Genius

[poliphilo]

If Yves St Laurent was a genius- which is what they're calling him in the obituaries- what word do we use to describe Leonardo da Vinci?

Mind you, no-one called Leonardo a genius in his lifetime. Our modern use of the word seems to date from the 19th century- and from the work of Sir Francis Galton- another genius.

I suppose our use of the word has always been a bit loose. There are "universal" geniuses like Goethe- who excelled in all sorts of different disciplines and (according to a website I've just consulted) may have had the highest IQ of all time- and specialised geniuses like Einstein- who was great in a single field. 

Exactly how brilliant do you have to be? I have no difficulty describing Mozart as a genius, but step down a few rungs and what about Tchaikovsky? What about Paul McCartney? 

I reckon there ought to be a cut-off point. Below a certain level you're not a genius, just very talented. 

Also there has to be achievement. Being extremely intelligent but doing nothing about it isn't good enough. And the achievement has to be important. Now that's another slippery word- but I reckon a significant breakthrough in philosophy, science or the arts puts you in the running, but being very good at chess doesn't. 

I would hesitate to describe any sportsman or woman as a genius. Same goes (coming full circle) for people who design frocks. 

Genius and saint are the highest titles we can give a human being. I think we should be as careful with the one as the Vatican is (or used to be before JPII got going) with the other. There are gifted people- and then there are people whose gift is so extraordinary as to seem almost supernatural: these are the geniuses- and there are very, very few of them.

Comments

[glitzfrau.livejournal.com]

*puts on spod hat*

Genius, as I understand it, is a concept that dates back to the late eighteenth century, Sturm und Drang and the beginnings of Romanticism. It's a secular notion that came in to replace the notion of sainthood once Christianity faded as a universal intellectual paradigm. Thus, genius is the idea that some people are metaphysically touched with abilities and visions that cannot be attained by mere human endeavour, but are the result of direct communication with a (secularised) divine other.

For me, the notion has run its course: I don't believe in a metaphysical other, and more, although people like to think that (eg) Goethe was a universal genius, who reads Goethe now? who finds his insights relevant? so isn't it noteworthy how the universal world-spirit does actually speak to its devotees in an idiom quite strongly flavoured with their particular time, place and mores? What we consider paradigm-breaking is often in fact just as conventional as what we consider run of the mill, I say.

I could say a LOT more about Johann Wolfgang von G., but I'll spare you...

[glitzfrau.livejournal.com]

P.S.: I have an IQ of about 90. According to most online tests I do.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I've taken IQ tests- but can never remember my score. I'm hopeless with numbers.

[glitzfrau.livejournal.com]

Oooh, this is an excellent article about genius (not IQ). Marjorie Garber is a glorious scholar.

Through the Renaissance and well into the eighteenth century the most familiar meaning of "genius" in English was something like "temperament" or "disposition": people were described as having a "daring genius" or an "indolent genius."

Joseph Addison's essay "On Genius," published in The Spectator in 1711, laid out the terrain of genius as we use the term today, to denote exceptional talent or someone who possesses it. According to Addison, there were two kinds of genius—natural and learned (the greatest of geniuses were the natural ones, whose inborn gifts freed them from dependence on models or imitation). Homer, Pindar, and Shakespeare were his examples of the first category, Aristotle, Virgil, Milton, and Francis Bacon of the second. In general terms this dichotomy—brilliant versus industrious—still underlies our notions of genius today, but despite Thomas Edison's oft quoted adage "Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration," it's the inspiration that we dote on.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes, that is good article. Thanks for the link.

And who'd have thought that the term originated with Addison?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Something I read suggested that Kant used the term. I immediately backed away because Kant and I don't mix.

Aren't you being a little hard on Goethe? Ailz had to study him as part of an OU course and thought he was pretty cool. I've read a poem or two. I like Erl Koenig so much I translated it.

Maybe Goethe wasn't as great as they thought at the time, but Shakespeare, Mozart, Beethoven? There are plenty of old-time genii who still push our buttons.

[glitzfrau.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love Goethe! And Kant too, for that matter. But they're my job. I think it would be giant academic snobbery to insist that they're still motors of our general culture (though the Enlightenment is coming back into fashion with a bang.) Plenty of old-time genii do push our buttons (though Shakespeare wasn't called a genius until a hundred and fifty years after his death) - but plenty don't. Milton? Spenser? Pope? Napoleon, and the military genii of the nineteenth century? They'll come back, but at present they're a duty-roll of honour, not really names emblazoned in fire on our individual hearts thanks to an ecstatic encounter with their work. We might love them, but we're literati - we do this stuff for a living, and surely contact with a divine inspiration would have a bit more universal an appeal than the rarefied fanbase than (e.g.) Lawrence now enjoys.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I suppose one could argue (not that I'm sure I want to) that people like Goethe are fixed stars and if they've fallen out of favour it's because we- their descendants- are unworthy of them.

[bodhibird.livejournal.com]

Why would you hesitate to call a woman a genius? I know you well enough from your writing to be certain that it's not because you think women are inherently inferior.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Ach- sorry about that. For "woman" read "sportswoman".

[bodhibird.livejournal.com]

Ah! okay! *g* I rather expected you to say something like, "Geniuses require someone to wait on them and take care of their mundane needs while they excel, and very few if any men are willing to do that."

... Oh, wait a minute, that's *my* theory.

[craftyailz.livejournal.com]

If anything Polifilo's problem is that as far as he's concerned for a woman not to be a genius is a very rare thing. He taught me about feminism and why I should support it.

[bodhibird.livejournal.com]

I have no trouble believing this. I see now that he meant "sportsman or -woman" in his post.

[solar-diablo.livejournal.com]

It's another overuse of language, much the same way the "love" has been used to define so much, so often, it's become a rather meaningless word. Obits are about glossing over a person's life and offering enthusiastic praise for the deceased, so it's little wonder the dead are described in ways that make them hard to recognize to those who knew them in real life. Where was the "wonderful father, husband, humanitarian, and genius" when the body still had a pulse?

It's a media-driven age where linguisitically we've become accustomed to using sledgehammers in favor of scalpels. The language gets mashed as expected.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

The media speak in cliches- stale ideas expressed in stale language. One of the tasks of the writer (any writer) is- in Eliot's phrase- "to purify the dialect of the tribe.

[craftyailz.livejournal.com]

Ah, but is he considered a genius for his frocks or his ability to make people pay a fortune for them?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Neither activity is worthy of such an accolade IMHO

[craftyailz.livejournal.com]

You could do with some new frocks though, dear.

[amritarosa.livejournal.com]

I feel that way about the term "hero" which has been way overused in recent years.

I doubt that all the folks it has been applied to were really regarded as the equivalent of the offspring of a god and a human. In fact, it's been applied mostly to the opposite- a person from humble, common origins doing something laudable.WHich in itself is fine- just don't call them heroes, call them something else!

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I couldn't agree more.

Over here it's become customary to refer to anyone who has ever served in the armed forces as a "hero". It annoys me terribly.

[kaysho.livejournal.com]

I might add one more qualification: anyone who thinks he is a genius, isn't. He's merely an ego. :)