Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Muhammad: A Prophet for Our Time | 1991 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 2 | Ulysses S. Grant: The Unlikely Hero | 2004 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 3 | George Balanchine | 2004 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 4 | Beethoven | 2005 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 5 | Thomas Jefferson | 2005 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 6 | Caravaggio | 2005 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 7 | Alexander the Great | 2005 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 8 | Freud | 2006 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 9 | Francis Crick | 2006 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 10 | Alexis de Tocqueville | 2006 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 11 | Shakespeare | 2007 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 12 | Machiavelli | 2007 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
| 13 | George Washington | 2009 | Karen Armstrong | Buy |
The Eminent Lives series covers an unusually diverse range of subjects: military commanders, composers, scientists, politicians, and writers, each written by an author with a particular connection to the subject. The brevity of each volume — typically around 200 pages — demands that authors make choices about what to include and what to omit, and the best entries in the series work precisely because of that constraint.
Armstrong’s Muhammad sits naturally with her broader work on Islam. Other volumes in the series include biographies of Beethoven, Caravaggio, and Thomas Jefferson, written by authors chosen for their ability to connect a historical figure to contemporary readers. The series offers a useful library of short, readable biographies across history and culture.