Worklife with Adam Grant WorkLife: What motivates great Americans with Ron Chernow
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Jul 8, 2025 
Ron Chernow, a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer, shares his insights on American historical figures and explores the complexities of their legacies. He discusses his new book on Mark Twain, highlighting Twain's chaotic creativity and disillusionments. Chernow delves into what motivates greatness in America, emphasizing resilience and leadership. He also reflects on the transformative power of biography, suggesting it requires both artistic intuition and rigorous research, while assessing how personal relationships shape our understanding of these impactful lives.
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Choosing a Biography Subject
- Choosing a biography subject is like a marriage: the right choice enables success, the wrong blocks it.
- Chernow seeks figures who created American cultural foundations and challenges historical consensus.
Rethinking Alexander Hamilton
- Historical perceptions can be misleading; Chernow saw Hamilton as overlooked despite major achievements.
- A biography and musical helped revive Hamilton's popularity and public awareness.
Method of Understanding Subjects
- Biographers immerse in thousands of letters and diaries to reconstruct subjects' minds.
- Chernow uses 25,000 index cards to organize evidence and psychologically project into the subject's perspective.
