Thanks Avik! I used to find childhoods of exceptional people really interesting when I was younger -- to some extent, I was interested in how I could be more like them. But now, how exceptional people approach work is more interesting to me in biographies.
There are remarkable anecdotes about Feynman throughout the book -- for example, how he decided to give up alcohol, how he got inspired by James Watson's memoir, his O-ring demonstration on live TV after Challenger. I posted about his childhood instead mainly because i) the chapter dealing with it has unusually many interesting stories per page, so it paints a rather complete picture of him as a kid, and ii) his childhood is comparatively less written about -- I myself knew about his safecracking and his fondness for math shortcuts before reading the book, but essentially nothing about his childhood.
Really cool post; do you generally find the childhoods of famous people as most salient in biographies?
Thanks Avik! I used to find childhoods of exceptional people really interesting when I was younger -- to some extent, I was interested in how I could be more like them. But now, how exceptional people approach work is more interesting to me in biographies.
There are remarkable anecdotes about Feynman throughout the book -- for example, how he decided to give up alcohol, how he got inspired by James Watson's memoir, his O-ring demonstration on live TV after Challenger. I posted about his childhood instead mainly because i) the chapter dealing with it has unusually many interesting stories per page, so it paints a rather complete picture of him as a kid, and ii) his childhood is comparatively less written about -- I myself knew about his safecracking and his fondness for math shortcuts before reading the book, but essentially nothing about his childhood.