Think Like Da Vinci: 7 Easy Steps to Boosting Your Everyday Genius. Michael Gelb

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      François I, king of France and patron of Leonardo.

      Accompanied by his small entourage of pupils and assistants, Leonardo wound his way through Milan to Amboise in the Loire Valley, knowing he would not return to the land of his birth. The last few years of his life were spent there under the patronage of François I, king of France. Although Da Vinci had many patrons and admirers throughout his days, the French king was perhaps the only one who came close to recognizing and appreciating the singular nature of Da Vinci’s genius. François provided Leonardo with a lovely château and a generous stipend and left the great master free to think and work as he pleased. Although his official title was “painter, engineer, and architect of the king,” Da Vinci’s primary obligation was to converse, to muse, and to philosophize with his majesty. According to Benvenuto Cellini, François “affirmed that never had any man come into the world who knew so much as Leonardo, and that not only in sculpture, painting, and architecture, for in addition he was a great philosopher.”

      Under King François’s patronage Leonardo persevered in his studies, but time was running out. Years of exile had sapped his vitality. Then a severe stroke cost him the use of his right hand. Leonardo saw that he would die without fully realizing his dream of unifying all knowledge.

      His last days, like much of his life, are shrouded in mystery. He once wrote, “As a day well spent brings blessed sleep, so a life well lived brings a blessed death.” Yet elsewhere he noted, “It is with the greatest reluctance that the soul leaves the body, and its sorrow and lamentations are not without cause.” Vasari tells us that as death approached, Leonardo, never religious but always deeply spiritual, “desired scrupulously to be informed of Catholic practice and the good and holy Christian religion.”

      Leonardo Da Vinci died at the age of sixty-seven on May 2, 1519. Vasari claims that in his final days Leonardo was filled with repentance and apologized to “God and man for leaving so much undone.” Yet toward the end Leonardo also wrote, “I shall continue” and “I never tire of being useful.” Vasari records that Leonardo was observing and describing, in scientific detail, the nature of his illness and symptoms as he died in the arms of the French king. Although some scholars claim that documents prove that François was elsewhere at the time of Da Vinci’s death, the evidence is inconclusive, and Vasari may be right. It is easy to believe, however, that the maestro would, even at the moment of death, continue his process of learning and study.

      The life of Leonardo da Vinci is a mysterious tapestry, woven in paradox, dyed in irony. No one has ever attempted so much in so many areas, and yet much of his work was left unfinished. He never completed The Last Supper, The Battle of Anghiari, or the Sforza horse. Only seventeen of his paintings exist, a number of which are incomplete. Although his notebooks contained wondrous information, he never organized and published them as he intended.

      Scholars have offered a range of social, political, economic, and psychosexual explanations for Da Vinci’s leaving so many works incomplete. Some have even branded him a failure because he left so much unfinished. Professor Morris Philipson argues convincingly, however, that this is somewhat like criticizing Columbus for not discovering India.