Excellent Insight into the Life and Empire of Howard Hughes

books:


	• Howard Hughes - His Life and Madness Donald L. Bartlett, James L. Steele Andre Deutsch Ltd, 2003 - 688 pages average customer review:based on 9 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

highly recommended

The Demise of an Empire

Donald Bartlett and James Steel's book, "Empire: The Life, Legend, and Madness of Howard Hughes" is an excellent example of journalistic reporting converted into book form; the book is simply fascinating to read. The authors accomplish the gargantuan task of separating fact from fiction in the very complex life of Howard Hughes. "Empire" is impeccably researched and documented; It is a bona fide biography that reads more like fiction than real life-such was the world of Howard Hughes.

"Empire" traces the rise and tragic fall of Howard Hughes; a man who wore many hats, he was an aviator, Hollywood movie producer, Las Vegas hotel/casino owner ... and a recluse. For one brief shining moment, Hughes was considered one of America's premier aviators, breaking flying records, but then falling out of grace with government and the aviation industry for breaking contract deadlines. In the long run, Howard Hughes would become a grand failure in the world of big business.

Bartlett and Steel show the reader a man who had everything to live for, good looks, fame, fortune, power and prestige, but he was unable to triumph over his social and physical phobias that led to psychological, emotional, and physical illnesses and to his final descent into the dwellings of the insane. Hughes' deep mistrust of all people-even family, worked against him and led to his demise and the lose of his billion dollar empire by the very people whose job it was to safeguard him and his empire.

By the time I finished reading "Empire: The Life, Legend, and Madness of Howard Hughes, I was much more accepting of my status as a non wealthy individual. Although Howard Hughes had everything a man could possibly wish for, he was underprivileged in peace of mind.... The authors do a superb job in separating fact from myth in the life of Howard Hughes. The book is worth reading.

for more information click here

Unshrouds the mystery with facts, not speculations

The Life, Legend, and Madness offers an in-depth view into the secretive life of Howard Hughes. Unbiased in its writing, the book focuses on all of Hughes accomplishments and successes, as well as some of the darker aspects of his life. After reading this book, one can really see that Hughes is one of the few "larger than life" characters that ever lived.

Hughes played an integral role in shaping this country, a role unknown to many of today's younger generations. Donald Barlett and James Steele do an amazing job detailing both his accomplishments and private life. Some of his endeavors are less obvious today than others, such as helping transform Las Vegas into the resort town we know today. Many people are unfamiliar with the Hughes Medical Institute or the creations from the Hughes Aircraft Company. Although the book does show his odd lifestyle behind the darkened windows and closed doors, it is fair in that it also accurately focuses on his important business dealings.

The popular movie "The Aviator" seems to be scripted largely from the first half of this book. To fully appreciate the movie, I recommend reading this particular book first. Not only will it help clarify references that may slip by in the movie, but this book shows that Hughes was much more than a movie producer who flirted with Hollywood's divas of the day. He was a master engineer, expert businessman, and defender of Democracy (he furiously fought Communists). Innovative people like Hughes is what America is all about.

for more information click here

Howard Hughes, Naked

The story of Howard Hughes, told superbly in this classic bio, is simply magnetic. How else could you describe a tale that begins with young Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. being born into one of Texas's wealthiest oil families (his father's company, Hughes Tool Company, held a virtual monopoly on drill-bits for many years), moving to Califoria to become a movie mogul, pioneering aviation, heading TWA, and then slipping into degenerative obsessive madness that rendered him completely in the hands of his manipulative underlings. Thus in this book we confront both the young, energetic Hughes (romantically linked to both Jane Russell and Katharine Hepburn) and the old, sick hughes - a nudist who left his hair and fingernails uncut for years, chronicly addicted to codeine, flitting between vacuum-sealed hotel rooms in diffent countries (Bahamas, Nicaragua, Toronto, London, etc.), yet whose name continued to command terror and respect among presidents and governors.

As I read this book, there were many Hughes habits that I found deeply endearing, even as the weird details mounted. How can you not like a guy who, in the pre-VCR era, decided to buy the local Nevada TV station, just so they'd play the movies he wanted? Who - upon installing his home entertainment system - had an obsessive-compulsive need to watch the epic 1968 thriller "Ice Station Zebra" over and over again? (It's a good movie, after all.) Who bought up half of the real estate of Nevada in a doomed expectation of a world gold shortage? Or who lent his name to the ocean-dredging vessel, Glomar Explorer, to aid the CIA's covert attempts to refloat a Soviet sub? And there was something genuinely visionary about the way he built his aircraft and electronics empires. Indeed, despite the piles of carefully-compiled evidence of financial disasters at TWA, RKO, Air West and Summa Corporation, somehow I want to believe that Hughes was not the bungling sicko that emerges from these pages, but so what if he was, the story remains magnificent.

As a postscript, every time you see a DirectTV advertisement, remember that it used to be a Hughes company.

for more information click here

The best book on Howard Hughes

"Empire: The Life, Legend, and Madness of Howard Hughes" is indeed an empire within itself. This book manages to expose the life of a very seceretive and private man of power who lived in his own unique way in the world. An incredible book about an incredible man...

Excellent Insight into the Life and Empire of Howard Hughes

After reading other books on Howard Hughes, I thought this book would be a waste of my time since I'd "read everything else" but little did I know that this book went into such detail of his life, exposing in great detail specifics that other books briefly mentioned.

reviews: page 1, 2

Howard Hughes lived one of the greatest, most heroic, misunderstood, mysterious, bizarre, and tragic lives in American history. In this brilliantly documented biography, the mythology that surrounded that life is disentangled from the truth. Hughes had always been different. Certainly his riches set him apart, but he was also tough. Orphaned and a millionaire at eighteen, Hughes repudiated his relatives, seized control of the Hughes Tool Company, the linchpin of his fortune, and went on to become a flamboyant movie producer, holder of many world aviation records, principal owner of Trans World Airlines, a critically important defense contractor, Hollywood's most pursued and elusive bachelor, and partner of the United States government. This is an epic biography of an epic figure who bestrode the world like a colossus yet could not master himself.

for more information click here

hot