Michael Lewis – Author Biography
Early Life
Michael Lewis was born on October 15, 1960, in New Orleans, Louisiana. He earned a B.A. in art history from Princeton University in 1982 and an M.S. in economics from the London School of Economics in 1986. While in London, he was hired by Salomon Brothers — the Wall Street bond-trading powerhouse — and spent the late 1980s on its trading floor, an experience that would become his first book.
Career
Lewis quit Salomon in 1988 to write Liar’s Poker (1989), a darkly comic exposé of 1980s Wall Street excess that became an instant classic of financial journalism. He reinvented the business narrative with Moneyball (2003), about the Oakland Athletics’ data-driven revolution in baseball, and The Big Short (2010), the definitive account of the investors who saw the 2008 financial crisis coming. Both became Oscar-nominated films. The Blind Side (2006), Flash Boys (2014) on high-frequency trading, The Undoing Project (2016) on psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, and Going Infinite (2023) on crypto mogul Sam Bankman-Fried continued his run. He is a contributing writer at Vanity Fair.
Major Works
Liar’s Poker (1989), Moneyball (2003), The Blind Side (2006), The Big Short (2010), Boomerang (2011), Flash Boys (2014), The Undoing Project (2016), The Fifth Risk (2018), Going Infinite (2023).
Writing Style and Themes
Lewis’s gift is making complex systems — bond trading, baseball statistics, mortgage-backed securities — read like thrillers. He finds outsiders who see what insiders miss: Billy Beane, Michael Burry, Daniel Kahneman. His recurring themes are information asymmetry, institutional blindness, and the human tendency to trust broken systems. His prose is clear, wry, and propulsive, and his books routinely move markets and policy debates.
Legacy
Lewis essentially invented the modern narrative nonfiction blockbuster about money. Liar’s Poker defined Wall Street’s image for a generation; Moneyball changed how sports are run; The Big Short shaped public understanding of the financial crisis. Three of his books became major films. He remains the most widely read financial writer in the world.
