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About the Book:

We open with a brief “Portrait” biography that chronicles Charlie’s progress from his modest Omaha childhood to his prodigious financial success. As you will see, Charlie's Midwest values serve him well on this journey. Next, we summarize the Munger approach to life, learning, decision-making, and investing. This section details both Charlie's unconventional way of thinking and his extraordinary work ethic—the twin fonts of his amazing success. Our “Mungerisms: Charlie Unscripted” section presents a collection of the trenchant remarks he has made at past Berkshire Hathaway and Wesco Financial annual meetings.

In the balance of the book, Charlie speaks to his audience via speeches and talks he gave over a twenty-year period. The “Ten Talks” section covers a wide spectrum of Charlie’s interests, ranging from how one acquires worldly wisdom, to how his “Multiple Mental Models” can be applied to business, to how the investment strategies used by charitable foundations can be improved. The tenth talk is a special rendition of “The Psychology of Human Misjudgment” that Charlie created especially for this book. Each talk is well worth your time not only for the enjoyment it will provide you, but also for what you can absorb from the rich assortment of ideas and practices that Charlie relies on. You will probably never find a better opportunity to learn from someone so smart—and so forthright. In his talks, Charlie simply opens up and tells it like it is. A special note: Charlie’s redundancy in expressions and examples is purposeful: for the kind of deep “fluency” he advocates, he knows that repetition is the heart of instruction.

A word about the style and layout of the book: Charlie is enormously curious about nearly everything he bumps into in life. Accordingly, as we ourselves bumped into people, places and subjects mentioned by Charlie in his Talks, we supplemented his text with related information, photographs and other graphics. The “sidebars” peppered throughout the talks, for example, serve to explain concepts, add a supporting voice, or emphasize an important Munger idea. We hope these sidebars will not only inform, but also amuse and even encourage you to further pursue these subjects on your own.

I wish you good reading and an appreciation of the brightness and dry humor that those of us who know Charlie Munger have come to treasure and expect from him.

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