Each year as the Season of Busy begins to wind down, I select a new biography to read in the coming year. Last year I chose a marvelous and inspiring biography of Beatrix Potter (by Linda Lear) whom I learned was far more than just the author and illustrator of The Tale of Peter Rabbit and other children’s books. In fact, Potter’s life was so complex and interesting, beginning set against the back drop of Victorian England, and ending as a respected sheep farmer and conservationist in the Lake District, it took me most of the year to make it through the book.

What I find fascinating about biographies is the detail, the back story, to the person described in the book. Invariably, these stories are ones of struggle, determination, and setbacks, that are reflective of the personal grit we explored in this blog in the past few months. While the stories are typically ones of eventual success, it is what happens in between the beginning and the fame that is most interesting to me. Continue reading →