Some of the Famous Artists, writers, sportsmen, scientists, entertainers, businessmen, politicians, activists, singers, musicians etc. who were dyslexic. 

 Abhishek Bachchan is a popular Indian actor. He appeared in hit movies like Dhoom, Yuva, Sarkar Raj, Dostana and Paa among many others In the movie, Taare Zameen Par, Aamir Khan has cited the example of Abhishek Bachchan as someone who struggled with dyslexia in his childhood but now has become a superstar.

Alexander Graham Bell is a well known inventor of the telephone. Alexander was actually attempting to find a way that could make deaf people hear. His mother's deafness made him extremely sensitive to disabilities. He himself had dyslexia which caused him problems at school, but he always kept his interest for science, especially biology. He showed a great indifference for everything else and had poor grades in all grades.

Leonardo Da Vinci was a scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, painter, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician and writer. As an engineer, Leonardo conceived ideas vastly ahead of his own time. Historians believe the artist was dyslexic based on his notes being written backwards, from right to left, in a mirror image and the many spelling errors.

"Your brain is much better than you think; just use it!"- Leonardo Da Vinci

Thomas Edison was an American inventor credited with over 1000 patented inventions. He was noted to be terrible at mathematics, unable to focus, and had difficulty with words and speech. Thomas Edison was dyslexic. A teacher sent the following note home with him -"He is too stupid to learn." His mother withdrew the child from school and taught him herself.

"I remember that I was never able to get along at school. I was always at the foot of the class." - Thomas Edison

Albert Einstein is famous for his equation E=mc². Einstein was then known to suffer from dyslexia mainly because of his bad memory and his constant failure to memorize the simplest of things. He could not talk until the age of four. He did not learn to read until he was nine. His teachers considered him slow, unsociable and a dreamer. He would not remember the months in the year and he never learned how to properly tie his shoelaces. He failed the entrance examinations to college but finally passed that after an additional year of preparation.

Agatha Christie is the world's bestselling book writer of all times. Her books sold approximately 4 billion copies worldwide. Agatha is dyslexic. Some of her popular books are The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Peril at End House and Murder on the Orient Express.

"I, myself, was always recognized . . . as the "slow one" in the family. It was quite true, and I knew it and accepted it. Writing and spelling were always terribly difficult for me. My letters were without originality. I was . . . an extraordinarily bad speller and have remained so until this day." - Agatha Christie

Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter, draughtsman, and sculptor. His dyslexia made schooling difficult for him. Picasso was well known for his paintings that were backwards, upside down and jumbled cubist works. He had trouble learning at school with arranging letters and words which is a trait of dyslexia.

Jorn Utzon is the architect behind the Sydney Opera House. He was dyslexic and dyscalculic. The Sydney Opera House was declared a World Heritage Site on 28 June 2007. Utzon created many other masterpieces in his lifetime.

"I didn't become an engineer, because I have dyslexia and a missing sense of mathematics. You have to have a good brain to become an engineer. Remember, geometry is different. As a compensation for these handicaps, apparently I have a sense of the spatial room. I imagine a building and then it's completed in my head. I've been able to use this as an architect."- Jorn Utzon

John Winslow Irving is an American novelist and Academy Award-winning screenwriter. He is a dyslexic. Some of Irving's novels, such as The Cider House Rules and A Prayer for Owen Meany, have been bestsellers and many have been made into movies. He also received an O. Henry Award and an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay in 2000 for the film The Cider House Rules.

"The diagnosis of dyslexia wasn't available in the late fifties - bad spelling like mine was considered a psychological problem by the language therapist who evaluated my mysterious case....and turned me over to the school psychiatrist." - John Irving

Hans Christian Anderson is an author of children's fairy tales.Andersen attended grammar school for about five years, but his dyslexia made the experience difficult and traumatic. He wrote stories like, 'The Emperor's New Clothes', 'The Snow Queen', 'The Ugly Duckling' and 'The Little Mermaid'. They have been translated into hundreds of different languages and continue to be distributed even today in millions.

Orlando Bloom is a popular Hollywood actor. At the age of seven, he was tested and diagnosed with dyslexia, and also came to know that he possesses a high IQ. He has acted in movies like The Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, Elizabethtown, Kingdom of Heaven and New York, I Love you.

"It was a struggle. It was a lot of work... I had to work three times as hard to get two-thirds of the way." -Orlando Bloom

Salma Hayek is the most successful Latin actress in Hollywood. She has appeared in more than thirty films and secured a nomination for an Oscar.

"I can learn my lines fine. It’s just reading them in the first place that is the problem."- Salma Hayek

Keira Knightley is a popular Hollywood actress. Her dyslexia made it impossible for her to learn lines. She got good help from some amazing teachers and her parents worked tirelessly with her, so by the time she was 11, she had kind of overcome the problem. She says she can now read scripts without a fault.

"I remember going in for an audition when I was eight, and it was the most excruciating experience because I couldn't read my lines." - Keira Knightley

Jodie Kidd is an international supermodel who has graced the covers of magazines such as Elle and Vogue. Despite having a high I.Q, She flunked all her seven GCSEs apart from art. She was suspended twice and threatened with expulsion.

"I got used to being told off. If I wasn't told off every day in every lesson, I was in shock. I hated academic work". - Jodie Kidd

Tom Cruise is an American actor and film producer. Cruise has said that he suffered from abuse as a child. This was partially due to him suffering from dyslexia. Despite being a success in his chosen field, this entertainer can learn lines only by listening to a tape.

"My childhood was extremely lonely. I was dyslexic and lots of kids make fun of me. That experience made me tough inside, because you learn to quietly accept ridicule."- Tom Cruise

Whoopi Goldberg is an outstanding American actress and has acted in films like Ghost, Made in America, Jumping Jack Flash, The Color Purple, and Star Trek: Generations. Whoopi had a lot of difficulty in school, but it was not until she was an adult did she learn that she had dyslexia.
"When I was a kid they didn't call it dyslexia. They called it... you know, you were slow, or you were retarded, or whatever...........What you can never change is the effect that the words "dumb" and "stupid" have on young people."- Whoopi Goldberg

Liv Rundgren Tyler is an American actress and a model. She has appeared in an eclectic range of films like Lord of the Rings film trilogy, Jersey Girl, Lonesome Jim, Reign Over Me, Armageddon, The Strangers and The Incredible Hulk.

"My diary is a disaster - sometimes I can’t even read it. I can’t spell at all, it’s embarrassing. Thank God for spell check on computers. I’ll spell the same word completely differently in the same sentence." - Liv Rundgren Tyler

Steven Allan Spielberg is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan. His movies: Jaws, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and Jurassic Park have achieved box office records, each becoming the highest-grossing film made at the time. He is dyslexic.

"I felt like an alien. I always felt like I never belonged to any group that I wanted to belong to."-Steven Allan Spielberg

Keanu Reeves is a famous Hollywood star. He is best known for his roles in Speed, The Devil's Advocate, Constantine and the Matrix. Reeves suffered from dyslexia. He had lot of trouble reading and got fed up and didn’t bother to finish high school.

"I was hopeless at high school - I failed everything but Latin." - Keanu Reeves

Magic Johnson is a retired American basketball player for the Los Angeles Lakers and was nicknamed 'Magic' due to his flowing passes and winning performances. He was well known for his unselfish play-making and quick moves on the run, maybe it was his gift of dyslexia which allowed him to be intuitive and not caught up with game plans.

"The looks, the stares, the giggles . . . I wanted to show everybody that I could do better and also that I could read." - Magic Johnson

Muhammad Ali was a world heavyweight champion boxer. He won gold-medal in 1960 Olympics. His success as a boxer is widely respected, and he is also known as a champion, leader, humanitarian and an artist. The boxer barely graduated from high school due to dyslexia and also has a daughter who is dyslexic.

Henry Ford was the founder of the Ford Motor Company. He was one of the first to apply assembly line manufacturing to the mass production of affordable automobiles. Henry Ford had problems with schooling due to dyslexia but excelled in engineering.

"Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal." - Henry Ford

Walter Elias Disney was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor entrepreneur, philanthropist and creator of an American-based theme park called Disneyland. Walt Disney had dyslexia. He was labeled 'slow' as a child and was fired from the Kansas City newspaper for not being creative.

Tommy Hilfiger is a renowned fashion designer.The second of nine children; he describes himself as a scrawny, dyslexic kid who became the class clown to mask his embarrassment over less-than-average grades. Hilfiger never went to fashion design school.


"I performed poorly at school, when I attended, that is, and was perceived as stupid because of my dyslexia. I still have trouble reading. I have to concentrate very hard at going left to right, left to right; otherwise my eye just wanders to the bottom of the page." -Tommy Hilfiger

Nelson Rockefeller was the forty-first Vice President of the United States As a boy of nine; he did not know the letters of the alphabet. He was thought of as dull and backward. In addition to his reading problem young Nelson's father believed that left-handedness could be cured with proper training and discipline. In later years he would wonder what psychological problems might have been caused by his father's aversion to using the left hand.

"I was one of the 'puzzle children' myself -- a dyslexic . . . And I still have a hard time reading today. Accept the fact that you have a problem. Refuse to feel sorry for yourself. You have a challenge; never quit!" - Nelson Rockefeller

George Washington was the first President of the United States of America. He had very little formal schooling. When he was 14 years of age his grammar and spelling were described as "atrocious". However he did have a flair for mathematics. He was made President of a new country called, United States of America.

Dr. Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States. Despite suffering from dyslexia and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Wilson taught himself shorthand to compensate for his difficulties. In 1886, he received his Ph.D. in political science from Johns Hopkins University. Wilson remains the only American president to have earned a doctoral degree.

Cher is an American pop singer and actress. She won an Academy Award, a Grammy Award, an Emmy Award, three Golden Globe Awards and a People's Choice Award for her work in films, music and television. Due to dyslexia Cher decided to quit school and even now faces challenge of remembering phone numbers and balancing cheque book.

"I never read in school. I got really bad grades--D's and F's and C's in some classes, and A's and B's in other classes. In the second week of the 11th grade, I just quit. When I was in school, it was really difficult. Almost everything I learned, I had to learn by listening. My report cards always said that I was not living up to my potential."- Cher

John Winston Lennon was best known as a singer, songwriter and guitarist for The Beatles. His songs such as "Imagine" and "Strawberry Fields Forever" are frequently ranked among the best songs of the 20th century. Lennon was expelled from his primary school for misbehaviour. Unknown to his teachers John suffered from dyslexia and without his glasses he was considered legally blind.

Joss Stone is an English soul and R & B singer-songwriter and actress. Stone emerged to fame with her multi-platinum debut album, The Soul Sessions. Her second album, the equally multi platinum Mind, Body & Soul, topped the UK Albums Chart for one week and spawned the top ten list.

"I forget a lot of stuff. I'm not stupid, but I am dyslexic. I don't remember the words to my own songs!"- Joss Stone

Noel David Gallagher is an English musician and songwriter. Some of their famous songs are "Some Might Say" and (what's the Story) Morning Glory. Many have praised Gallagher's songwriting, with George Martin claiming Noel to be 'the finest songwriter of his generation'. He is dyslexic.

"What I was bad at was spelling. Still am. Anything over six letters and that's me gone." - Noel Gallagher