Books about successful outsiders or misfits

April 7, 2010 4:33 PM

Can you recommend any books or other compendiums of bios of notable, successful people who were misfits or outsiders for much of their upbringing? A friend's teen daughter has always marched to her own drummer, but she is having an especially tough time right now and we'd like to give her some examples of positive role models. (The folks in the Apple "Think Different" campaign are the easy, obvious ones - we'd like something a bit more thoughtful and real.)
posted by twsf to Media & Arts (19 answers total)

I'm not sure if this is the kinda thing you're looking for *exactly* but... Craig Ferguson wrote a book about his childhood which I think is a great read.
posted by kirstk at 4:36 PM on April 7, 2010

I own the book Solitude and it has a bunch of suggestions of people who felt like outsiders. The book was a good counterpoint to a culture that looks at individuality and introverts as weird and unsettling. The book is possibly something I would have read as a teenager.

Rudyard Kipling
Beatrix Potter
Kafka
Beethoven
Kant
Newton
Brahms
Tennyson

are some of the suggestions of individuals who either spent a lifetime or a period of their life as outsiders.
posted by aetg at 4:42 PM on April 7, 2010

Wil Wheaton!
posted by fairytale of los angeles at 4:43 PM on April 7, 2010

I recall this book from my much younger years, when I found it interesting and in its own way inspiring. If I am remembering right, the basic message was that everyone profiled was exceptional only because they had worked so incredibly hard for their success.
posted by bearwife at 4:47 PM on April 7, 2010

I just thought I would actually like to also add David Sedaris to the list of suggestions. Although he's 'just an author' his writing is easy to read, engaging and often hilarious. All of his books are excellent - collections of short stories - but I usually recommend Me Talk Pretty One Day and Naked first.
posted by kirstk at 4:50 PM on April 7, 2010 [2 favorites]

How about Richard Wright's Black Boy ? It might depend on what age your friend's daughter is exactly, but I found it a engrossing, harrowing, and eye-opening read when I was in my older teens. Growing up in the Jim Crow South with literary ambitions that fundamentalist family and racist community tries to quash, he didn't have access to a library or peers that understood him. Wright definitely was a misfit and outsider, and yet became one of the most important authors of the 20th century.
posted by erstwhile ungulate at 4:50 PM on April 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

You might try David McCullough's Mornings on Horseback: The Story of an Extraordinary Family, a Vanished Way of Life and the Unique Child Who Became Theodore Roosevelt. The subtitle really says it all. TR was a sickly child, and his sister Bamie was disabled all of her life. I love this book!
posted by jgirl at 4:59 PM on April 7, 2010

If she's interested at all in art, it sounds to me like she'd be likely to appreciate Frida Kahlo's life story.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 5:12 PM on April 7, 2010

I don't know how notable she is, but Kendall Hailey's "The Day I Became an Autodidact" was the first book that came to mind when I read this.
posted by lemniskate at 5:14 PM on April 7, 2010

Might not be quite what you're looking for, but Thinking in Pictures, by Temple Grandin, comes to mind.
posted by chez shoes at 5:23 PM on April 7, 2010

Maybe this isn't what you are looking for, but there's some evidence that the way society glamorizes independence and autonomy is not such a good thing for teenagers. Nuture Shock blogged about it.
posted by AlsoMike at 5:33 PM on April 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

Wilma Mankiller's autobiography *A Chief and Her People,* with Michael Wallis (St. Martins, 1999) -- in honor of her passing. She lived an incredible and unique life and her book chronicles a passage from marginality to leadership under remarkable duress.
posted by fourcheesemac at 5:38 PM on April 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

John Moffat
posted by phrontist at 6:09 PM on April 7, 2010

A Wrinkle in Time and Meet the Austins by Madeleine L'Engle, are both fiction, but both made a huge impression on me when I was going through that stage. Depending on her age, they may be a bit young for her, but they are very, very good.

What probably helped me the most, though, was meeting the girl who became my best friend. She was also an outsider, but she was the youngest sibling of a family full of misfits, so she had lots of role models. Being around her taught me it was okay to be weird. So maybe a Big Sisters type organization might be able to match her up with someone?
posted by MexicanYenta at 6:16 PM on April 7, 2010

Shock Value by John Waters is fun.
posted by dhammond at 6:19 PM on April 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

since Mexican Yenta recommended fiction, I feel like I can too -- Anne of Green Gables is an orphan and outcast who marches to her own drummer even after she is taken in by the Cuthberts in Avonlea. It's also generally considered one of the first bildungsromans featuring a female protagonist. I always found it helpful during when marching to my own drummer, especially that Anne had a loving family (in the Cuthberts) and found a place in society where her differences and uniqueness were celebrated; she neither had to make herself into someone else, nor resign herself to permanent outsider status.

Both the titular novel and the rest of the series. :)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:39 PM on April 7, 2010

Oh, and what about Obama's autobiography about his youth?
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:40 PM on April 7, 2010

I'm sorry that I can't leave this alone, I just keep thinking about more and more books that I read when I was younger or would have loved to, if not for the fact that I got older before I got ahold of them. A list of a few books that don't exactly fit your requested theme but that I loved the hell out of:

Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer

Annapurna by Maurice Herzog

Each of these is a story - a true story - about remarkable resilience and perseverance. And not one of the stories isn't memorable and moving. If those two strike your fancy, further mountaineering books such as In the Zone, Eiger Dreams and Left For Dead may also be interesting. Although I get that one or two deadly stories about mountaineering can be enough for one person.

If you're not into those ideas, I also thought to recommend Band of Brothers, Flyboys, or The Victors.

For less history, less serious, and more funny - Try mostly anything by Bill Bryson, Catch me if You Can, or The Hoax.

And last but not least, if you're looking for pure inspirational, a book I read every single year, without fail, is Jonathan Livingston Seagull.
posted by kirstk at 7:26 PM on April 7, 2010

Response by poster: The girl's mom says she is getting choked up by all these wonderful responses and thanks everyone...
posted by twsf at 8:36 AM on April 8, 2010