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Scanning through the comments, I'm noticing a bit of skepticism over the "legitimacy" of this work. To a large extent, that's probably fair: people have every r
by jonnathanson 13y ago
Scanning through the comments, I'm noticing a bit of skepticism over the "legitimacy" of this work. To a large extent, that's probably fair: people have every right to be skeptical of anything calling itself a biography. The rigor of scholarship, access, and sourcing involved in writing a competent biography is a high hurdle to clear.
That said, the idea of Leanpub is to let authors write lean. Writing lean isn't an excuse for half-baked scholarship, but it is an opportunity to publish an "MVP" book and iterate from there. To me, that's what the author is trying to do here, and he should be applauded for that effort and gumption.
This is a huge undertaking, and for that reason alone, I'm intrigued. I wish the minimum price weren't as high as it is (probably another big blip on the skepticism radar), but I would love to check it out.
- nonchalance 13y agoGoing into a biography, most of us have a basic understanding of core life events. We read biographies because we are interested in unique insights that (hopefully) biographers can provide. The only real way to do that is by interviewing people and drawing out interesting details that haven't been published yet (for a dead person, you might draw from a recently-discovered journal) In this case, the author did neither. Which is not to say this biography is bad, but the price should reflect that
- vertr07 13y agoSince when did the market price for books reflect the effort put in by the author?
- scott_s 13y agoHe's not arguing that the value is reflected by the effort put in by the author, but the insight gained by the reader.
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