Louis Braille: A Touch of Genius

This new biography includes 31 never-before-translated letters, some written by Louis's own hand. An extraordinary collection of documents, photographs, and artistic works--some unearthed from a curator's private archives in France--complement Mellor's meticulous primary research into Louis's life as a child, student, teacher, musician and genius inventor. This new, visually elegant hardcover book adds a dimension to the material on Louis Braille's life that has fed schoolchildren's biography projects for many years.

Michael Mellor embarked on a biography of Louis Braille when he happened upon several dozen of Braille’s letters on display at l’Institut National de Jeunes Aveugles (INJA), the school in Paris where Braille was a student and teacher. Mellor is editor emeritus of the Matilda Ziegler Magazine for the Blind in New York City. He holds an M.A. in the History of Science from the University of Leeds in England, where he was born.

Michael Mellor embarked on a biography of Louis Braille when he first saw the letters of Louis Braille on display at l’Institut National de Jeunes Aveugles, the school in Paris where Louis was a student, teacher, and creator of an embossed code that carries his name.As editor of the Matilda Ziegler Magazine for the Blind for eighteen years, Mike has long held a fascination for braille. His published paper, “Making a Point: The Crusade for a Universal Embossed Code in the United States,” was delivered at the International Conference on “The Blind in History and the History of the Blind,” in Paris, France, where he came upon Louis’s extant letters and decided to translate them for publication.Mellor holds an MA in the History of Science from the University of Leeds in England, where he was born. During National Service with the Royal Air Force, he maintained electronic equipment on jet fighters. He lives in Brooklyn, New York, where he enjoys being an urban farmer.