Leonardo's Legacy

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Nonfiction 

Restless genius  
LEONARDO'S LEGACY:
How Da Vinci Reimagined the World
By Stefan Klein
Da Capo Press

Reviewed by Kathy Highcove

Da Vinci died in 1519, but his life's work - his legacy - has never ceased to intrigue and enlighten ensuing generations. His extensive journals reveal a restless genius who searched his entire life to accurately perceive and understand the world around him.

In Leonardo's Legacy, author Stefan Klein probes Da Vinci's writings to reveal how his observations, theories and prophecies were precursors of modern thought. As Sigmund Freud once remarked, Leonardo “was like a man who woke too early in the darkness, while all others were still asleep.”

DaVinci left a legacy of marvelous art, sculpture, engineering structures, inventions, and scientific insights. He scribbled notes and made drawings his entire adult life to record his observations and discoveries for posterity. Unfortunately, he often wrote in code to hide his research from spying eyes, so these cryptic journals are still being interpreted by scholars today. The parts of his journal that have been analyzed and translated are the basis of Leonardo's Legacy.

Chapter by chapter, author Klein demonstrates that Leonardo was an artist, engineer, sculptor, inventor, scientist, writer, and builder - a multi-faceted mind. He asks the reader: What do all these seemingly diverse qualities have in common? Basically, a good eye. Da Vinci wanted to see things as they really were, not as some zealot or local literati wanted things to be. And to this end he spent many hours just watching the flow of water, the play of sunlight and shadow, the passage of stars, the flight of a bird, the germination of seeds, or - as evidenced by the mysterious smile of the Mona Lisa - the intricacies of human facial expressions. Without a telescope or a microscope, he tried to truly observe and record minute detail and changes in nature around and above him.

Klein believes that Da Vinci's greatest strength was the ability to see how seemingly diverse forms of life are interconnected parts of a larger universal pattern: analogy to the extreme, one might say. This Renaissance man had insights that would not occur to others for hundreds of years. Klein writes:

The analogies he kept finding everywhere he looked not only helped him to explain the world, but also gave wing to his creative genius. His world was like a set of building blocks, which he used to make ever new combinations. He let his thoughts roam and alight on ideas. His manuscripts explained “… a way to stimulate and arouse the mind to various inventions” by staring at random patterns, such as those found on a discolored rock, and discovering new shapes. Leonardo used this method to home his creations.

Influential people of the past century such as Einstein, Ford, Edison. Gates, Curie, Jobs, and Salk were adept at researching and pursuing their own studies on their own terms. But in Leonardo's time, to profess an independent belief or hypothesis was often akin to heresy. Truth-seekers paid dearly when they were judged to be dangerous heretics by the Church.

Leonardo was not religious, even though he was often employed by the church clergy. His creed was his own creed. And his beliefs evolved over time, unlike the infallible truths of the Vatican that were usually realized and proclaimed after a spiritual influx of divine inspiration.

Klein shows how Leonardo constantly hired out to raise funds for his studies. Whenever money ran short he found a rich patron - never mind their morals, personal goals, or power games - and he worked on his employer's projects. To the end of his life, Leonardo skillfully found patrons and a way to continue his studies in whatever community he inhabited. (That ability to survive on his own terms was genius in itself.)

This book demonstrates, through journal entries and drawings, that Da Vinci recognized the relationship between different forms of creation. For example, he saw the relationship between the human body's muscular and skeletal system and the beams, struts and supports of architecture. His analogies reveal a fertile mind that was truly awake to the intricacies of life around him.

The last section of the Klein book is a helpful chronology with illustrations taken from Da Vinci's journal. A thick section of sources follows the chronology.

If Da Vinci were to be magically transported to modern times, he'd fit right in. His thirst for knowledge was insatiable. He drank in all he could learn … about everything and anything. I wonder what he'd have done with an iMac and an iPad and the Internet.

Leonardo's Legacy effectively demonstrates how much one mind can achieve when determined to explore, experiment and question the status quo. Leonardo Da Vinci let his imagination lead him on to countless discoveries, and ensuing generations will always be enriched by the products of his genius.