In this authoritative and engrossing full-scale biography, Walter Isaacson, bestselling author of "Einstein "and "Steve Jobs," shows how the most fascinating of America's founders helped define our national character. Benjamin Franklin is the founding father who winks at us, the one who seems made of flesh rather than marble. In a sweeping narrative that follows Franklin's life from Boston to Philadelphia to London and Paris and back, Walter Isaacson chronicles the adventures of the runaway apprentice who became, over the course of his eighty-four-year life, America's best writer, inventor, media baron, scientist, diplomat, and business strategist, as well as one of its most practical and ingenious political leaders. He explores the wit behind "Poor Richard's Almanac" and the wisdom behind the Declaration of Independence, the new nation's alliance with France, the treaty that ended the Revolution, and the compromises that created a near-perfect Constitution. In this colorful and intimate narrative, Isaacson provides the full sweep of Franklin's amazing life, showing how he helped to forge the American national identity and why he has a particular resonance in the twenty-first century. I have had a life long fantasy of hosting one of my heroes Benjamin Franklin on a tour of the modern world. Given his imaginative curiosity about the processes of nature and the ways knowledge of that realm could be put to practical use I believe he would by fascinated yet not surprised at where some of his discoveries have led. Isaacson,s engaging biography takes us beyond the image of the kite flying inventor of the lightning rod bifocals and swim fins beyond the spinner of adages about fish and house guests and pennies earned to the whole complicated Franklin. This unsparing yet appreciative look at ,the most accomplished American of his age , in Isaacson,s words shows Franklin in the light of his times and our own. In so doing it gives us a vivid portrait of a man whose virtues seem to be growing rare in public figures virtues including pragmatism tolerance,religious and otherwise,respect for the individual humility lack of pretense and opposition to arbitrary authority. ~ John Walter Isaacson, the CEO of the Aspen Institute, has been chairman of CNN and the managing editor of "Time" magazine. He is the author of "The Innovators: ""How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution"; "Steve Jobs"; "Einstein: His Life and Universe"; "Benjamin Franklin: An American Life"; and "Kissinger: A Biography", and the coauthor of "The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made". He lives in Washington, DC. Follow him on Twitter @WalterIsaacson. Historical - General Political United States - Revolutionary War