Elon Musk is a serial entrepreneur. He was 24 when he started his first business, a company called Zip2. By the time he turned 28, he had sold it for more than $300 million.
Musk -- who is the world's richest man -- now has a number of multi-billion-dollar companies under his belt, including SpaceX and Tesla. And the source of that entrepreneurial drive, according to biographer Walter Isaacson, is the same source of the trauma that continues to haunt him: his father, Errol Musk.
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"Elon Musk’s father instilled his drive but also his demons, beginning at an early age. In my book, Elon and his brother Kimbal tell vivid and psychologically brutal tales and the scars they left, and their father Errol spends hours giving his own side forcefully," Isaacson said, adding that "Musk is still dealing with the traumas."
Musk has discussed his estranged father on a handful of occasions in the past several years, notably speaking to Rolling Stone about the relationship between the two men in 2017. Musk told the magazine at the time that his father was physically and verbally abusive.
"He was such a terrible human being. You have no idea," Musk said. "My dad will have a carefully thought-out plan of evil. He will plan evil.”
Though he never went into specifics, he said his father has committed "every crime you can possibly think of."
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Maye Musk, Elon's mother, said in 2019 that Errol was physically and verbally abusive to her, in addition to their children.
Despite Errol saying on multiple occasions that he was the half-owner of an emerald mine, something that made the Musk family "very wealthy," Elon has said this is simply not true.
"He didn’t own an emerald mine & I worked my way through college, ending up ~$100k in student debt," Musk tweeted in 2019.
Musk went on to say that, in his mind, there is nothing more to be done to attempt to repair the broken relationship he has with his father.
Elon Musk’s father instilled his drive but also his demons, beginning at an early age. In my book, Elon and his brother Kimbal tell vivid and psychologically brutal tales and the scars they left, and their father Errol spends hours giving his own side forcefully.
— Walter Isaacson (@WalterIsaacson) July 31, 2023
Elon and… https://t.co/pecoREd1kd pic.twitter.com/c6aeqxCmZk
His father, in response, told the Daily Mail in 2018 that Elon needs to "grow up."
"He's having a tantrum, like a spoilt child. He can't have what he wants and now I am apparently an evil monster."
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