie the most intriguing of tales, where intellect and imagination collide with ambition, greed, and vanity.

The Last Leonardo: The Secret Lives of the World's Most Expensive Painting

By Ben Lewis ,

What is my book about?

In 2017 the Salvator Mundi was sold at auction for $450m. That dazzling price made it the world’s most expensive… show more.

• Bookshop.org

The books I picked & why

Leonardo. the complete paintings and drawings.

By Frank Zöllner , Johannes Nathan ,

Why did I love this book?

The definitive account of Leonardo’s life and work by one of the world’s greatest Leonardo scholars, magnificently illustrated, clearly written, admirably objective.

Frank was very generous in his advice to me, as I wrote my own book about Leonardo, though he generally takes a more favourable view of the Saudi Salvator Mundi than I do. It’s a big book but easy to dip in and out of with its Catalogue Raisonée structure of an account of the artist's life followed by essays on each painting.

1 author picked Leonardo. the Complete Paintings and Drawings as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it .

Unmatched in his ingenuity, technical prowess, and curiosity, Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) epitomizes the humanistic ideal of the Renaissance man: a peerless master of painting, sculpture, cartography, anatomy, architecture-and more. Simultaneously captivating art historians, collectors, and the millions who flock yearly to admire his works, Leonardo's appeal is as diffuse as were his preoccupations. His images permeate nearly every facet of Western culture-The Vitruvian Man is engraved into millions of Euro coins, The Last Supper is considered the single most reproduced religious painting in history, and the Mona Lisa has entranced countless artists and observers for centuries.

On the occasion… show more.

• Books like Leonardo. the Complete Paintings and Drawings
• Book lists with this book
• Why do people like this book?
• Leonardo da Vinci
• The Mona Lisa
• European history

Leonardo Da Vinci

By Walter Isaacson ,

There are no new scholarly discoveries about Leonardo in Walter Isaacson’s biography, but he writes in such an easy, lucid, and memorable way that this book is really the only place to start if you don’t know much about Leonardo.

Books on Leonardo can feel quite dense, and leave the reader with the sensation of floating in a galaxy of disconnected facts without knowing what journey they are on. Not so, Isaacson’s book, which is the airplane read of the Leonardo lexicon.

5 authors picked Leonardo Da Vinci as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it .

The #1 New York Times bestseller from Walter Isaacson brings Leonardo da Vinci to life in this exciting new biography that is "a study in creativity: how to define it, how to achieve it...Most important, it is a powerful story of an exhilarating mind and life" (The New Yorker). Based on thousands of pages from Leonardo da Vinci's astonishing notebooks and new discoveries about his life and work, Walter Isaacson "deftly reveals an intimate Leonardo" (San Francisco Chronicle) in a narrative that connects his art to his science. He shows how Leonardo's genius was based on skills we can improve… show more.

• Books like Leonardo Da Vinci
• Biographies

Living with Leonardo: Fifty Years of Sanity and Insanity in the Art World and Beyond

By Martin Kemp ,

Here we shift the focus to what it’s like being a Leonardist . Yes, that is a word! Oxford professor Martin Kemp is one of the world’s most in-demand Leonardo scholars. His inbox is full of emails from strangers who think they have an undiscovered Leonardo in their attic. He rebuilds Leonardo’s flying machines for museum exhibitions. And when a stolen Leonardo da Vinci painting is recovered, he gets a call from the police.

Somehow Kemp manages to be self-regarding and self-deprecating, accessible, and a little superior at the same time, as he whisks you along on his adventures in Leonardoland.

1 author picked Living with Leonardo as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it .

Living with Leonardo is a set of highly focused memoirs, a personal journey interwoven with historical research that encapsulates the author's relationship with Leonardo da Vinci over more than half a century. We learn of his encounters with the vast population that surrounds Leonardo: great and lesser academics, collectors and curators, devious dealers and unctuous auctioneers, major scholars and authors and pseudohistorians and fantasists; but also how he has grappled with swelling legions of 'Leonardo loonies', walked on the eggshells of vested interests in academia and museums, and fended off fusillades of non-Leonardos, sometimes more than one a week. Kemp… show more.

• Books like Living with Leonardo

Leonardo Da Vinci: Under the Skin

By Michael Farthing , Stephen Farthing ,

This is a slim volume, which stands out amidst the thousands of books on aspects of Leonardo, for its focus and unusual team of authors. Written by two brothers, one a professor of drawing, the other of medicine, it walks the reader through Leonardo’s anatomical drawings and their far-reaching influence on both science and art.

The authors are particularly good at sorting out what Leonardo got from previous students of anatomy, from the Greeks onwards, and what was new that he brought to, or took away from the dissection table, where he claims to have examined over thirty corpses.

1 author picked Leonardo Da Vinci as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it .

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) created many of the most beautiful and important drawings in the history of Western art. Many of these were anatomical and became the yardstick for the early study of the human body. From their unique perspectives as artist and scientist, brothers Stephen and Michael Farthing analyse Leonardo's drawings - which are concerned chiefly with the skeletal, cardiovascular, muscular and nervous systems - and discuss the impact they had on both art and medical understanding. Stephen Farthing has created a series of drawings in response to Leonardo, which are reproduced with commentary by Michael, who also provides… show more.

• Coming soon!

Leonardo Da Vinci: Extraordinary Machines

By David Hawcock ,

Here’s the one to get to introduce your children to Leonardo da Vinci – a pop-up book with gloriously beautiful drawings and 3D models of Leonardo’s inventions, which included airplanes, a submarine, a parachute, helicopter, armoured vehicle, and a crossbow-machine gun.

Aside from the renovation of the sewers and plumbing of a Florentine church, none of Leonardo’s technological designs are ever known to have been built and tested, which leaves us with the question of whether he was more of a dreamer than a doer. I think this would work for 6-12-year-olds.

• The Renaissance

Explore my book 😀

In 2017 the Salvator Mundi was sold at auction for $450m. That dazzling price made it the world’s most expensive painting. But is it a real Leonardo? " Forensically detailed and gripping investigation into the history, discovery and sales of the painting … the Salvator Mundi … sits in 'a pool of theories, surrounded by a tangle of conjecture, suspended from a geometry of clues'." Sunday Times

"It’s a story populated by characters straight out of a thriller: the soft-spoken but ambitious art dealer, the Russian oligarch in the middle of a messy divorce, the shadowy Swiss storage king who sidelines as a dealer, the Saudi prince eager to polish his reputation with a cleansing spritz of high art."  Wall Street Journal

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New book alert!

I'm an accomplished author, award-winning writer, seasoned blogger, and savvy Public Relations Consultant, but my true passion lies in being a die-hard dog lover. Due to the demands of my current pack of Australian Shepherds, Seven and Paige Turner, I’ve built a rewarding career working from home, writing dog-centric books, blogging for diverse clients, consulting in public relations, and creating dog-friendly travel stories. I also launched the online shop, “Dog Travel Gear,” where I share tips and adventures with fellow dog lovers on the blog, “Paws on the Go.”

Susan's book list on life with dogs

As one of 67 million Americans who serve as caretakers to their elderly parents, Susan Hartzler cared for her dad for three years, gaining profound insight into Parkinson's disease and the multifaceted challenges of caregiving. Throughout this period, Hartzler's rescue dog, Baldwin, a precious gift from her late mom, provided unwavering support.

This memoir offers a personal roadmap for those facing similar caregiving decisions. Thoughtful, tragic, and funny, it shows that, while demanding, caregiving can be a fulfilling endeavor, especially with a dog by one's side. The author's story will better prepare others in similar situations and encourage them to… show more.

In a role 67 million Americans face as caretakers to their elderly parents, Susan Hartzler cared for her dad for three years, gaining profound insight into Parkinson's disease and the multifaceted challenges of caregiving. Throughout this challenging period, Hartzler's rescue dog, Baldwin, a precious gift from her late mom, provided unwavering support.

This memoir offers a personal roadmap for those facing similar caregiving decisions. Thoughtful, tragic, and funny, it shows that while demanding, caregiving can be a fulfilling endeavor, especially with a dog by one's side. Hartzler's story will better prepare others in similar situations and encourage them to consider… show more.

• Elderly care

5 book lists we think you will like!

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• Nov. 27, 2017

LEONARDO DA VINCI By Walter Isaacson Illustrated. 574 pp. Simon & Schuster. $35.

Specialists on Leonardo da Vinci have to work like detectives. They must draw information from the tiniest of clues. A few years ago, a German scholar spotted a marginal note that a Florentine had entered in 1503 in his copy of Cicero’s letters. On a page on which Cicero remarked that the painter Apelles “finished the head and bust of his Venus with the most refined artistry, but left the rest of her body incomplete,” the Florentine reader, Agostino Vespucci, connected past to present: “Leonardo da Vinci works this way in all his paintings, as in the head of Lisa del Giocondo and that of Anne, mother of the Virgin. We will see what he will do in the Hall of the Great Council.”

This little note confirmed that the subject of the infinitely mysterious “Mona Lisa” was Lisa del Giocondo, the wife of a wealthy silk merchant. It showed that Leonardo’s contemporaries recognized and discussed the special qualities of his art. And it gave a taste of the way in which Renaissance Italians creatively combined disciplines. Vespucci was a classical scholar, trained by the most brilliant philologist of the late 15th century, Angelo Poliziano. He used his training not in the academy but in Florentine government, where he served as the assistant to another great innovator, Niccolò Machiavelli. Vespucci was reading Cicero’s lessons about the ancient Roman republic to help him better serve the modern Florentine republic. In Renaissance Italy, cultural borders existed only to be crossed.

Walter Isaacson follows dozens of clues to reanimate Leonardo da Vinci, one of the boldest of these border-crossers. Though Leonardo wrote endlessly, he revealed little directly about his inner life. Without fuss and without Freud — though Dan Brown, unfortunately, makes an appearance — Isaacson uses his subject’s contradictions to give him humanity and depth. A dandy, known for his bright pink clothing, Leonardo lived at times in rooms full of dissected bodies. A vegetarian who bought birds so that he could set them free, he designed killing machines. A connoisseur of grotesques, he painted glorious, glowing angels. As Isaacson follows Leonardo from one locale and occupation to another, his energy never fails and his curiosity never dims. Again and again he turns up a surprising and revelatory detail — the averted eyes that suggest Leonardo used mirrors to create a marvelous late self-portrait, human vertebrae drawn with precision and delicacy.

Leonardo embodies the creativity of the “many-sided people” of the Renaissance” — the term that the cultural historian Jacob Burckhardt coined for him and his contemporaries. He is most famous, today, as the painter of the “Mona Lisa” and “The Last Supper.” Yet when he offered his services to the ruler of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, he promised to invent bridges, cannons and war machines. Only at the end of his letter did he mention that he could sculpt and paint. And Leonardo’s dedication to STEM subjects was absolute. In his notebooks, he recorded the movements of everything from the water in rivers to the blood in the human aorta (the patterns of which he worked out centuries before anyone else). He designed machines to lift huge weights and enable men to fly. And he made apparent that because he could draw these anatomical and structural wonders, he saw more and more clearly than professional scholars and medical men.

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Leonardo da Vinci

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Table of Contents

• Rave and Reviews

About The Book

About the author.

Walter Isaacson is the bestselling author of biographies of Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, and Albert Einstein. He is a professor of history at Tulane and was CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of Time . He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2023. Visit him at Isaacson.Tulane.edu.

Product Details

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (October 2, 2018)
• Length: 624 pages
• ISBN13: 9781501139161

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Raves and Reviews

"As always, [Isaacson] writes with a strongly synthesizing intelligence across a tremendous range; the result is a valuable introduction to a complex subject. . . . Beneath its diligent research, the book is a study in creativity: how to define it, how to achieve it. . . . Most important, Isaacson tells a powerful story of an exhilarating mind and life." — The New Yorker

“To read this magnificent biography of Leonardo da Vinci is to take a tour through the life and works of one of the most extraordinary human beings of all time and in the company of the most engaging, informed, and insightful guide imaginable. Walter Isaacson is at once a true scholar and a spellbinding writer. And what a wealth of lessons there are to be learned in these pages." —David McCullough, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Wright Brothers and 1776

“I’ve read a lot about Leonardo over the years, but I had never found one book that satisfactorily covered all the different facets of his life and work. Walter—a talented journalist and author I’ve gotten to know over the years—did a great job pulling it all together. . . . More than any other Leonardo book I’ve read, this one helps you see him as a complete human being and understand just how special he was.” — Bill Gates

“Isaacson’s essential subject is the singular life of brilliance. . . . Isaacson deftly reveals an intimate Leonardo . . . a masterpiece of concision.” — San Francisco Chronicle

“A captivating narrative about art and science, curiosity and discipline.” —Adam Grant, #1 New York Times Bestselling author of Originals

“He comes to life in all his remarkable brilliance and oddity in Walter Isaacson’s ambitious new biography . . . a vigorous, insightful portrait of the world’s most famous portraitist...Isaacson’s purpose is a thorough synthesis, which he achieves with flair.” — The Washington Post

“Walter Isaacson is a renaissance man. . . . Rather like Leonardo, he’s driven by a joyful desire to discover. That joy bubbles forth in this magnificent book. In Isaacson, Leonardo gets the biographer he deserves—an author capable of comprehending his often frenetic, frequently weird quest to understand. This is not just a joyful book; it’s also a joy to behold. . . . Isaacson deserves immense praise for producing a very human portrait of a genius.” —The Times of London

“The pleasure of an Isaacson biography is that it doesn’t traffic in such cynical stuff; the author tells stories of people who, by definition, are inimitable....Isaacson is at his finest when he analyzes what made Leonardo human.” —The New York Times

“Monumental . . . Leonardo led an astonishingly interesting eventful life. And Isaacson brilliantly captures its essence.” — The Toronto Star

"Majestic . . . Isaacson takes on another complex, giant figure and transforms him into someone we can recognize. . . . Totally enthralling, masterful, and passionate.” — Kirkus Reviews , starred review

"Illuminating . . . This is a monumental tribute to a titanic figure." — Publishers Weekly , starred review

“Isaacson uses his subject’s contradictions to give him humanity and depth.” —Anthony Grafton, The New York Times

“Encompassing in its coverage, robust in its artistic explanations, yet written in a smart, conversational tone, this is both a solid introduction to the man and a sweeping saga of his genius.” — Booklist , starred review

“A fresh and enthusiastic reading of the extraordinary da Vinci notebooks, written in a way that makes them both accessible and contemporary. Absorbing, enlightening and always engaging.” — Miranda Seymour, author of Mary Shelley

“Isaacson's biography is linear enough to follow easily, yet it returns, as did the artist, time and again, to the highly concrete, enticingly yet rigorously investigable mysteries of the human and natural world. Model . . . . This beautiful book, on coated stock, showing text and illustrations to the best advantage, is a pleasure to hold.” —Bay Area Reporter

“Isaacson, to his credit, helps us see Leonardo’s artistic vision with fresh eyes. . . . He writes simply and clearly, and even though his principal character hails from antiquity, the narrative hums like a headline from the morning paper, alert to topical parallels between then and now . . . we finish the book with a renewed conviction that the world’s most famous Renaissance man was, in essence, inimitable.” —Christian Science Monitor

“A full and engrossing profile of the artist . . . The author moves fluidly between the scientific inquiries of Leonardo’s notebooks and the artistic achievements in his sketchbooks, and carries the same themes, such as the artist’s boundless curiosity and inquiry, through them in a way that does not seem too facile or overapplied.” —East Hampton Star

“A 21st century page-turner." —USA Today

“Exuberant . . . a richly illustrated ride through the artist’s life . . . a fascinating, bonbon-size tribute to the man who thought to ask.” — Newsday

“Beautifully produced and illustrated, the biography is an ideal match of author and subject. . . . Fascinated by Leonardo’s genius, Isaacson lucidly and lovingly captures his stunning powers of observation that spanned so many disciplines. . . . Isaacson’s monumental and magnificent biography does succeed in helping us understand what made da Vinci’s paintings so memorable, and in making Leonardo much more accessible, as a genius, a man of and outside of his times, and as a 'quirky, obsessive, playful, and easily distracted' human being.” — Tulsa World

“In some ways this is Walter Isaacson's most ambitious book. He uses the life he recounts in a wonderful way to speculate on the source of geniuses...always you are informed, entertained, stimulated, satisfied. This has to be the most beautifully illustrated and printed book I've seen in recent years.” —Fareed Zakaria GPS

“[A] splendid work that provides an illuminating guide to the output of one of the last millennium’s greatest minds.” — Guardian US

"Leonardo da Vinci's prowess as a polymath — driven by insatiable curiosity about everything from the human womb to deadly weaponry — still stuns. In this copiously illustrated biography, we feel its force all over again. Walter Isaacson wonderfully conveys how Leonardo's genius unified science and art." —NATURE

"Dazzling" —HARVARD GAZETTE

"Luminous . . . Leonardo Da Vinci is an elegantly illustrated book that broadens Isaacson’s viewfinder on the psychology of major lives – Henry Kissinger, Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs are the subjects of his previous biographies, best-sellers all." —THE DAILY BEAST

Awards and Honors

• Carnegie Medal Honor Book

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LEONARDO DA VINCI

by Walter Isaacson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 17, 2017

Totally enthralling, masterful, and passionate, this book should garner serious consideration for a variety of book prizes.

A majestic biography of “history’s most creative genius.”

With many exceptional popular history books under his belt, Isaacson (History/Tulane Univ.; The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution , 2014, etc.) is close to assuming the mantle currently held by David McCullough. Here, Isaacson takes on another complex, giant figure and transforms him into someone we can recognize. The author believes the term “genius” is too easily bandied about, but Leonardo (1452-1519), from the tiny village of Vinci, near Florence, was “one of the few people in history who indisputably deserved—or, to be more precise, earned —that appellation.” He was self-taught and “willed his way to his genius.” With joyous zest, Isaacson crafts a marvelously told story “of a misfit: illegitimate, gay, vegetarian, left-handed, easily distracted, and at times heretical.” Like a child in a candy store, Isaacson often stops to exclaim; he shares his enthusiasm, and it’s contagious. For the author, the starting point are da Vinci’s notebooks, all 7,200 pages, the “greatest record of curiosity ever created.” Da Vinci’s groundbreaking, detailed drawings charted the inner worlds of the skull, heart, muscles, brain, birds’ wings, and a working odometer, along with doodles and numerous to-do lists. In his iconic Vitruvian Man , completed when he was 38 and struggling to learn Latin, “Leonardo peers at himself with furrowed brow and tries to grasp the secrets of his own nature.” Isaacson is equally insightful with the paintings, of which there are few. The Last Supper is a “mix of scientific perspective and theatrical license, of intellect and fantasy.” Regarding the uncompleted Mona Lisa , he writes “never in a painting have motion and emotion, the paired touchstones of Leonardo’s art, been so intertwined.” As Isaacson wisely puts it, we can all learn from Leonardo.

Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-5011-3915-4

Page Count: 576

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: Sept. 2, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017

BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | HISTORICAL & MILITARY | GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR

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by Walter Isaacson

by Walter Isaacson with adapted by Sarah Durand

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by Elie Wiesel & translated by Marion Wiesel ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 16, 2006

The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...

Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children. 

He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions. 

Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006

ISBN: 0374500010

Page Count: 120

Publisher: Hill & Wang

Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006

BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | HOLOCAUST | HISTORY | GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | GENERAL HISTORY

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INTO THE WILD

by Jon Krakauer ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1996

A wonderful page-turner written with humility, immediacy, and great style. Nothing came cheap and easy to McCandless, nor...

The excruciating story of a young man on a quest for knowledge and experience, a search that eventually cooked his goose, told with the flair of a seasoned investigative reporter by Outside magazine contributing editor Krakauer (Eiger Dreams, 1990). 

Chris McCandless loved the road, the unadorned life, the Tolstoyan call to asceticism. After graduating college, he took off on another of his long destinationless journeys, this time cutting all contact with his family and changing his name to Alex Supertramp. He was a gent of strong opinions, and he shared them with those he met: "You must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life''; "be nomadic.'' Ultimately, in 1992, his terms got him into mortal trouble when he ran up against something—the Alaskan wild—that didn't give a hoot about Supertramp's worldview; his decomposed corpse was found 16 weeks after he entered the bush. Many people felt McCandless was just a hubris-laden jerk with a death wish (he had discarded his map before going into the wild and brought no food but a bag of rice). Krakauer thought not. Admitting an interest that bordered on obsession, he dug deep into McCandless's life. He found a willful, reckless, moody boyhood; an ugly little secret that sundered the relationship between father and son; a moral absolutism that agitated the young man's soul and drove him to extremes; but he was no more a nutcase than other pilgrims. Writing in supple, electric prose, Krakauer tries to make sense of McCandless (while scrupulously avoiding off-the-rack psychoanalysis): his risky behavior and the rites associated with it, his asceticism, his love of wide open spaces, the flights of his soul.

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1996

ISBN: 0-679-42850-X

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Villard

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1995

GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR

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by Jon Krakauer

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Six Artful Books About Leonardo da Vinci

Books about artists, whether fictional or factual, should have pictures. Lots and lots of pictures. Especially books about the prolific Renaissance Master, Leonardo da Vinci.

S.W. Sondheimer

When not prying Legos and gaming dice out of her feet, S.W. Sondheimer is a registered nurse at the Department of Therapeutic Misadventures, a herder of genetic descendants, cosplayer, and a fiction and (someday) comics writer. She is a Yinzer by way of New England and Oregon and lives in the glorious 'Burgh with her husband, 2 smaller people, 2 cats, a fish, and a snail. She occasionally tries to grow plants, drinks double-caffeine coffee, and has a habit of rooting for the underdog. It is possible she has a book/comic book problem but has no intention of doing anything about either. Twitter: @SWSondheimer

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I don’t read a ton of biographies. I blame the 10 years of higher education which consisted of reading a great number of dry academic texts. And being tested on said texts. The combination often makes reading  any  sort of non-fiction a struggle because I forget I’m  not  going to be tested; I get hung up on small details and try to imprint them on my brain rather than simply enjoying the tale of a fascinating life.

One of the reasons I imagine Watler Isaacson’s Leonardo Da Vinci is so popular at the moment is its conversational style, and the author’s obvious adoration of his subject, which comes through even when he’s focusing on some of the great man’s more questionable qualities (such as the tendency not to finish commissions). Isaacson has also chosen his anecdotes well, reframing one of the art world’s gods as a brilliant, but fallible human, which serves to make da Vinci even more fascinating and allowing us mere mortals to engage with him on a different, common level.

The only thing I think Isaacson’s work lacks? Art. There are some reproductions of da Vinci’s works scattered throughout, including one of my favorites (a preparatory cartoon for  The Virgin and Child With St. Anne , which I prefer to the finished painting for many of the same reasons Isaacson does, which I have had the privilege to see at the National Gallery in DC during college.  Portrait of Givrena de’ Benci  is part of their collection as well) but even the full page prints are small (as they must be to fit into a standard size book) and it’s difficult to get a feel for the intricate detailing, despite Isaacson’s admirable descriptions. Also, Leonardo was, foremost, a draftsman and painter and it only seems appropriate that books  about him be bursting with sketches and colors of their own.

There are a few different ways creators might choose to go about this of course. The first is to tell da Vinci’s story  with  pictures. The other is to reproduce his work, scattering the commentary rather than the art. In both of those spirits, might I recommend:

Leonardo da Vinci: The Renaissance Man by Dan Danko and Lalit Kumar Sharma (Campfire Biography)

This is a perfect book for da Vinci beginners and to introduce the younger set to this towering historical presence. It’s a “just the facts, ma’am” sort of graphic novel that sums up da Vinci’s life and works while also telling the story of the  Mona Lisa’s theft from the Louvre in 1911. Some of the stories relayed in the comic are likely more myth than reality but the fact they feature in Leonardo’s notebooks mean they were important to him  which, in turn, makes them worthy inclusions in a book  about him. The art isn’t super flash but it is clean and sharp, which allows the reader to focus on the story and the hash-marked shading on character’s faces is a nice nod to da Vinci’s personal style by Sharma.

Chiaroscurao: The Private Lives of Leonardo da Vinci  by Pat McGreal, David Rawson, Chaz Truog, and Rafael Kayanan (Vertigo)

Chiaroscurao  was originally published on the mid-90s which, I’ll tell you straight up, isn’t my favorite period for comic art (though the collage photographs which lead off each chapter are eerie and compelling) so there’s that. This isn’t a book to read if you’re looking for  facts  about da Vinci; instead, the authors and artists use the more… sensational mutterings about the man as jumping off points to build a drama worthy of an arc on  Dynasty , very much sex, drugs, and silver lutes. Told from the point of view of da Vinci’s companion of two plus decades, a man he nicknamed “Salai,” or “little devil,” it highlights some of the less complimentary aspects of da Vinci’s personality and work habits, as well as Salai’s own conflicted feelings regarding his long standing relationship with Leonardo. A wholly enjoyable story walking, according to Rawson, “the line between  I, Claudius and  Caligula” and having a grand time doing so. This one is  not for the kids.

Leonardo’s Notebooks: Writing and Art of the Great Master edited by H. Anna Suh (Black Dog and Leventhal)

Departing from fictionalized accounts, Suh, (who spent time on the curatorial staff at the Met) presents readers with a condensed version of da Vinci’s 4000  known  pages of sketches and notes, allowing us to go right to the source for a glimpse into the mind of the insatiably curious artist, scientist, and engineer. With the exception of the introductory pages, all of the text in Writing and Art of the Great Master is da Vinci’s own, translated from Italian and placed in context beside related sketches. This isn’t a book to  read so much as to  pore through , trying to follow the twists and turns of Leonardo’s thought patterns and flights of both ideas and fancy.

Leonardo da Vinci : The Graphic Work by Johannes Nathan and Frank Zöllner (TASCHEN)

A meticulous observer of everything from the tongues of woodpeckers to the folds in fabric to the shadows beneath a subject’s chin, da Vinci’s graphic works are just as lovely and mesmerizing as his finished paintings. And there are also many, many more of them to enjoy and study than there are completed oils of frescoes. The drawings are broken down by subject matter in  The Graphic Work  and, with the exception of a short introduction at the beginning of each chapter discussing the key points of that particular subject, the book is entirely reproductions of da Vinci’s handiwork. I’m particularly enamored of the anatomy drawings, which are so detailed and so based on observation (da Vinci was a great dissector of both human and animal corpses despite (supposedly) being a vegetarian) I could have used them to study for class back in nursing school; the draperies studies, which demonstrate the power of light and shadow even in a limited, duo-chrome palette; and, most of all, the predatory sketches and cartoons made to assist in the layout of paintings. That last, especially, allows one to study Leonardo’s creative process and the trajectory of his anatomical studies and his work in perspective and optics.

Leonardo da Vinci: The Mechanics of Man by Martin Clayton and Ron Philo (The Getty Museum)

Sensing a title theme? Me too.

Leonardo notes in his writings, and other sources seem to confirm, he intended to write a great many treatises on a great many things before his death in 1519. Alas, as he was apparently wont with even his most deeply held obsessions and many of his favorite works, he never finished said treatises, including the one on anatomy. Clayton and Philo, however, have composed it for us, arranging da Vinci’s drawings by body system. Even the reproductions are unbelievably delicate and, for the most part, quite accurate, from the bones of the foot to the minute muscles around the mouth, with which da Vinci took great care, wanting his most famous of smiles to be as perfectly detailed. He was a proponent, as were few artists before him, of building human figures from the inside out, making certain the positions of muscles and ligaments were viable and correct before laying skin and cloth over then.

Those with a medical inclination will notice da Vinci reproduces the cranial nerves almost as well as a modern anatomy book and did experiments to determine what each of them did as well as positing the theories that a fetus doesn’t breathe air and has its own circulatory system of umbilical vessels.

These drawings are art and science combined, as likely to hang on a wall as to be used for study. I… may have to find a copy of this one to keep.

Leonardo da Vinci :  The Complete Paintings by Frank Zöllner (TASCHEN)

Da Vinci paintings are precious things. There aren’t actually all that many of them, especially  finished  works, and those still extant are scattered throughout museums all over the world. I, for one, would love to someday have the disposable income to go on a da Vinci journey so, if someone could get on me winning the lottery or randomly inheriting several million dollars, that would be fantastic. Of course, I can’t really complain: I’ve been to the National Galleries in DC and London, the Uffizi, and the Prado so I’ve been lucky enough to see more of the original work than many people do in their lifetime but there’s still so much to see… Alas. While reproductions may never do the master’s work complete justice the lovely thing about a book is that you can touch it, hold it as close to your face as you want (without getting arrested), and that should the author/publisher choose, which Zöller and TASCHEN do, small areas of the painting can be enlarged to show minute details that blend into a background or even da Vinci’s own fingerprint (yup. The Master of Masters finger painted with oils, kids). This would actually be a handy book to have with you  while reading Isaacson’s biography as many of the distinguishing features of certain works, as well as specific aspects used for authentication, are photographed close-up in  The Complete Paintings , which adds a visual to Isaacson’s descriptions. Zöller’s commentary is succinct and interesting, with most of the pages given over to the art itself. At the end of the book is an appendix with a short but detailed history of each painting.

The world is an ugly place right now. Losing myself in beauty and science and color for a few hours every so often keeps me sane and these books proved to be sanctuaries. I hope you enjoy them as well.

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Weekend picks for book lovers, including Walter Isaacson's new da Vinci bio

What should you read this weekend? USA TODAY’s picks for book lovers include a big new biography of Leonardo da Vinci, the Renaissance painter very much in the news for smashing auction records.

Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson; Simon & Schuster, 624 pp.; non-fiction

Best-selling biographer Walter Isaacson has tackled Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs, and now he’s cast his considerable storytelling skills on an Italian Renaissance giant with Leonardo da Vinci . And don’t laugh, but the movie rights have already been bought by Leonardo DiCaprio, whose namesake he’ll honor by taking the leading role.

Isaacson’s biographical choice is a shrewd one. Leonardo might have been born in the 15th century, but he’s never far from pop culture. Beyond the ubiquitous references to paintings such as the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper , a da Vinci painting of Christ just sold at auction for a record-shattering $450 million. Fabled techies-turned-collectors such as Bill Gates own his prized codexes.

Here are some of the things we learn about Leonardo the man, as opposed to Leonardo the cliché. He was gay, enjoying the company of two younger men who eventually split his estate. He was left-handed and wrote backward, less for effect and more simply because it seemed easier. He was an inquisitive jack of all trades — painter, set designer, engineer — because that’s what helped pay the bills.

But most of all, he was an observer. Of everything.

The way a bird gained loft or the way wind flowed over its wings led to his own sketches showing how man could one day fly. His passion for the human form and how muscles rippled and tensed as the body moved created a groundbreaking portrait artist. His obsession with apocalyptic images brought about blueprints for military designs that were centuries before their time.

USA TODAY says ★★★½ out of four. “Manages to bring (da Vinci) into vivid, 3D life…a 21st-century page-turner.”

The Revolution of Marina M. by Janet Fitch; Little Brown, 800 pp.; fiction

Fitch's epic novel about the life of a young woman coming of age against the tumult of the Russian Revolution and the subsequent civil war is only part one of two planned volumes.

USA TODAY says ★★★½ . “There is plenty of action and drama…Fitch ( White Oleander ) is an excellent writer.”

The Water Will Come : Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World by Jeff Goodell; Little, Brown, 352 pp; non-fiction

A journalistic take on what will happen to the world’s coastal regions as climate change elevates sea levels and conjures up extreme weather.

USA TODAY says ★★★. “Goodell talks about climate change and what it means to every person on the planet in a way that will engage even the non- Nova crowd.”

Strange Weather by Joe Hill; William Morrow; 432 pp.; fiction

A collection of four short novels by the horror author ( The Fireman , NOS4A2 ), who also happens to be Stephen King’s son.

USA TODAY says ★★★½. “Hill whips up emotional moments that strike like lightning and thunderously rumble your soul.”

The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine; Harper, 390 pp.; fiction

Amber Patterson, newly arrived in an ultra-rich town on Long Island Sound, is ready to ascend into its firmament by whatever means she has to use.

USA TODAY says ★★★½. “Utterly irresistible… the pages keep flying, flying, flying by.”

Contributing reviewers: Marco della Cava, Steph Cha, Zlati Meyer, Brian Truitt, Charles Finch

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Leonardo da Vinci Paperback – Unabridged, October 2, 2018

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• Print length 624 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Simon & Schuster
• Publication date October 2, 2018
• Dimensions 6.13 x 1.5 x 9.25 inches
• ISBN-10 1501139169
• ISBN-13 978-1501139161
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• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Simon & Schuster; Unabridged edition (October 2, 2018)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 624 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1501139169
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1501139161
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.92 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.13 x 1.5 x 9.25 inches
• #2 in Historical Italy Biographies
• #12 in Biographies of Artists, Architects & Photographers (Books)
• #39 in Scientist Biographies

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About the author

Walter isaacson.

Walter Isaacson is writing a biography of Elon Musk. He is the author of The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race; Leonardo da Vinci; Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution; and Kissinger: A Biography. He is also the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. He is a Professor of History at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chairman of CNN, and editor of Time magazine.

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Customers say

Customers find the book great and well worth the time. They appreciate the deep research and detail. Readers describe the biography as interesting and sheds light on the varied achievements and adventures of history. They find the wit and curiosity entertaining. They also appreciate the beautifully illustrated book. Opinions are mixed on the writing quality, with some finding it well-written and others wanting more insight.

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Customers find the book amazing, compelling, and brilliant. They also say the tone is easy to follow and clearly done. Readers also mention it's fascinating to read about art superstars from the Renaissance.

"...The sensitive viewer will see a spectacular work of art but also the ideal of human proportions and geometry. Sfumato is a painting technique..." Read more

"...he gets bigger, when you fall back, more complex as you dial in, more brilliant , more varied, more troubled, more sensitive and extraordinary than..." Read more

"...However, the writing and tone is easy to follow and clearly done ." Read more

"...It's not boring with facts and it humanize the genius ." Read more

Customers find the research quality of the book insightful, deep, and informative. They also describe the book as extraordinarily detailed, scholarly, and engaging. Readers mention the book is very educational with no stress.

"...In A NutshellThis is a thorough and well-written biography of one of history’s most fascinating individuals. You’ll enjoy the read...." Read more

"...was that if there was any writer who could bring something fresh, exciting , and surprising to the subject of da Vinci's life, it was, without a doubt..." Read more

"...Issacson found a way. He clearly worked his ass off. He tells this story with tenderness and deft clarity. The writing is elegant and suspenseful...." Read more

"...● The effect of light reflection, eyes conveying inner thoughts , sense of motion...." Read more

Customers have mixed opinions about the writing quality of the book. Some mention it's well-written and readable, while others say it reads like a list and the images are hard to visualize and understand.

"...everlasting benefit that the author seems to possess an extraordinarily discerning eye for these works in addition to an erudite mind capable of..." Read more

"This book does a great job of describing Da Vinci’s life, his art, and his many other interests...." Read more

"...edition are all tiny and in black and white and not supporting at all the excellent text ...." Read more

"...He tells this story with tenderness and deft clarity. The writing is elegant and suspenseful . He draws you in with a brief quaint scene in Italy...." Read more

Customers find the book fascinating and masterfully interpreted. They appreciate the biographical narrative seamlessly interwoven with analysis and context of the work of Da Vinci. Readers also mention the book provides a glimpse of all the aspects of Leonardo's genius. They also appreciate the illustrations throughout and representations of original da Vinci work. Reader also mention that the author does a great job of presenting the back story and details for Da Vinc's three worlds.

"...It's by a long mile his finest writing, and such a fitting portrait for Leonardo in the 21st century...." Read more

"First, the book is superb. Isaacson’s deep research and well balanced portrayal of Leonardo makes me feel as though I know the man…almost like we..." Read more

"...It's not a particularly dramatic story because Leonardo tried to avoid conflict and drama as much as possible since it took away from his researches..." Read more

"...The author does a great job of presenting the back story and details for Da Vinci’s three world-class achievements: The Last Supper, “the most..." Read more

Customers find the biography excellent, interesting, and sheds light on the varied achievements and adventures of history. They appreciate the wonderful insights and complex characters.

"...Isaacson offers a comprehensive, well-written, intimate, and riveting biography on one of the world’s most misunderstood geniuses...." Read more

"...Read everything you can find from Isaacson. His biographies of important people are illuminating ...." Read more

"...is thanks to these notes that the author was able to write this excellent biography ." Read more

Customers find the book fascinating, entertaining, and intellectually stimulating. They also appreciate the wit and curiosity of Leonardo.

" Fascinating . Very detailed and a long read, but worth it." Read more

"...anatomy and distilled principles from Physics for his paintings is fascinating , entertaining and inspiring...." Read more

"Chernow, Isaacson... thin air up here. Great reading, entertaining and informative...." Read more

"...for reasons why this specific Isaacson book is worth reading, entertaining , and definitely 5 stars, I think David McCullough's blurb on the back..." Read more

Customers find the book beautifully illustrated, with high-definition pictures. They appreciate the descriptions of the art. Readers also mention the book is replete with pictures and full-color pictures of every classic work by Leonardo.

"...The book was replete with pictures and elucidations of both his art work and scientific endeavors, with most of which found in his notebooks of 7000..." Read more

"...remarkable man is the depth of his mind and talent, elements caught in extraordinary intricacy by the author...." Read more

"...It includes numerous, high quality illustrations of Da Vinci’s most famous works of art, as well as dozens of pages from his incredibly detailed..." Read more

"...Well organized, scholarly, informative, superbly written, and beautifully illustrated ...." Read more

Customers have mixed opinions about the length of the book. Some mention it's long and beautiful, while others say it'll be too long and effusive at times.

"Fascinating. Very detailed and a long read , but worth it." Read more

"...I still think Leonardo is most likely a fascinating subject, but this book is long and very little of it explores his personal life...." Read more

"...I love his full length conclusions at the end of his works and his added analyses throughout...." Read more

"...However, this time it's a long slog , as Isaacson presents so much detail that it's easy to lose interest...." Read more

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Leonardo da Vinci Hardcover – 17 October 2017

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• Print length 624 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Simon & Schuster
• Publication date 17 October 2017
• Dimensions 15.56 x 3.81 x 23.5 cm
• ISBN-10 1501139150
• ISBN-13 978-1501139154
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Product description

About the author, excerpt. © reprinted by permission. all rights reserved., product details.

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Simon & Schuster (17 October 2017)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 624 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1501139150
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1501139154
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1 kg 50 g
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 15.56 x 3.81 x 23.5 cm
• Country of Origin ‏ : ‎ USA
• #1,914 in Biographies & Autobiographies (Books)

About the author

Walter isaacson.

Walter Isaacson is writing a biography of Elon Musk. He is the author of The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race; Leonardo da Vinci; Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution; and Kissinger: A Biography. He is also the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. He is a Professor of History at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chairman of CNN, and editor of Time magazine.

Customer reviews

• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 5 star 73% 18% 6% 1% 3% 73%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 4 star 73% 18% 6% 1% 3% 18%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 3 star 73% 18% 6% 1% 3% 6%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 2 star 73% 18% 6% 1% 3% 1%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 1 star 73% 18% 6% 1% 3% 3%

Customers say

Customers find the book intellectually stimulating, insightful, and inspiring. They describe the biography as brilliant, detailed, and top-notch. Readers praise the writing quality as painstakingly written, outstanding, and comfortable. They also appreciate the color accuracy, saying the paintings are in color print.

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Customers find the book intellectually stimulating, insightful, and well-written. They say it's an exciting experience and flourishes their imagination.

"This is fantastic book written by Isaacson on Da Vinci. Very inspiring if you are interested in life long learning, curiosity, innovation...." Read more

"...Leonardo set an example of how acute observations, fanatic curiosity , willingness to question dogma, and ability to discern patterns across..." Read more

"... Such an exciting experience . However, Without a doubt buy a hardcopy !!My favorite quotes from the book,"..." Read more

"This is book is nothing but 650 pages of wonderful inspiration ...." Read more

Customers find the biography quality brilliant, top-notch, and detailed. They say it explores the intricacies of Leonardo's lifetime with available information. Readers also mention the book is nicely illustrated and has notable simplicity, ease, and intelligence.

" Well-paced comprehensive biography that is pleasure to read and will definitely ignite curiosity...." Read more

"...Nicely illustrated and detailed it seems...." Read more

"A brilliant biography by one of the foremost biographers of our times Walter Isaacson...." Read more

"...In this highly interesting and remarkable biographical work , master biographer Walter Isaacson has tried to explore and analyze various known and..." Read more

Customers find the writing quality of the book painstakingly written, outstanding, and entertaining. They also say the font makes for a comfortable read and the explanation is amazing. Readers describe the book as a quick and easy art appreciation course with notable simplicity, ease, and intelligence.

"...Consider it as a quick and easy art appreciation course . The book is hard cover and printed on thick, good quality paper...." Read more

"...His research, presentation and narration are outstanding - and quite entertaining too...." Read more

"...This biography of Da Vinci is top-notch. Very well structured and written , and gorgeously produced with high quality illustrations...." Read more

"...Oh what an effort. Painstakingly written ...." Read more

Customers appreciate the color accuracy of the book. They also mention the quality of the pages is awesome and the paintings are in color print.

"...the whole life of Leonardo in 32 chapters, illustrated with full-color photographs of paintings , sketches, and diagrams from his notebooks...." Read more

"...Leonardo da Vinci, also print quality of pages is awesome, paintings are in color print ...." Read more

" Colourful personality and razor sharp mind..." Read more

Customers appreciate the value for money of the book. They mention it's expensive but a good book.

"...The Paper Quality, and the cover of the Book is superb, It's really cheap for the price I paid, I think the thickness of this book might be around..." Read more

" Expensive But Good Book ..." Read more

"Great book and great seller .... Atlantic..." Read more

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Leonardo da Vinci

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Table of Contents

• Rave and Reviews

About The Book

About the author.

Walter Isaacson is the bestselling author of biographies of Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, and Albert Einstein. He is a professor of history at Tulane and was CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of Time . He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2023. Visit him at Isaacson.Tulane.edu.

Product Details

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (October 2, 2018)
• Length: 624 pages
• ISBN13: 9781501139161

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Raves and Reviews

"As always, [Isaacson] writes with a strongly synthesizing intelligence across a tremendous range; the result is a valuable introduction to a complex subject. . . . Beneath its diligent research, the book is a study in creativity: how to define it, how to achieve it. . . . Most important, Isaacson tells a powerful story of an exhilarating mind and life." — The New Yorker

“To read this magnificent biography of Leonardo da Vinci is to take a tour through the life and works of one of the most extraordinary human beings of all time and in the company of the most engaging, informed, and insightful guide imaginable. Walter Isaacson is at once a true scholar and a spellbinding writer. And what a wealth of lessons there are to be learned in these pages." —David McCullough, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Wright Brothers and 1776

“I’ve read a lot about Leonardo over the years, but I had never found one book that satisfactorily covered all the different facets of his life and work. Walter—a talented journalist and author I’ve gotten to know over the years—did a great job pulling it all together. . . . More than any other Leonardo book I’ve read, this one helps you see him as a complete human being and understand just how special he was.” — Bill Gates

“Isaacson’s essential subject is the singular life of brilliance. . . . Isaacson deftly reveals an intimate Leonardo . . . a masterpiece of concision.” — San Francisco Chronicle

“A captivating narrative about art and science, curiosity and discipline.” —Adam Grant, #1 New York Times Bestselling author of Originals

“He comes to life in all his remarkable brilliance and oddity in Walter Isaacson’s ambitious new biography . . . a vigorous, insightful portrait of the world’s most famous portraitist...Isaacson’s purpose is a thorough synthesis, which he achieves with flair.” — The Washington Post

“Walter Isaacson is a renaissance man. . . . Rather like Leonardo, he’s driven by a joyful desire to discover. That joy bubbles forth in this magnificent book. In Isaacson, Leonardo gets the biographer he deserves—an author capable of comprehending his often frenetic, frequently weird quest to understand. This is not just a joyful book; it’s also a joy to behold. . . . Isaacson deserves immense praise for producing a very human portrait of a genius.” —The Times of London

“The pleasure of an Isaacson biography is that it doesn’t traffic in such cynical stuff; the author tells stories of people who, by definition, are inimitable....Isaacson is at his finest when he analyzes what made Leonardo human.” —The New York Times

“Monumental . . . Leonardo led an astonishingly interesting eventful life. And Isaacson brilliantly captures its essence.” — The Toronto Star

"Majestic . . . Isaacson takes on another complex, giant figure and transforms him into someone we can recognize. . . . Totally enthralling, masterful, and passionate.” — Kirkus Reviews , starred review

"Illuminating . . . This is a monumental tribute to a titanic figure." — Publishers Weekly , starred review

“Isaacson uses his subject’s contradictions to give him humanity and depth.” —Anthony Grafton, The New York Times

“Encompassing in its coverage, robust in its artistic explanations, yet written in a smart, conversational tone, this is both a solid introduction to the man and a sweeping saga of his genius.” — Booklist , starred review

“A fresh and enthusiastic reading of the extraordinary da Vinci notebooks, written in a way that makes them both accessible and contemporary. Absorbing, enlightening and always engaging.” — Miranda Seymour, author of Mary Shelley

“Isaacson's biography is linear enough to follow easily, yet it returns, as did the artist, time and again, to the highly concrete, enticingly yet rigorously investigable mysteries of the human and natural world. Model . . . . This beautiful book, on coated stock, showing text and illustrations to the best advantage, is a pleasure to hold.” —Bay Area Reporter

“Isaacson, to his credit, helps us see Leonardo’s artistic vision with fresh eyes. . . . He writes simply and clearly, and even though his principal character hails from antiquity, the narrative hums like a headline from the morning paper, alert to topical parallels between then and now . . . we finish the book with a renewed conviction that the world’s most famous Renaissance man was, in essence, inimitable.” —Christian Science Monitor

“A full and engrossing profile of the artist . . . The author moves fluidly between the scientific inquiries of Leonardo’s notebooks and the artistic achievements in his sketchbooks, and carries the same themes, such as the artist’s boundless curiosity and inquiry, through them in a way that does not seem too facile or overapplied.” —East Hampton Star

“A 21st century page-turner." —USA Today

“Exuberant . . . a richly illustrated ride through the artist’s life . . . a fascinating, bonbon-size tribute to the man who thought to ask.” — Newsday

“Beautifully produced and illustrated, the biography is an ideal match of author and subject. . . . Fascinated by Leonardo’s genius, Isaacson lucidly and lovingly captures his stunning powers of observation that spanned so many disciplines. . . . Isaacson’s monumental and magnificent biography does succeed in helping us understand what made da Vinci’s paintings so memorable, and in making Leonardo much more accessible, as a genius, a man of and outside of his times, and as a 'quirky, obsessive, playful, and easily distracted' human being.” — Tulsa World

“In some ways this is Walter Isaacson's most ambitious book. He uses the life he recounts in a wonderful way to speculate on the source of geniuses...always you are informed, entertained, stimulated, satisfied. This has to be the most beautifully illustrated and printed book I've seen in recent years.” —Fareed Zakaria GPS

“[A] splendid work that provides an illuminating guide to the output of one of the last millennium’s greatest minds.” — Guardian US

"Leonardo da Vinci's prowess as a polymath — driven by insatiable curiosity about everything from the human womb to deadly weaponry — still stuns. In this copiously illustrated biography, we feel its force all over again. Walter Isaacson wonderfully conveys how Leonardo's genius unified science and art." —NATURE

"Dazzling" —HARVARD GAZETTE

"Luminous . . . Leonardo Da Vinci is an elegantly illustrated book that broadens Isaacson’s viewfinder on the psychology of major lives – Henry Kissinger, Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein and Steve Jobs are the subjects of his previous biographies, best-sellers all." —THE DAILY BEAST

Awards and Honors

• Carnegie Medal Honor Book

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Leonardo Da Vinci: The Biography Hardcover – 17 Oct. 2017

• Print length 624 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Simon & Schuster UK
• Publication date 17 Oct. 2017
• ISBN-10 1471166767
• ISBN-13 978-1471166761
• See all details

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Product description

From the back cover, about the author, product details.

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Simon & Schuster UK; 1st edition (17 Oct. 2017)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 624 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1471166767
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1471166761
• 88 in Biographies about Artists, Architects & Photographers
• 155 in Scientist Biographies
• 293 in Political Biographies

About the author

Walter isaacson.

Walter Isaacson is writing a biography of Elon Musk. He is the author of The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race; Leonardo da Vinci; Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution; and Kissinger: A Biography. He is also the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. He is a Professor of History at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chairman of CNN, and editor of Time magazine.

Customer reviews

• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 5 star 74% 19% 6% 0% 1% 74%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 4 star 74% 19% 6% 0% 1% 19%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 3 star 74% 19% 6% 0% 1% 6%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 2 star 74% 19% 6% 0% 1% 0%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 1 star 74% 19% 6% 0% 1% 1%

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Customers say

Customers find the book very nice, enjoyable, and brilliant. They say it provides interesting facts and insights into Leonardo's life. Readers describe the biography as first-class and captures not just his life, but the essence of how he thought. They also mention the pacing is easy to read and the illustrations are vivid.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

Customers find the book nice, enjoyable, and beautiful. They also appreciate the excellent quality and gripping analyses.

"This is one of the best books I have ever read: fascinating, fabulously well illustrated (every painting mentioned is illustrated on the page!),..." Read more

"...expected from Walter Isaacson, this is wonderfully written and enthusiastic book . It has over 140 excellent illustrations...." Read more

"Simply put, one of the best books I have ever read. This biographer is up to the challenge of his subject; and what a subject...." Read more

"Great book and wonderful condition " Read more

Customers find the information in the book interesting, insightful, and detailed. They say it's comprehensive and wide-ranging.

"...wide-ranging, complete, and chock full of interesting facts and observations about Leonardo's world: the nature of his illegitimacy, the roles of..." Read more

" very interesting " Read more

"...possess the talent of Leonardo but this book shows we can be caring, curious , and observant and that will give each of us a taste of genius." Read more

"...The book is very comprehensive and wide-ranging but is not filled with unnecessary detail and extraneous information...." Read more

Customers find the biography quality first-class, readable, and well-written. They say it captures not just Leonardo's life, but the essence of how he thought. Readers also say the book helps them understand the man and his life. They mention the book is well-researched and an absorbing read.

"...This is a first class biography ." Read more

"This is probably the best biography of an artist I have read. There's a simple test: do you feel bereft when you get to the end of the book. I did...." Read more

"...It captures not just his life , but the essence of how he thought and his inquisitive nature that set him apart..." Read more

" Very thoroughly researched biography , lots of great facts...." Read more

Customers find the book well-written and easy to read. They appreciate the simple words used.

"As would be expected from Walter Isaacson, this is wonderfully written and enthusiastic book. It has over 140 excellent illustrations...." Read more

"...book in the usual chapters but also in sections so that it is easy to read as much or as little as you have time for...." Read more

"I like the writer's style - interesting, fun, narrative, informative. A beautiful book with lots of illustrations and gripping analyses...." Read more

" well written and easy to read" Read more

Customers find the book nicely presented, with vivid illustrations. They also appreciate the brilliant evocation of how Leonardo's mind was allowed to develop.

"...strong, and good looking , and seemed to always be on the go...." Read more

"...Physically it is very fine, printed in Italy with fine illustrations in the body of the text where the reader wants them...." Read more

"...It’s a triple album that’s impressive in its grandeur and the amount of research that went in to it. Reading all his diaries etc..." Read more

"...A beautiful book with lots of illustrations and gripping analyses. I've read some books about Da Vinci before but this one is the best so far...." Read more

Reviews with images

Awesome read! Detailed info but not useless. Simple words used too. ALL in all its must have !

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Episode 15: #15 Leonardo da Vinci: The Biography

#15 Leonardo da Vinci: The Biography

Hosted by David Senra

• Business Building

David Senra is the host of Founders, where he studies history's greatest entrepreneurs. This is what he learned from reading Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson.

What I learned from reading  Leonardo da Vinci  by Walter Isaacson. 

Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium  — Subscribers can listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes and every bonus episode. 

Introduction

“I embarked on this book because Leonardo da Vinci is the ultimate example of the main theme of my previous biographies. How the ability to make connections across disciplines, arts and science, humanities and technology is a key to innovation, imagination, and genius.

Benjamin Franklin, a previous subject of mine, was a Leonardo of his era. With no formal education, he taught himself to become an imaginative polymath who was Enlightenment America's best scientist, inventor, diplomat, writer, and business strategist. He proved by flying a kite that lightning is electricity, and he invented a rod to tame it. He devised bifocal glasses, enchanting musical instruments, clean burning stoves, charts of the Gulf Stream, and America's unique style of homespun humor. Albert Einstein, when he was stymied in his pursuit of his theory of relativity, would pull out his violin and play Mozart, which helped him reconnect with the harmonies of the cosmos. Ada Lovelace, whom I profiled in a book on innovators, combined the poetic sensibility of her father Lord Byron with her mother's love of the beauty of math to envision a general-purpose computer.

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