Books like Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination

01

Steve Jobs

Walter Isaacson · Biography

Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs was authorized by Jobs himself, who gave Isaacson more than forty hours of interviews and opened up his family, friends, and colleagues to the same scrutiny.

Shares creativity and innovation with Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination.

02

Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration

Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace · Business

Creativity, Inc.

Shares creativity and innovation with Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination.

03

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future

Ashlee Vance · Biography

Ashlee Vance's biography of Elon Musk is the most comprehensive account of Musk's life and companies up to 2015, written with Musk's cooperation after an initial refusal and a long negotiation.

Both dig into innovation.

04

Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike

Phil Knight · Memoir

Shoe Dog is Phil Knight's account of the first two decades of Nike, from the $50 loan he borrowed from his father in 1964 to fund his first shipment of Japanese running shoes to the company's IPO in 1980.

A kindred biography read.

05

The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution

Walter Isaacson · Science

The Innovators is Walter Isaacson's history of the digital revolution, tracing the development of computers and the internet from Ada Lovelace's conceptualization of programming in the 1840s through the emergence of the modern internet, personal computer, and smartphone.

Both dig into innovation.

06

Creative Selection

Ken Kocienda · Business

Creative Selection is Ken Kocienda's first-hand account of how software gets made at Apple during the period when the iPhone and iPad were born.

Shares creativity and innovation with Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination.

07

Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World

Adam Grant · Psychology

Originals is Adam Grant's examination of how people champion new ideas without losing their jobs, their relationships, or their nerve.

Shares creativity and innovation with Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination.

08

Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War

Robert Coram · Biography

Boyd is Robert Coram's biography of Colonel John Boyd, the Air Force fighter pilot who became one of the most influential military strategists of the twentieth century without ever having commanded a major unit, written a best-selling book, or achieved the rank that would have made him famous while alive.

Both dig into innovation.

09

Einstein: His Life and Universe

Walter Isaacson · Biography

Walter Isaacson's Einstein biography is the most widely read account of the physicist's life in English, written after Isaacson was granted access to forty thousand previously sealed documents in the Hebrew University Einstein Archives.

Both dig into creativity.

10

Leonardo da Vinci

Walter Isaacson · Biography

Walter Isaacson's biography of Leonardo da Vinci is built around a simple and provocative claim: Leonardo's genius was not a supernatural gift but an extreme version of a learnable quality — curiosity.

Both dig into creativity.

11

Making Movies

Sidney Lumet · Biography

Making Movies is Sidney Lumet's account of how films get made, written by a director who spent fifty years making them.

Both dig into storytelling.

12

The Dream Machine: J.C.R. Licklider and the Revolution That Made Computing Personal

M. Mitchell Waldrop · Biography

The Dream Machine is a biography of J.C.R.

Both dig into innovation.