In this bold book, Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein vividly describe how geniuses from Albert Einstein and Richard Feynman to e.e. cummings and Isabel Allende use a common toolbox of mental skills to create new ideas and expressions in every area of the arts and sciences. Illustrations, photos.

Creativity isn't born, it's cultivated--this innovative guide distills the work of extraordinary artists and thinkers to show you how.

All the imagination needs to be fruitful is exercise. Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein identify the thinking tools employed by history's greatest creative minds--from Albert Einstein and Jane Goodall to Amadeus Mozart and Virginia Woolf--so that anyone with the right mix of inspiration and drive can set their own genius in motion. With engaging narratives and ample illustrations, Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein investigate cognitive tools as diverse as observing, imaging, recognizing patterns, modeling, playing, and more to provide a clever, detailed and demanding fitness program for the creative mind (Kirkus Reviews).