'The lives it illuminates'

 

“I think a biography is only as interesting as the lives and times it illuminates.” – A. Scott Berg

 

Born in Connecticut on this date in 1949, Berg is one of our premier biographers writing on the lives of Samuel Goldwyn, the founder of MGM; aviator Charles Lindbergh; actress Katherine Hepburn, and President Woodrow Wilson – his most recent book.  He’s currently researching for a book on Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.

 

While studying at Princeton, Berg got into writing biographies by expanding on his senior thesis about Maxwell Perkins, the Scribner’s editor for both F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway.  The resulting book, Max Perkins: Editor of Genius, won a National Book Award and was adapted into the movie “Genius.”  A close friend of Hepburn, he wrote Kate Remembered as a biography-cum-memoir about both their friendship and Hepburn’s acting career.

 

Berg said he set a goal at age 22 to write “a series of biographies about great 20^th Century American cultural figures from different parts of the country.”   So far, he’s done 5 – one about every 8-10 years.  

 

 “I am a compulsive worker,” he said.   “But I'm also a compulsive relaxer.”