In Ray Davies’s Americana autobiography, he relays the story of a woman who wanted to join him on the road to see how he ‘does it’ – ‘it’ mainly relating to his writing of songs. In an attempt to discourage, he had to explain how boring that would be for her in reality.
It’s likely that what we call genius is the result of those who turned up so frequently and obsessively in a specific area – and who were willing to fail so many times that outlier results eventually emerged.
If that’s a fair characterisation, genius is likely pretty boring to observe most of the time. Lots of patience combined with lots of failure.
The reason, I think, that we like to think of genius as something more than this – to frame it as something given, romantic, and otherworldly – is because that would let us off the hook. If it’s something magical, maybe it will simply arrive for us one day without us having to venture into the unknown and endure any of the slogging.
The Thoughts of Others
“I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” – Michelangelo
