A rant on the topic of the insufferable genius

[asakiyume]

I posted a version of this as a comment on a Goodreads review, but it's more appropriate for an LJ post.

I really hate the notion that talent and genius excuse a person from appalling behavior. The trade-off that people seem to accept and be fascinated by goes like this: "On the one hand, the character is selfish, self-centered, heartless, demanding, you name it. On the other: they're a genius! Such art! [or: such science! or: such insights!]"

Stuff worth doing--art, science, whatever--takes time and concentration, and any time a person is putting into that is time not spent doing other stuff, so sure: a person dedicated to [fill in] is going to be less available for whatever the folks surrounding them want them to be available for, and this can seem selfish, and people can argue back and forth about where to draw the line. But even a person who's giving themselves pretty much 100 percent to whatever-it-is can still be kindly and considerate when they're interacting with people..... or they can be assholes.

But this goes for people who *aren't* 100 percent dedicated to [fill in]--just ordinary people living ordinary lives, trying to balance out all the demands they face. It's the same struggle, just less extreme. But we take the notion of dedication to [whatever], add in the fairy dust of "genius," and then, voilà, people [or at least, characters] are given a kind of carte blanche.

When you ramp it up to "genius," then you get to add in the notion that their contributions to overall society (their discovery of a cure for a horrible ailment, or their creation of a heartbreaking work of staggering beauty, etc.) are worth--or not worth! the novel or biography will be happy to delve into this--their flaws in other aspects of life.

Maybe it's that kindness, patience--all the things that the Sherlock Holmeses of the world are excused from engaging in--are undervalued. You can be a genius in mathematics or painting or philosophy or physics, but we don't talk much about geniuses in kindness. Those people get to be portrayed as lovable losers--"He spends all his time chatting affably with neighbors but can't finish the Big Project at work."

... The problem with expanding this rant is that I start seeing nuances and exceptions and arguments with my own position.

... Short-form summary: Life is full of conflicting demands, and there's interest in how people manage it, or fail to manage it. But the valorization of the selfish genius--I'm sick of it.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Absolutely--both people whom we're close to and distant figures whom we only just admire (but don't know).

[haikujaguar.livejournal.com]

I feel that way about Ayn Rand. My God, the trainwreck of her personal life. It was very nearly inevitable given what she lived through, but it was so monumental in execution that I read her biographies with a kind of awe that she could be so obviously messed up, and through that, so destructive.

And yet her books are just magnificent.

The only adjective I can come up with is 'tortured.' Does it excuse her behavior? Of course not. All you can do is look at the work and realize that a human made it.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Yeah; in my comment up above to cmcmck, I found myself turning around what I was saying in the entry, because on the one hand, giving geniuses a free pass seems wrong, but on the other hand, delighting in finding flaws in people and castigating them for those flaws is wrong too. *All* people are human beings: they're going to have flaws and make mistakes.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Plus, it's absolutely true that a person can be a delightful person and yet their art may not appeal to you, or you can adore their art, and yet not be very fond of them as a person.

(Of course the other two squares in that four-square positional diagram are also possible, but people aren't as surprised by those)

[yamamanama.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to think of artists I think are wonderful people and yet I don't like their art, but none come to mind.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Try it in this direction: have you ever liked some art (or literature), and then discovered something about the *person* that made you unhappy?

I don't actively dislike any art produced by people I like, but some do work in genres or styles that I'm not very interested in.

[yamamanama.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's happened. Dan Simmons.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I can think of lots and lots. In some cases, they write in genres which don't appeal to me overall. For instance, I very rarely enjoy horror, but many horror writers are wonderful people.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I think the more writers you know, the more likely this is to come to be the case.