biography of steve jobs by walter isaacson

• Get 25% off with code GIFT25. Terms apply
• Sign up and get a free ebook!
• Don't miss our ebook deals!
• Avoid Publishing Scams. Learn More.

• Unabridged Audio Download
• Abridged Audio Download
• Abridged Compact Disk
• Unabridged Compact Disk

Trade Paperback

LIST PRICE $22.00

Get 25% off plus free shipping on orders of $40 or more with code GIFT25. (Terms apply)

Buy from Other Retailers

• Amazon logo
• Bookshop logo

Table of Contents

Reading group guide, about the book.

Get a FREE ebook by joining our mailing list today! Plus, receive recommendations for your next Book Club read.

About The Author

Walter Isaacson is the bestselling author of biographies of Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, and Albert Einstein. He is a professor of history at Tulane and was CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of Time . He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2023. Visit him at Isaacson.Tulane.edu.

Product Details

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (October 5, 2021)
• Length: 672 pages
• ISBN13: 9781982176860

Browse Related Books

• Business & Economics > Leadership
• Biography & Autobiography > Business
• Biography & Autobiography > Composers & Musicians
• Computers > History

Related Articles

• 12 Mathematical Books to Help You Solve Your Reading Rut Problem - Off the Shelf
• 11 Exceptional Audiobooks for Your Every Mood - Off the Shelf
• 13 Books You’ll Want to Read Before They Hit the Big Screen - Off the Shelf
• Chipotle’s Literary Salon: The Books Behind the Burritos - Off the Shelf

Awards and Honors

• Heather's Pick - Fiction

Resources and Downloads

High resolution images.

• Book Cover Image (jpg): Steve Jobs Trade Paperback 9781982176860

Get a FREE ebook by joining our mailing list today!

Plus, receive recommendations and exclusive offers on all of your favorite books and authors from Simon & Schuster.

More books from this author: Walter Isaacson

You may also like: Thriller and Mystery Staff Picks

More to Explore

Limited Time eBook Deals

Check out this month's discounted reads.

Our Summer Reading Recommendations

Red-hot romances, poolside fiction, and blockbuster picks, oh my! Start reading the hottest books of the summer.

This Month's New Releases

From heart-pounding thrillers to poignant memoirs and everything in between, check out what's new this month.

Tell us what you like and we'll recommend books you'll love.

• Biographies & Memoirs
• Professionals & Academics

Buy new: .savingPriceOverride { color:#CC0C39!important; font-weight: 300!important; } .reinventMobileHeaderPrice { font-weight: 400; } #apex_offerDisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventPriceSavingsPercentageMargin, #apex_offerDisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventPricePriceToPayMargin { margin-right: 4px; } $39.99 $ 39 . 99 FREE delivery Friday, November 29 Ships from: pearlbook Sold by: pearlbook

Save with used - good .savingpriceoverride { color:#cc0c39important; font-weight: 300important; } .reinventmobileheaderprice { font-weight: 400; } #apex_offerdisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventpricesavingspercentagemargin, #apex_offerdisplay_mobile_feature_div .reinventpricepricetopaymargin { margin-right: 4px; } $33.20 $ 33 . 20 join prime (function(f) {var _np=(window.p._namespace(""));if(_np.guardfatal){_np.guardfatal(f)(_np);}else{f(_np);}}(function(p) { p.when('ready').execute("npa-prime-signup-ingress", () => { p.load.js("https://d1nruqhae353qc.cloudfront.net/primesignup/widget.js"); }); })); to get free delivery saturday, november 23 ships from: amazon sold by: qtkdesigns, return this item for free.

We offer easy, convenient returns with at least one free return option: no shipping charges. All returns must comply with our returns policy.

• Go to your orders and start the return
• Select your preferred free shipping option
• Drop off and leave!

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required .

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

Image Unavailable

• To view this video download Flash Player

Follow the author

Steve Jobs: A Biography Hardcover – Large Print, October 24, 2011

Purchase options and add-ons.

• Print length 630 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Thorndike Press
• Publication date October 24, 2011
• Dimensions 6.25 x 2 x 9.75 inches
• ISBN-10 9781410445223
• ISBN-13 978-1410445223
• See all details

Frequently bought together

Similar items that may deliver to you quickly

Editorial Reviews

About the author, product details.

• ASIN ‏ : ‎ 1410445224
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Thorndike Press; Large Print edition (October 24, 2011)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 630 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9781410445223
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1410445223
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.6 pounds
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.25 x 2 x 9.75 inches
• #1,838 in Computers & Technology Industry
• #6,556 in Biographies of Business & Industrial Professionals
• #54,284 in Engineering (Books)

Videos for this product

Click to play video

Merchant Video

About the author

Walter isaacson.

Walter Isaacson is writing a biography of Elon Musk. He is the author of The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race; Leonardo da Vinci; Steve Jobs; Einstein: His Life and Universe; Benjamin Franklin: An American Life; The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution; and Kissinger: A Biography. He is also the coauthor of The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made. He is a Professor of History at Tulane, has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chairman of CNN, and editor of Time magazine.

Customer reviews

• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 5 star 78% 16% 4% 1% 1% 78%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 4 star 78% 16% 4% 1% 1% 16%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 3 star 78% 16% 4% 1% 1% 4%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 2 star 78% 16% 4% 1% 1% 1%
• 5 star 4 star 3 star 2 star 1 star 1 star 78% 16% 4% 1% 1% 1%

Customer Reviews, including Product Star Ratings help customers to learn more about the product and decide whether it is the right product for them.

To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. Instead, our system considers things like how recent a review is and if the reviewer bought the item on Amazon. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness.

Customers say

Customers find the book marvelous, engrossing, and fascinating. They also find it informative, objective, and a great case study of three companies. Readers describe the writing quality as easy to read, beautiful, and well-written. They mention the biography is rich and telling. They describe the storytelling as compelling, exciting, and entertaining. Readers praise the author's writing style as compelling and frank.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

Customers find the book marvelously engrossing, fascinating, and easy to read. They say it's full of stories and anecdotes. Readers also mention the book chronicles well and provides a journey of discovery.

"...I Jove it when you can bring really great design and simple capability to something that doesn't cost much," he said as he pointed out the clean..." Read more

"...It's a story worth reading . If for nothing else, read it to understand what it took to create the device on which you're reading this very review." Read more

"...of it - until the last few chapters - was very well written and interesting ...." Read more

"Book review by Richard L. Weaver II, Ph.D.This is a fascinating , if not riveting, story that is not only well-written and well-..." Read more

Customers find the book very informative and brilliant. They say it provides a great case study of three companies. Readers also mention the book is objective, even critical. They describe it as an intelligent, readable, and accurate story.

"... Intuition is a very powerful thing , more powerful than intellect, in my opinion. That's had a big impact on my work."..." Read more

"...The book offers a great case study of three companies: Apple, NeXT and Pixar...." Read more

"...more in the last few chapters, but most of the book seemed to be very objective , even critical...." Read more

"...bright, imaginative, creative, intelligent, educated, and knowledgeable , but the way he treated others, the way he thought about others who were not..." Read more

Customers find the book easy to read, well-written, and easy to follow. They say it's accessible and doesn't overtly technical in nature. Readers appreciate the carefully chosen and crafted words. They also mention the losing battle to cancer is described with gracious transparency.

"...but even so, most of it - until the last few chapters - was very well written and interesting...." Read more

"...This is a fascinating, if not riveting, story that is not only well-written and well-constructed (organized in a chronological manner), but it is..." Read more

"...Through Isaacson's insightful eyes and his carefully chosen and crafted words , I feel I have personally met a man that will be remembered as an..." Read more

Customers find the biography rich, telling, and surprisingly public. They say it's personal, introspective, and charismatic. Readers also mention the book is a vivid reminder of God's common grace.

"...Most importantly, this is a very personal book ...." Read more

"Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs is a comprehensive, well-researched biography that does justice to the complexity of Jobs' life and legacy...." Read more

"...This biography was an excellent read and a must for anyone interested in Silicon Valley, Steve Jobs himself, or the creation of one of technologies..." Read more

"... Great biography ." Read more

Customers find the storytelling compelling, exciting, and entertaining. They say it provides a look into an incredible life. Readers also mention the book is gripping and riveting.

"...This book didn't disappoint. It was both captivating , and offered meaningful insight into Steve Jobs and the history of Apple...." Read more

"...While it could have benefited from tighter editing, it remains a compelling and insightful read...." Read more

"...had no control over the product (other than the cover design), it is a compelling , but not always flattering bio of a mercurial and important..." Read more

"...much for reading biographies, but this one is compelling, even exciting . As I write this review, it has been only 45 days since Steve Jobs died...." Read more

Customers find the author's writing style compelling, frank, and nice. They say it's an extraordinary biography of a creative genius. Readers also mention the narration of his own words is clear and helps capture the story.

"...Sure, he was incredibly bright, imaginative, creative , intelligent, educated, and knowledgeable, but the way he treated others, the way he thought..." Read more

"...Walter Issacson's biography is highly readable and very compelling...." Read more

" Loved the writing style and storytelling ...." Read more

"...(friends, foes, lovers, rivals, you name it), he has created a remarkably personal portrait -- one that brought me to tears on more occasions than I..." Read more

Customers find the book very honest, real, and compelling. They say it provides a compelling but realistic view of one of the greatest innovators of our time. Readers also mention the author writes with a measured yet realistic respect.

"...It is an honest , complete, and intimate conclusion that accurately and completely draws together many of the comments, reactions, and..." Read more

"...It was delightful and fascinating while feeling authentic and true to his character and the beginning of Apple. I learned a lot." Read more

"...I was impressed by the candidness of the interviews ...." Read more

"...She crafted what I consider to be the perfect, visceral , and emotional post-script to the Isaacson biography. It will bring you to tears...." Read more

Customers have mixed opinions about the pacing of the book. Some find it beguiling, eccentric, and cringe-worthy. Others say the book is incomplete, chaotic, and unprofessional. They also mention the language is flat, dull, and riddled with technical errors.

"...churning details how Steve Jobs was a disloyal, lying, backstabbing, vindictive , manipulative, vengeful, and all-around vile and damaged human being...." Read more

"...Instead, he was a genius. His imaginative leaps were instinctive, unexpected , and at times magical...." Read more

"...The last segment of the book - Apple II - I found to be rather dry , with a sort of hurried, factual quality to it..." Read more

"...express himself at the end was a beautiful, warm, and touching way to conclude the book . Just as Jobs was a true genius (very few measure up!),..." Read more

Reviews with images

• Sort by reviews type Top reviews Most recent Top reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. please try again later..

Top reviews from other countries

• Amazon Newsletter
• About Amazon
• Accessibility
• Sustainability
• Press Center
• Investor Relations
• Amazon Devices
• Amazon Science
• Sell on Amazon
• Sell apps on Amazon
• Supply to Amazon
• Protect & Build Your Brand
• Become an Affiliate
• Become a Delivery Driver
• Start a Package Delivery Business
• Advertise Your Products
• Self-Publish with Us
• Become an Amazon Hub Partner
• › See More Ways to Make Money
• Amazon Visa
• Amazon Store Card
• Amazon Secured Card
• Amazon Business Card
• Shop with Points
• Credit Card Marketplace
• Reload Your Balance
• Amazon Currency Converter
• Your Account
• Your Orders
• Shipping Rates & Policies
• Amazon Prime
• Returns & Replacements
• Manage Your Content and Devices
• Recalls and Product Safety Alerts
• Registry & Gift List
• Conditions of Use
• Privacy Notice
• Consumer Health Data Privacy Disclosure
• Your Ads Privacy Choices

Ask the publishers to restore access to 500,000+ books.

Internet Archive Audio

• Grateful Dead
• Old Time Radio
• 78 RPMs and Cylinder Recordings
• Audio Books & Poetry
• Computers, Technology and Science
• Music, Arts & Culture
• News & Public Affairs
• Spirituality & Religion
• Radio News Archive

• Flickr Commons
• Occupy Wall Street Flickr
• NASA Images
• Solar System Collection
• Ames Research Center

• All Software
• Old School Emulation
• MS-DOS Games
• Historical Software
• Classic PC Games
• Software Library
• Kodi Archive and Support File
• Vintage Software
• CD-ROM Software
• CD-ROM Software Library
• Software Sites
• Tucows Software Library
• Shareware CD-ROMs
• Software Capsules Compilation
• CD-ROM Images
• ZX Spectrum
• DOOM Level CD

• Smithsonian Libraries
• FEDLINK (US)
• Lincoln Collection
• American Libraries
• Canadian Libraries
• Universal Library
• Project Gutenberg
• Children's Library
• Biodiversity Heritage Library
• Books by Language
• Additional Collections

• Prelinger Archives
• Democracy Now!
• Occupy Wall Street
• TV NSA Clip Library
• Animation & Cartoons
• Arts & Music
• Computers & Technology
• Cultural & Academic Films
• Ephemeral Films
• Sports Videos
• Videogame Videos
• Youth Media

Search the history of over 866 billion web pages on the Internet.

Mobile Apps

• Wayback Machine (iOS)
• Wayback Machine (Android)

Browser Extensions

Archive-it subscription.

• Explore the Collections
• Build Collections

Save Page Now

Capture a web page as it appears now for use as a trusted citation in the future.

Please enter a valid web address

• Donate Donate icon An illustration of a heart shape

Bookreader Item Preview

Share or embed this item, flag this item for.

• Graphic Violence
• Explicit Sexual Content
• Hate Speech
• Misinformation/Disinformation
• Marketing/Phishing/Advertising
• Misleading/Inaccurate/Missing Metadata

plus-circle Add Review comment Reviews

5,632 Views

100 Favorites

DOWNLOAD OPTIONS

No suitable files to display here.

IN COLLECTIONS

Uploaded by station47.cebu on July 17, 2020

SIMILAR ITEMS (based on metadata)

• 4.6 • 21.1K Ratings

Publisher Description

Walter Isaacson’s “enthralling” ( The New Yorker ) worldwide bestselling biography of Apple cofounder Steve Jobs. Based on more than forty interviews with Steve Jobs conducted over two years—as well as interviews with more than 100 family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues—Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the roller-coaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing. At a time when America is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, Jobs stands as the ultimate icon of inventiveness and applied imagination. He knew that the best way to create value in 21st century was to connect creativity with technology. He built a company where leaps of the imagination were combined with remarkable feats of engineering. Although Jobs cooperated with the author, he asked for no control over what was written. He put nothing off-limits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly. And Jobs speaks candidly, sometimes brutally so, about the people he worked with and competed against. His friends, foes, and colleagues provide an unvarnished view of the passions, perfectionism, obsessions, artistry, devilry, and compulsion for control that shaped his approach to business and the innovative products that resulted. Driven by demons, Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. But his personality and products were interrelated, just as Apple’s hardware and software tended to be, as if part of an integrated system. His tale is instructive and cautionary, filled with lessons about innovation, character, leadership, and values. Steve Jobs is the inspiration for the movie of the same name starring Michael Fassbender, Kate Winslet, Seth Rogen, and Jeff Daniels, directed by Danny Boyle with a screenplay by Aaron Sorkin.

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY DEC 19, 2011

If not the greatest of computer moguls, the late Apple Computer co-founder was certainly the most colorful and charismatic to judge by this compelling biography. Journalist Isaacson (Albert Einstein) had his subject's intimate cooperation but doesn't shy away from Jobs's off-putting traits: the egomania; the shameless theft of ideas; the "reality distortion field" of lies and delusions; the veering between manipulative charm and cold betrayal; the bullying rages, profanity and weeping; the bizarre vegetarian diets that he believed would ward off body odor and cancer (he was tragically wrong on both counts). Isaacson also sees the constructive flip-side of Jobs's flaws, arguing that his crazed perfectionism and sublime sense of design he wanted even his computers' circuit boards to be visually elegant begat brilliant innovations, from the Mac to the iPad, that blended "poetry and processors." The author oversells Jobs as the digital artiste pitting well-crafted, vertically integrated personal computing experiences against the promiscuously licensed, bulk-commodity software profferred by his Microsoft rival Bill Gates. (Gates's acerbic commentary on Jobs's romanticism often steals the page.) Still, Isaacson's exhaustively researched but well-paced, candid and gripping narrative gives us a great warts-and-all portrait of an entrepreneurial spirit and one of the best accounts yet of the human side of the computer biz. Photos.

Customer Reviews

Worth the wait..

Have been waiting for Steve's official biography since the early 2000… My patience finally paid off with this great book, this is the day I have been waiting for. Thank you Steve for leaving behind this wealth for us, RIP... and thank you Walter for the great mastery in translating Steve's thoughts in words for us. :)!

Fascinating topic, poor writing. Needs an Update!

I love Apple and Steve. Because of this, I pre-ordered this book from iBook Store months ago. The book is interesting because the subject is riveting. However, the writing is very poor. There are numerous grammatical errors, paragraphs don't flow, and chapters end abruptly. (E.g. "His father was calm and gentle, traits that his son later praised more than emulated. He was also resolute." and " He walked into the room of the student who had offered to buy it only to discover that he was having sex with his girlfriend." Who's he, whose son, whose girlfriend?!) I realize the book was rushed, but it really needs some editing. I would love to get the updated 1.1 version.

Amazing, inspiring, incredible.

This biography by Walter Isaacson was well done. It clearly reiterates one of Steve Jobs' most famous quotes. "Stay hungry. Stay foolish."

More Books Like This

More books by walter isaacson, customers also bought.

Advertisement

Supported by

Books of The Times

Making the iBio for Apple’s Genius

• Share full article

By Janet Maslin

• Oct. 21, 2011

After Steve Jobs anointed Walter Isaacson as his authorized biographer in 2009, he took Mr. Isaacson to see the Mountain View, Calif., house in which he had lived as a boy. He pointed out its “clean design” and “awesome little features.” He praised the developer, Joseph Eichler, who built more than 11,000 homes in California subdivisions, for making an affordable product on a mass-market scale. And he showed Mr. Isaacson the stockade fence built 50 years earlier by his father, Paul Jobs.

“He loved doing things right,” Mr. Jobs said. “He even cared about the look of the parts you couldn’t see.”

Mr. Jobs, the brilliant and protean creator whose inventions so utterly transformed the allure of technology, turned those childhood lessons into an all-purpose theory of intelligent design. He gave Mr. Isaacson a chance to play by the same rules. His story calls for a book that is clear, elegant and concise enough to qualify as an iBio. Mr. Isaacson’s “Steve Jobs” does its solid best to hit that target.

As a biographer of Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin , Mr. Isaacson knows how to explicate and celebrate genius: revered, long-dead genius. But he wrote “Steve Jobs” as its subject was mortally ill, and that is a more painful and delicate challenge. (He had access to members of the Jobs family at a difficult time.) Mr. Jobs promised not to look over Mr. Isaacson’s shoulder, and not to meddle with anything but the book’s cover. (Boy, does it look great.) And he expressed approval that the book would not be entirely flattering. But his legacy was at stake. And there were awkward questions to be asked. At the end of the volume, Mr. Jobs answers the question “What drove me?” by discussing himself in the past tense.

Mr. Isaacson treats “Steve Jobs” as the biography of record, which means that it is a strange book to read so soon after its subject’s death. Some of it is an essential Silicon Valley chronicle, compiling stories well known to tech aficionados but interesting to a broad audience. Some of it is already quaint. Mr. Jobs’s first job was at Atari, and it involved the game Pong. (“If you’re under 30, ask your parents,” Mr. Isaacson writes.) Some, like an account of the release of the iPad 2, is so recent that it is hard to appreciate yet, even if Mr. Isaacson says the device comes to life “like the face of a tickled baby.” 

And some is definitely intended for future generations. “Indeed,” Mr. Isaacson writes, “its success came not just from the beauty of the hardware but from the applications, known as apps, that allowed you to indulge in all sorts of delightful activities.” One that he mentions, which will be as quaint as Pong some day, features the use of a slingshot to launch angry birds to destroy pigs and their fortresses.

So “Steve Jobs,” an account of its subject’s 56 years (he died on Oct. 5), must reach across time in more ways than one. And it does, in a well-ordered, if not streamlined, fashion. It begins with a portrait of the young Mr. Jobs, rebellious toward the parents who raised him and scornful of the ones who gave him up for adoption. (“They were my sperm and egg bank,” he says.)

Although Mr. Isaacson is not analytical about his subject’s volatile personality (the word “obnoxious” figures in the book frequently), he raises the question of whether feelings of abandonment in childhood made him fanatically controlling and manipulative as an adult. Fortunately, that glib question stays unanswered.

Mr. Jobs, who founded Apple with Stephen Wozniak and Ronald Wayne in 1976, began his career as a seemingly contradictory blend of hippie truth seeker and tech-savvy hothead.

“His Zen awareness was not accompanied by an excess of calm, peace of mind or interpersonal mellowness,” Mr. Isaacson says. “He could stun an unsuspecting victim with an emotional towel-snap, perfectly aimed,” he also writes. But Mr. Jobs valued simplicity, utility and beauty in ways that would shape his creative imagination. And the book maintains that those goals would not have been achievable in the great parade of Apple creations without that mean streak.

Mr. Isaacson takes his readers back to the time when laptops, desktops and windows were metaphors, not everyday realities. His book ticks off how each of the Apple innovations that we now take for granted first occurred to Mr. Jobs or his creative team. “Steve Jobs” means to be the authoritative book about those achievements, and it also follows Mr. Jobs into the wilderness (and to NeXT and Pixar) after his first stint at Apple, which ended in 1985.

With an avid interest in corporate intrigue, it skewers Mr. Jobs’s rivals, like John Sculley, who was recruited in 1983 to be Apple’s chief executive and fell for Mr. Jobs’s deceptive show of friendship. “They professed their fondness so effusively and often that they sounded like high school sweethearts at a Hallmark card display,” Mr. Isaacson writes.

Of course the book also tracks Mr. Jobs’s long and combative rivalry with Bill Gates. The section devoted to Mr. Jobs’s illness, which suggests that his cancer might have been more treatable had he not resisted early surgery, describes the relative tenderness of their last meeting.

“Steve Jobs” greatly admires its subject. But its most adulatory passages are not about people. Offering a combination of tech criticism and promotional hype, Mr. Isaacson describes the arrival of each new product right down to Mr. Jobs’s theatrical introductions and the advertising campaigns. But if the individual bits of hoopla seem excessive, their cumulative effect is staggering. Here is an encyclopedic survey of all that Mr. Jobs accomplished, replete with the passion and excitement that it deserves.

Mr. Jobs’s virtual reinvention of the music business with iTunes and the iPod, for instance, is made to seem all the more miraculous (“He’s got a turn-key solution,” the music executive Jimmy Iovine said.) Mr. Isaacson’s long view basically puts Mr. Jobs up there with Franklin and Einstein, even if a tiny MP3 player is not quite the theory of relativity. The book emphasizes how deceptively effortless Mr. Jobs’s ideas now seem because of their extreme intuitiveness and foresight. When Mr. Jobs, who personally persuaded musician after musician to accept the iTunes model, approached Wynton Marsalis, Mr. Marsalis was rightly more impressed with Mr. Jobs than with the device he was being shown.

Mr. Jobs’s love of music plays a big role in “Steve Jobs,” like his extreme obsession with Bob Dylan. (Like Mr. Dylan, he had a romance with Joan Baez. Her version of Mr. Dylan’s “Love Is Just a Four-Letter Word” was on Mr. Jobs’s own iPod.) So does his extraordinary way of perceiving ordinary things, like well-made knives and kitchen appliances. That he admired the Cuisinart food processor he saw at Macy’s may sound trivial, but his subsequent idea that a molded plastic covering might work well on a computer does not. Years from now, the research trip to a jelly bean factory to study potential colors for the iMac case will not seem as silly as it might now.

Skeptic after skeptic made the mistake of underrating Steve Jobs, and Mr. Isaacson records the howlers who misjudged an unrivaled career. “Sorry Steve, Here’s Why Apple Stores Won’t Work,” Business Week wrote in a 2001 headline. “The iPod will likely become a niche product,” a Harvard Business School professor said. “High tech could not be designed and sold as a consumer product,” Mr. Sculley said in 1987.

Mr. Jobs got the last laugh every time. “Steve Jobs” makes it all the sadder that his last laugh is over.

By Walter Isaacson

Illustrated. 630 pages. Simon & Schuster. $35.

The Books of The Times review on Saturday, about “Steve Jobs,” by Walter Isaacson, described Angry Birds, a popular iPhone game, incorrectly. Slingshots are used to launch birds to destroy pigs and their fortresses, not to shoot down the birds.

When we learn of a mistake, we acknowledge it with a correction. If you spot an error, please let us know at [email protected] . Learn more

Explore More in Books

Want to know about the best books to read and the latest news start here..

100 Best Books of the 21st Century:  As voted on by 503 novelists, nonfiction writers, poets, critics  and other book lovers — with a little help from the staff of The New York Times Book Review.

Cher Turns Back Time:  In the first volume of her memoir  (which she hasn’t read), the singer and actress explores a difficult childhood, fraught marriage to Sonny Bono and how she found her voice.

Reinventing the Romance Comic:  To fully understand Charles Burns’s remarkable graphic novel, “Final Cut,” you have to look closely at the way in which it was rendered .

Turning to ‘Healing Fiction’:  Cozy, whimsical novels — often featuring magical cats — that have long been popular in Japan and Korea are taking off globally. Fans say they offer comfort during a chaotic time .

The Book Review Podcast:  Each week, top authors and critics talk about the latest news in the literary world. Listen here .