Rise of the Benevolent Octopus is a meditation on fundamental questions of leadership in conversation with spirits from the ancient and modern world. Trapped in an anxiety dream that takes the reader through an imposter book signing, a great ideas conference, lunch at an elite club, a talk show with a tragic poet, and a walk in the woods with idealistic students, the narrator discovers a type of leadership that is playful, versatile, creative, curious, and ultimately committed to the flourishing of others, a constellation of traits contained within the metaphor of the benevolent octopus. The book is an invitation to the reader to tell their own story of becoming a benevolent octopus, whether that story is already or yet to be written. Astonishing. This mind-blowing and paradigm-busting dream of a book creates a philosophical discourse with some key ancient friends of humanity to introduce an irresistibly compelling and modern understanding of what leadership actually is and how it works. Equally thrilling, the book records with searing and lyrical detail the autobiographical journey of the author, an intellectually incandescent humanist classicist professor at Howard University who grew up in the culture of the Southern white working class, imbibed and battled fundamentalist systems of thought of all kinds, and finally came to share his irrepressible love of words, stories, ideas, science, ethics, philosophy and politics with young generations hungry for both ways of understanding a scary world and ways of becoming leaders for positive change. This work, at once rigorously systematic and profoundly personal, is a stirring and magnificent achievement, and a major breakthrough in the critical but overlooked field of leadership studies. — Congressman Jamie Raskin (Maryland) Part memoir, part historical and leadership meditation, and a pulse check of our world today, Rise of the Benevolent Octopus is the biggest of conversations. Titans of thought and Grecian heroes of old are on a first-name basis with industry giants. Socrates converses with Elon Musk. Playful at times, unflinching at times, this work is a call and response between past and present, teacher and student, audience and author. At its best, Sandridge invites us all to join in the great and worthy fray of understanding where humanity has been and defining where it is going. — Morowa Yejidé, author of Creatures of Passage Rise of the Benevolent Octopus is an almost encyclopedic description of how we might engage with examples of "the humanities" around us—from literature, art, film, music and more—to find our own way of becoming leaders, hopefully benevolent ones. The author says it better than I could, in Episode 3: "The goal of the book is not to get people to learn my rules about leadership by reading my summaries of ancient literature. It's to train and encourage people to develop rules, or lessons, or whatever you want to call them, by reading literature on their own." Throughout the book, Prof. Sandridge demonstrates an uncanny ability to engage minds, to open readers or students to new ideas and to ideas we might have thought of as "out of reach" to many. His own vulnerability, openness to other ideas, versatility and resilience create a model of benevolence and how any of us might cultivate it, that feels accessible, desirable and essential in the current political polarization we inhabit. He makes this reader want to be in class with him—what a gift for his students to be stretched, comforted, inspired and ultimately shaped into an octopus arm by such a brilliant and benevolent scholar and teacher. — Hilary Link, President of Drew University To use a metaphor, Rise of the Benevolent Octopus is like a tree, one rooted in the classics with a trunk carved by contemporaries, and branches heavy with the untasted fruits of their ambition. Better than a book of answers, this is a book of questions made urgent by the emerging cadre of leaders who promise to deliver our algorithmically-determined needs and wants. Treasured song lyrics and cinema scenes keep the meditation cozy and within reach. — Nadia Hashimi, author of The Pearl That Broke Its Shell and Sparks Like Stars Norman Sandridge's Rise of the Benevolent Octopus offers a refreshing alternative to conventional leadership texts, blending dream, dialogue, and drama with rich literary, musical, and cultural references for overwhelmed, yet under-nourished readers. It's an advantageous alternative to flat leadership texts and connects readers to universal human experiences. Opening with a relatable dream sequence about public speaking anxiety, Sandridge's warm prose introduces valuable analogies and an engaging lexicon. The narrative unfolds with urgency and ease, peppered with references from the Odyssey , to R.E.M. songs, and from Star Wars to Harry Potter. Readers will find themselves smiling at these familiar touchstones as they navigate the text. Through subtle Socratic