So The Virgin Way is been and gone. He's an ideas man is Richard Branson!
No wonder he likes this Steve Jobs quote:
Creativity comes from spontaneous meetings, from random discussions. You run into someone, you ask what they're doing, you say "Wow" and soon you're cooking up all sorts of ideas.
So now I'm onto Mark Lewisohn's first volume of All Those Years - his massive Beatle history, called Tune In (840 pages of text plus notes and index equals a 946 wonder filled document for the ages).
At some point I should explain my obsession with all things Fab but for now I'm tuning in to Mr Lewisohn. I bought this some time ago - it's one of those books I dread starting coz I know I'll become consumed by it and not want it to end.
The guy is a Beatles expert par excellence. I've read a lot of Beatle books in my time but in one footnote on page 19 he gives me three wonderful, hitherto unknown, facts:
In 1916 Paul McCartney's family bought a piano from Nems music store - not yet owned by the Epstein family. Paul bought the piano back in 1981 (it had previously been sold). Paul's dad self taught himself the piano despite being deaf in one ear (as a child he fell off a wall behind his house at 3 Solva Street, Liverpool).
Stunning! Thanks Mark!
Love and peace - Wozza
To my surprise I've turned into a bit of a Richard Branson fan.
Richard's blog often turns up some unexpected treats and his 2014 book The Virgin Way is my latest purchase from that sale table outside Poppies bookstore in Havelock North.
It's come as a bit of a shock after the exuberant prose of Haruki Murikami.
Richard may be a genius entrepreneur and a source of motivation to millions but his writing style is a throwback to an earlier age. I mean who calls their book 'The Virgin Way'?
Seven years older than me means I have heard many of the same expressions he uses from my own parents. Richard relates them in a plain style (fob people off; astute advice, not to be outdone...I opened the book at random three times and those were the first words I found).
I don't mean that as a criticism. It's kinda refreshing. Lately, I've been reading a lot of material from medium.com and vox.com which has a very (post) modern style. Richard doesn't kowtow to trends. Nor does he like mission statements - a man after my own heart!
Subtitled 'How to Listen, Learn, Laugh and Lead', the book delivers what it says on the tin.
Here's a bit to chew on until we meet again:
I remember asking my father about the RAF motto of 'Per Ardua ad Astra'. When dad told me that it meant, 'Through Adversity to the Stars', my impressionable young brain seized on to it as the most inspirational thing I'd ever heard. There was something incredibly compelling about the notion of battling one's way to the stars no matter how difficult the challenge.
Love and peace - Wozza
