Items30The creator’s order
  1. 1Henrietta LacksHenrietta LacksBorn 1 Aug 1920Lacks is a powerful starting point because her life connects a family story to the institutions of modern medicine. Rebecca Skloot's The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks follows the woman behind the HeLa cell line and her family's discovery of its use. The book mixes reporting, science and…0i
  2. 2Alexander von HumboldtAlexander von HumboldtBorn 14 Sept 1769Humboldt offers a route from adventurous travel into the history of environmental thinking. Andrea Wulf's The Invention of Nature follows his observations and the connections between living systems, landscapes and human activity, then traces their reception by other thinkers. It is an inviting…0i
  3. 3Frida KahloFrida KahloBorn 6 Jul 1907Kahlo's paintings become more interesting when her life is allowed to be more than a familiar image on a poster. Hayden Herrera's Frida connects the work with physical pain, Mexican politics, family and her relationship with Diego Rivera. It is a substantial biography, but the visual art supplies…0i
  4. 4Frederick DouglassFrederick DouglassDouglass rewards readers interested in how a person turns lived experience into public language. David W. Blight's Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom follows the abolitionist's speeches, writing, political work and complicated family life. This is one of the larger reading commitments here,…0i
  5. 5Hedy LamarrHedy LamarrRichard Rhodes's Hedy's Folly makes Lamarr an accessible way into the unexpected overlap between entertainment and invention. It follows the film star's collaboration with composer George Antheil on a wartime frequency-hopping communication system. The partnership is more revealing than the loose…0i
  6. 6Mary ShelleyMary ShelleyBorn 30 Aug 1797Fiona Sampson's In Search of Mary Shelley reconstructs the author through letters, diaries and surviving records. The attraction is the relationship between a very young writer's imaginative work and a life shaped by intellectual family circles, loss and practical responsibilities. You do not need…0i
  7. 7Josiah WedgwoodJosiah WedgwoodThe Radical Potter by Tristram Hunt brings together design, experimental manufacture, marketing and eighteenth-century politics. Wedgwood is rewarding because an ordinary object, a piece of pottery, leads into changes in consumption and industrial organisation. His abolitionist commitments sit…0i
  8. 8Rosa ParksRosa ParksBorn 4 Feb 1913Jeanne Theoharis's The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks replaces a single familiar bus incident with decades of organising. Following Parks from Alabama to Detroit makes the relationship between individual action and a movement much clearer. This is a good first biography if you want a book that…0i
  9. 9Srinivasa RamanujanSrinivasa RamanujanBorn 22 Dec 1887Robert Kanigel's The Man Who Knew Infinity follows Ramanujan from India into his collaboration with G. H. Hardy at Cambridge. It makes mathematical work part of a human story involving education, belief, illness and cultural distance. There is mathematics to encounter, but the main reason to begin…0i
  10. 10Madam C. J. WalkerMadam C. J. WalkerBorn 23 Dec 1867A'Lelia Bundles's On Her Own Ground places Walker's hair-care enterprise within Black women's work, migration, community networks and political activity. The author is a descendant, but the book is a researched account rather than a fictionalised succession of inspirational scenes. Walker makes a…0i