Saturday, February 5, 2011

Book Review - The Element, by Ken Robinson

If you are familiar with Sir Ken Robinson’s famous TED talk on how schools can kill creativity, or his more recent RSA Animate piece on the need to change education paradigms, then you will already know what to expect with ‘The Element’.  It is more of the same strong call that is rapidly spreading across the globe to develop a society that will nurture human talent.  This is done so using a host of wonderful stories of people who have discovered their element and how they have reached amazing success through this.  People including musical artists Bob Dylan and Jay-Z, The Simpsons creator Matt Groening, Actress Meg Ryan, Broadway Choreographer Gillian Lynne, physicist Richard Feynman, athletic legends, business leaders, and more.

I would recommend this book to anyone at all, though if you are already familiar with Sir Ken’s work it is more for your own inspiration via the collection of stories of people’s lives.  The drum that he is banging will not be unfamiliar territory, though the the print form of these ideas give more time to reflect and absorb the details than the video presentations.