Your elusive creative genius | Elizabeth Gilbert
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN people link it in threads about creativity, late bloomers and creative burnout as a humble, relatable take on where inspiration comes from.
What it is
Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love, reflects on the pressure placed on artists to be geniuses. She proposes the older idea that creative people have a genius that visits them rather than being one.
Recommended by 2 HN commenters across 1 different months, 2011 to 2021.
What Hacker News said
Recommends wglb · 2012-07 · on “Late bloomer, not a loser. (I hope) ”
This is really quite germane: [this video] . While she talks about writing, I think it applies to the kind of thing you are talking about here.
Recommends bgilroy26 · 2012-07 · on “The "Just look at it" hack for problem solving”
This TED talk by the author of Eat, Pray, Love addresses the very question at hand: "Who/What is responsible for creativity?". It approaches the question from a very subjective point of view. I haven't read her book, but she is humble and relatable in the video. [this video]
Cites walexander · 2011-07 · on “Hemingway, Hounded by the Feds”
What are with some of these comments? This is not a story about a man who lost his 401k value. This is about seeing the end of the road and realizing the greatest things you've done you can never do again. Here's a man who is considered by some the greatest american writer (words of my freshman year english prof), who felt like he would "never achieve what he was capable of"(paraphrase). See: [LINK] [this video]
Cites hyperpallium2 · 2021-08 · on “We don't 'do' learning. It does us”
The idea of a "muse", and "genius" is something that visits you (not something you are). IIRC, this TED talk is about it [this video]