Posted: 16 Feb 2010 05:14 AM PST

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Walter Isaacson is working on a Steve Jobs biography with help from Steve Jobs, Brad Stone at the New York Times reports.

Walter was formerly a managing editor at Time magazine, as well as the author of biographies for Ben Franklin and Albert Einstein, both of which were best-sellers.

As Brad points out, plenty of Steve Jobs books have been written, but they've always been unauthorized. This will be the first written with his cooperation.

Should be interesting to see how Steve Jobs tells the Steve Jobs story.

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Mays, Aaron and 'cooperative' biographies - PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW

Posted: 13 Feb 2010 09:10 PM PST

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NEW YORK — Once again, it's Willie Mays vs. Hank Aaron.

This time, in the book world.

Long, and long-awaited, biographies of the two iconic baseball sluggers come out this year, within three months of each other: James S. Hirsch's 600-plus page "Willie Mays," just released, and Howard Bryant's 600-plus page book on Aaron, "The Last Hero," scheduled for May.

Mays, who spent much of his career with the New York/San Francisco Giants and Aaron, a longtime star for the Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves, are still endlessly compared, with Mays celebrated as the more dynamic on-field presence and Aaron honored for overtaking Babe Ruth as baseball's home run king.

Both books are sympathetic accounts that cover not just Mays and Aaron but the era in which they played, especially how they responded — or didn't — to the civil rights movement. Mays and Aaron, each of whom have published autobiographies, agreed to be interviewed by their respective biographers, although the relationships differed.

Mays was involved from the start and will share in the revenues from the Scribner release, billed as "authorized." Aaron had not yet agreed to speak to Bryant when the author signed with Pantheon, in 2006. Aaron is not being paid and, Bryant said, didn't even see the book before it was finished.

"Luckily, it turned out all right," said Bryant, a senior writer for ESPN.com who has written books on steroids and the Boston Red Sox. "Had he not cooperated, it would have been a very different book."

Biographies of living people generally are either authorized — written with the subject's involvement and to the subject's taste — or "Unauthorized," written without the subject's permission and often against the subject's wishes. The most famous unauthorized biographies are Kitty Kelley's best sellers about such celebrities as Jackie Kennedy, Frank Sinatra and Nancy Reagan. A Kelley book on Oprah Winfrey is due in April.

But in between stands a category you could call "cooperative," in which the subject is available, but otherwise disengaged. "Cooperative" biographies in recent years have included Gerald Martin's "Gabriel Garcia Marquez: A Life" and Peter Biskind's "Star," about Warren Beatty. The Mays book fits partly because Hirsch says he was granted full editorial freedom and "The Last Hero" does entirely because Aaron's participation was limited to talking to Bryant.

Bryant said he had been anxious for years to write about Aaron, whom he says he first met in 1997 at a tribute for the late Jackie Robinson, major league baseball's first black player. Bryant initially was unable to contact Aaron for the book, learning later that the Hall of Famer feared the interview would center on Barry Bonds' pursuit of Aaron's career home run title.

Meanwhile, Bryant spoke to friends and acquaintances of Aaron's, including former Presidents Carter and Clinton, baseball Hall of Famers Joe Morgan and Reggie Jackson, and such former Braves teammates as Joe Torre and Dusty Baker.

"Before I got to Aaron, the best advice I got was from David Halberstam, who wrote a book on Michael Jordan without getting Jordan and a book about Bill Clinton without getting Clinton," Bryant said of the late Pulitzer Prize-winning author and journalist.

"He said to me, 'The strategy was very simple — for every day they didn't talk to me, make three phone calls to other people.' You have to work around obstacles. It was the best piece of advice anyone's given me."

After Bonds overtook Aaron, in 2007, Aaron opened up to Bryant.

"When Henry and I finally spoke, he was tremendous, he was unbelievably gracious," Bryant said. "He was even somewhat embarrassed someone was taking an interest. He didn't ask for any money. He didn't ask for any review copy of the book. He could have made the one phone call that every author dreads — which is to call all of his people and say, 'Hey, this guy is writing a book about me. Don't talk to him.' "

Like Bryant, Gerald Martin began working on his Garcia Marquez book before receiving any assurance that his subject would talk to him. When they first discussed the project, Garcia Marquez was reluctant, asking Martin, "Why do you want to write a biography? Biographies mean death."

But Garcia Marquez relented and set just one condition: "Don't make me do your work," Martin recalled in the book's foreword. When asked if his book was authorized, Martin likes to respond, "No, it is not an authorized biography. It's a tolerated biography."

As Bryant, Biskind and others have learned, the cooperative book can be the most rewarding and most stressful way of working. It is ideal, because the biographer has freedom and access, and stressful because there is no obligation — contractual or otherwise — to keep the subject from changing his or her mind.

Biskind, known for the Hollywood history "Easy Riders, Raging Bulls," is a contributing editor to Vanity Fair who had interviewed Beatty several times and says he first suggested a biography around 1989-90. Beatty, known for being noncommittal, initially had no answer, then implied he was writing his own book, then called Biskind a couple of years ago and told him to do it. Biskind was pleased, but suspicious.

"He's a movie star and they do what they want. He did this kind of turnaround which I learned later is characteristic of him: He pitched an idea and sort of hooked me, and then he turned around and acted like I had to sell the idea to him," Biskind says. "So, we had a series of lunches and phone calls and I became convinced he would do it."

Deirdre Bair's "Samuel Beckett," winner in 1981 of a National Book Award, is considered a model for the cooperative biography, with the Irish playwright promising that he would "neither help nor hinder," Bair explained recently. In 1971, she had finished a dissertation on Beckett and thought a book worth pursuing. She wrote to him in Paris, his longtime residence.

"He replied, 'My life is dull and without interest. The professors know more about it than I do. It is best left unchampioned,' " Bair said. "Then, he scrawled across the page, 'Any biographical information I possess is at your disposal."'

She remembered her relationship as productive and businesslike, with Bair calling him "Mr. Beckett," and Beckett addressing her as "Miss Bair." A more personal, and difficult bond was formed with a new subject, Simone de Beauvoir, who called her biographer "Deirdre" and had very different ideas about how to "cooperate."

"When we started, she said, "I'll talk. I'll tell you things and then you write them down.' And I sort of put my head in my hands in despair," Bair recalled. "And she said, 'What's wrong?' And I said, 'That's not how I worked with Beckett.' And she said, 'Well, I can't let him get ahead of me. All right, that's how I'll work you, too.' "

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Intriguing: Neda's videographer - CNN

Posted: 16 Feb 2010 06:04 AM PST

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Editor's note: Every weekday, CNN focuses on a handful of people in the news. This is a chance to find out more about what they've done -- good or bad -- what they've said or what they believe, and why we think they're intriguing.

(CNN) -- Neda Agha-Soltan: The night before she was killed on the streets of Tehran, the woman the world would come to know simply as Neda had a dream. "There was a war going on," she told her mother, Hajar Rostami, the next morning, "and I was in the front."

Neda's mother had joined her in the street protests that erupted after Iran's disputed June 12 presidential election. But on that fateful morning, she told her daughter she couldn't go with her. As Neda prepared to leave, the mother told CNN last November, she was filled with anxiety. "I told her to be very careful, and she said she would."

On June 20, Neda, 26, headed to Tehran's Nilofar Square, where thousands of protesters gathered. Tear gas was lobbed at the crowd. Her eyes burning, Neda headed to a medical clinic to get them washed. Neda later walked toward her car, parked on a side street not far from the heated protests. A single bullet struck her chest, and Neda was dead.

On Monday, Long Island University announced it was awarding a 2009 George Polk Award, one of journalism's highest honors, to the unknown videographer who captured Neda's final moments -- her collapse on the street and her death. The New York Times reports that this is the first time in the 61-year history of the prestigious awards that judges have given the honor to work done anonymously.

"This video footage was seen by millions and became an iconic image of the Iranian resistance," John Darnton, curator of the Polk Awards, told the newspaper. "We don't know who took it or who uploaded it, but we do know it has news value. This award celebrates the fact that, in today's world, a brave bystander with a cellphone camera can use video-sharing and social networking sites to deliver news."

The New York Times: Polk award winners include anonymous video uploader

George Polk Awards in Journalism: 2009 winners

CNN: Neda was 'like an angel,' mother says

William Ward Warren: When President Kennedy and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy arrived at Dallas Love Field on November 22, 1963, there were as many as 100 photographers there, mostly shooting black and white film. On Monday, the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza in Dallas released never-before-seen, 8 mm amateur color film taken by Warren.

According to a release by museum curator Gary Mack, Warren was 15 at the time of the assassination, and because students were given the day off for the president's visit, he took his camera to Love Field to watch the arrival of Air Force One.

"My dad operated a furniture store adjacent to the airport, and so that morning on his way to work, he dropped me off at the airport to see [President Kennedy] come in," Warren said, according to the museum release. "It was cool and yet the sun was shining bright, and there was lots of excitement."

Kennedy was killed less than an hour after Warren captured the start of his visit to Texas. The owner of a freight brokerage business, Warren, now 61, lives in north Texas with his wife and children.

CNN: Watch the footage from the Sixth Floor Museum

CNN: Film released of JFK arrival in Dallas

Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza

Dafna Michaelson: The former director of volunteer services at a Denver, Colorado, hospital -- and a single mother of two children -- left her job and spent all 52 weeks of 2009 traveling to all 50 states and Washington. She funded her "50 in 52 Journey" by draining her 401k -- the entire $31,000 -- and then asking others for donations.

Her goal was to collect the stories of ordinary Americans who were making a difference in their local communities and to share those stories on her Web site. She ultimately interviewed more than 500 people, blogged regularly and posted 370 videos.

In January, she launched the Journey Institute, telling CNN on Monday, "One main thing I heard while traveling was, if they didn't have someone to push them or mentor them or train them, they wouldn't have been able to put their idea into action."

So after her journey, Michaelson decided to help people get their ideas off the couch and put them into action. Her plan is to bring people from every state facing similar challenges to Denver and give them training on how to solve those problems.

Michaelson said, "No matter where I went, I met people who were the same as the pioneers who built this country. They not only had to build their barns and plant their fields, they had to help their neighbors do the same. The people I met had the same values as those pioneers."

50 in 52 Journey Web site

The Denver Post: Woman travels nation, documents people making life better

Kim Jong Il: Tuesday is the "Dear Leader's" birthday, but where, do you ask, was he born in 1942? His official biography declares it was at the foothills of Mount Baekdu, North Korea's sacred mountain, amid bright lights and double rainbows. But historians are pretty sure he was born at a guerrilla base under Soviet protection in the Soviet Union. The discrepancy should not surprise. When Time magazine's Frances Romero wrote about the supreme leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the profile began, "An easy way of summing up Kim's life in one sentence would be to throw in the words reportedly, allegedly and the occasional is said to."

His father, Kim Il Sung, founded North Korea, and his son ran the country more or less for 20 years as his father aged, taking power officially in 1997, a few years after his father's death. "Here's a guy who is very concerned about his physical stature, among other things," said Dr. Jerrold Post, a former CIA psychologist who heads the political psychology program at George Washington University. "He's 5-foot-2 and wears 4-inch lifts in his shoes."

Post, in his book "Leaders and Their Followers in a Dangerous World," writes that Kim also loved to drink a certain Hennessy cognac that sold for $630 a bottle in Korea. Hennessy, the maker of Paradis cognac, confirmed that Kim was the biggest buyer of the cognac, and between 1988 and 1998, maintained an estimated annual account of $650,000 to $800,000.

Post wrote the ruler "annually spent 770 times the income of the average North Korean citizen ($1,038) on cognac alone!" Post told CNN that Kim Jong Il once kidnapped the most prominent South Korean movie star and kept her under house arrest with her husband for eight years. And he has a collection of some 20,000 videotapes, including the complete James Bond movie collection.

In August 2008, Kim had a stroke and was out of view for some time, and now seems to have recovered. Post said he believes that some of his toughness on North Korean nuclear policy now may be the indication of a power struggle at the end of his rule.

CNN: North Korea marks Kim Jong Il's birthday

CNN: Mystery has surrounded Kim Jong Il

Time: Two-minute bio: Kim Jong Il

Bode Miller: NBC Winter Games anchor Bob Costas said this weekend that the word "redemption" may be the most overused cliché in all of Olympics coverage, but it pretty much describes Bode Miller's downhill race Monday.

Sports Illustrated and the U.S. Ski Team Web site report that Miller, winner of 32 World Cup races, won two silver medals in Salt Lake City, Utah, but none during any of his five races at the Turin Olympics in in Italy in 2006. Then in May 2007, Miller announced he was leaving the U.S. Ski Team to race independently, only to rejoin the team in 2009.

Monday in Vancouver, British Columbia, Miller won a bronze medal in the men's Olympic downhill, finishing behind Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway, who took silver, and gold medal winner Didier Defago of Switzerland. Miller missed the gold by nine one-hundredths of a second, but he now holds the U.S. record for most medals in Alpine skiing. According to his official biography, Miller was born in New Hampshire in 1977, was home-schooled until fourth grade and started skiing at 3.

U.S. Ski Team: Bode Miller bio

SI: Bode Miller career highlights

CNN: Winter Olympics coverage

What makes a person intriguing?

There are people who enter the news cycle every day because their actions or decisions are new, important or different. Others are in the news because they are the ones those decisions affect. And there are a number of people who are so famous or controversial that anything they say or do becomes news.

Some of these people do what we expect of them: They run for office, pass legislation, start a business, get hired or fired, commit a crime, make an arrest, get in accidents, hit a home run, overthrow a government, fight wars, sue an opponent, put out fires, prepare for hurricanes and cavort with people other than their spouses. They do make news, but the action is usually more important than who is involved in the story.

But every day, there are a number of people who become fascinating to us -- by virtue of their character, how they reached their decision, how they behaved under pressure or because of the remarkable circumstances surrounding the event they are involved in.

They arouse our curiosity. We hear about them and want to know more. What they have done or said stimulates conversations across the country. At times, there is even a mystery about them. What they have done may be unique, heroic, cowardly or ghastly, but they capture our imaginations. We want to know what makes them tick, why they believe what they do, and why they did what they did. They intrigue us.

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Chinese pair wins skating gold at last - San Francisco Chronicle

Posted: 16 Feb 2010 06:40 AM PST

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Chinese pairs, skating with joy and verve, broke up the Russian hegemony Monday night at Pacific Coliseum by winning the gold and silver medals, and a German pair claimed the bronze.

"This is an embodiment of the Olympic spirit," said Hongbo Zhao in winning gold with his partner and wife, Xue Shen.

"This is also the attractiveness of the Olympic Games," Shen said.

The best Russia could do was a fourth-place finish by Yuko Kavaguti and Alexander Smirnov, whose deeply flawed long program cost them any shot at a medal.

"Everyone was really nervous," Smirnov said. "It's hard to handle the stress of such a competition."

The Chinese seemed to handle it just fine, however, subsuming their nerves with lifts, spins, throws and jumps that showed just how far the country has come in pairs skating.

The husband and wife pair of Shen and Zhao put a capstone on a long career by winning the gold medal with 216.57 points despite not winning the long program. Their five-point margin after the short program carried them through their free skate as they earned 139.91 points.

"We're very happy. This is a dream come true," Zhao said. "We've had this dream for many, many, many years. Today we achieved our goal."

The bronze medalists at the 2002 and 2006 Olympics, Shen and Zhao likely will retire with gold medals around their necks.

"It's hard to continue skating. Maybe it's time to have a baby," Shen said.

China took home the silver medal as Qing Pang and Jian Tong skated magnificently to a world record in the long program with 141.81 points and a total of 213.31. They went from fourth to second with their robust and joyous 4 minutes, 30 seconds on the ice.

"Our performance today is very good. I still feel it's a dream," Pang said.

Germans Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy were in position for a silver medal after their short program but came up a bit lacking Monday night with a program marred by a fall by Szolkowy on a double Axel. Earlier, Savchenko downgraded a triple toeloop to a double, with costly results.

They scored 134.64 on their free skate for a total of 210.60, more than enough to distance themselves from Kavaguti and Smirnov with 194.77.

It was the first time since 1960 at Squaw Valley that a Russian/Soviet pair was not on the medals podium. Starting in '64 at Innsbruck, Russians won 12 consecutive gold medals in pairs, sharing the top rung in 2002 with Canadians Jamie Sale and David Pelletier.

Though Shen and Zhao left the Coliseum as the gold medalists, it was Pang and Tong who wowed an audience of 11,000 with their world record score in the free skate.

They nailed every one of their 12 elements, starting with a double Axel-double Axel and receiving bonus points for two stunning throws in the back half of the program, Tong flinging Pang as if she weighed no more than the teddy bears that fans toss on the ice.

As for Shen, 31, and Zhao, 36, they have been at this for some time now, having partnered in 1992. In that time, they got married, achieved great prominence, won bronze medals in the last two Olympics, retired in 2007 and came back to the sport for just this moment - at the top of the podium as gold medalists.

Until Monday night, they said their proudest moment had been selling out the Capital Gymnasium in Beijing for the 2004 Cup of China skating event, for to them, it meant "that they succeeded in their goal to make figure skating a popular sport in their country," according to their official Olympic biography.

They might have to amend that "proudest moment" now.

Red, traditionally a good luck color in China, was the preferred color of costume for the gold and silver medalists and seemed to add to the richness of their performances.

This was no night for teal or gray.

The best U.S. pair, Mark Ladwig and Amanda Evora, finished 10th with 171.92 points.

E-mail John Crumpacker at jcrumpacker@sfchronicle.com.

This article appeared on page B - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

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Biographies

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

“Steve Jobs Working With Walter Isaacson On Biography - The Business Insider” plus 3 more

“Steve Jobs Working With Walter Isaacson On Biography - The Business Insider” plus 3 more

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