Abraham Lincoln
A formidable lawyer and the 16th president of
the United States
Abraham Lincoln failed twice in
business before he was 25 years
old, had a nervous breakdown
and also failed in seeking public
office
eight
times
before
becoming the sixteenth president
of the United States. Lincoln was
a self-educated lawyer with less
than a year of formal schooling.
He is said to have walked for miles
in pursuit of books, and, although
he wasn't a voracious reader, he
set out to thoroughly understand
everything he did read.
David Bowie
An extraordinary multi-faceted personality
David Bowie, a great singer, musician,
multi-instrumentalist, actor and painter,
has never trained in any of the
mentioned fields and only received a few
singing lessons in the 1960's (as reported
by his former manager, Ken Pitt). As a
teenager he took some lessons on
saxophone by Ronnie Ross. However he
managed to teach himself all the
instruments including piano, keyboards/synths, electric/acoustic
guitar, harmonica, koto, limited bass and percussion. His
paintings and sculptures were created (and exhibited) without
any formal art school training. He took a few lessons in movement
and dance with the Lindsey Kemps Dance company but trained
himself in mime.
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