Talent

Cool and I hope things will continue to work out well for you.

It depends. Different writers are good at different things. Lee Child and DFW are both talented, but in different ways.

But no matter how poetically you can describe a sunset, a talent shared by all successful authors is the the talent to work hard for years and finish things. Maybe that's more tied to passion. Talent is such a vague idea, basically impossible to actually describe. It means something different to basically everyone.

Hard work matters more than talent

1% inspiration, 99% perspiration.

After all, talent means nothing if you don't do anything with it, and that means work.

To be completely honest, I'm not really sure I believe in this idea of talent. IMHO, anyone without some kind of mental impairment who's determined enough is capable of being a great writer.

There are times where I feel like people cripple themselves by thinking of talent as this nebulous, mystic thing that they either have or don't, instead of a hell of a lot of smaller skills/techniques that can be observed, broken down and absorbed.

Again, IMHO, talented people are just those who got a head start by figuring out a lot of that stuff growing up... like kids who had readers for parents or those who loved escaping into books (and the techniques they saw happened to stick), etc.

I think that writing takes talent, I've seen writers who have been writing for more than forty years, and haven't been very successful in publishing. It's more than just hard work.

I think I might be able to answer some of your questions or at least point you in the right direction, Celticroots, but I would need more information. Different writers need different skills, so this question has no general answer. Would you mind answering a couple of questions?

What do you write? Fiction, poetry or non-fiction? If you write genre fiction, what genres?
How long have you been writing? Do you have any formal training in creative writing, or literary criticism?
Do you plan on doing this for a living? If so, what are your career goals?
Do you have any interest in being literary, (e.g. writing original, revolutionary novels, writing stories with beautiful prose in them, writing social commentary etc.)? If so please describe what you're trying to write in detail. (There are many kind of literature.)

jpoelma13 said:

I think that writing takes talent, I've seen writers who have been writing for more than forty years, and haven't been very successful in publishing. It's more than just hard work.

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I feel (still my opinion here) that those guys are either extremely unlucky or writing something that not enough people want to read/popular enough to convince a publisher to stake their money its success. I don't think talent by itself gets you published.

EDIT:

But to go back to the original question (and sorry for the derail ), it would be a bit hard to list what talent entails... I'd say that you'd have to have a lot of things going for you, but those things vary with what kind of book you're writing/your genre, etc. It's a bunch of things that add up to give the impression that what you've produced is hard to replicate, in addition to some kind of effective/strong emotional impact.

So if you're a talented thriller writer you might be excellent at building suspense and writing snappy dialogue. You'd still be talented even if your prose isn't all that great, simply because you've mastered the bits you need to impress people in a particular area. A lot of writers bring people back not because they're amazing all round but because they excel at something specific.

TL;DR: The way I see it, you just have to be noticeably good at some (significant) aspect of whatever you're writing.

johnsolomon said:

I feel (still my opinion here) that those guys are either extremely unlucky or writing something that not enough people want to read.

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Or, and I have seen this -- refuse to take criticism

johnsolomon said:

I feel (still my opinion here) that those guys are either extremely unlucky or writing something that not enough people want to read. I don't think talent by itself can't get you published.

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If you fail to accomplish your goals on regular basis, there's something very wrong. Also, there are ways persuade people to like a book. What they are depend on the kind of fiction.

jpoelma13 said:

I think that writing takes talent, I've seen writers who have been writing for more than forty years, and haven't been very successful in publishing. It's more than just hard work.

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As other people have said, there is a degree of luck involved. Conversely, you have incredibly lucky people like EL James becoming outrageously successful very quickly. I don't want to disrespect a fellow writer, but its probably fair enough to explain her success through being in the right place and the right time.

jpoelma13 said:

If you fail to accomplish your goals on regular basis, there's something very wrong. Also, there are ways persuade people to like a book. What they are depend on the kind of fiction.

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EDIT: Sorry, misread your message.

I agree that it's more than hard work, but in this case I'm assuming said hard work is directed toward improving yourself. What I'm trying to say is that I don't believe in talent as this mysterious thing* you do or don't have, I believe in developing yourself and picking up skills through hard work.

"Talent" really = consciously/unconsciously accrued knowledge

*People seem to treat it as this innate quality that can be nurtured but can't be acquired if you don't already have it.

RightHoJeeves said:

As other people have said, there is a degree of luck involved. Conversely, you have incredibly lucky people like EL James becoming outrageously successful very quickly. I don't want to disrespect a fellow writer, but its probably fair enough to explain her success through being in the right place and the right time.

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Indeed some people do get lucky. Consider Bram Stoker. He wrote Dracula and never wrote a novel of the same quality again. But there are also many writers who get "lucky" far too often, (e.g. William Shakespeare) and that's the product of skill, and perhaps innate talent.

John, I don't believe talent is a mysterious thing you have or don't have either. There might be some innate qualities that are required to become an excellent writer which cannot be duplicated, but most people can learn to write well, even if they aren't some kind of super-writer.

johnsolomon said:

EDIT: Sorry, misread your message.

I agree that it's more than hard work, but in this case I'm assuming said hard work is directed toward improving yourself. What I'm trying to say is that I don't believe in talent as this mysterious thing* you do or don't have, I believe in developing yourself and picking up skills through hard work.

"Talent" really = consciously/unconsciously accrued knowledge

*People seem to treat it as this innate quality that can be nurtured but can't be acquired if you don't already have it.

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I agree with you. There are a hundred reasons why someone might never have success in writing, and I think its simplistic to say they lack some innate gift (particularly when you consider the fact that the human brain is far older than the craft of writing. How can the brain have (or not have) an innate talent in something that came after it?)

Talent is just another word for privilege.

I acknowledge that this is a skimpy explanation, but to me it breaks down like this:

Talent is something you're born with. If you don't have it at birth, you never will. It may not appear right away (if ever), but it's in there somewhere. It might or might not be nurtured. It's what separates the artist from the craftsman.

Abilities are what can be developed. Skills are the things you improve on in order to develop your abilities.

If you want to learn to play the guitar, you practice the skills. Practice enough and you should eventually develop the ability to play music. But if you weren't born with talent, you will never be a true musician (an artist).

Fortunately, nobody is born with or without talent, so we can all be artists if we work hard enough.

The nuances of language use seem to come more naturally to some people than others. How much if this is innate, and how much is a function of early exposure/conditioning, I don't know. If you never learn to read or write, all the natural/innate aptitude for written language would be for naught, though (maybe it would be channeled into something else, but who knows, really).

Some people do seem to unconsciously assimilate the nuts and bolts of creating good, readable prose from their own exposure to spoken and written language, whereas other people have to be more mindful of mechanics and craft (aka consciously learn the rules, then consciously learn when to break them).

Likewise, some assimilate the rules of punctuation and grammar unconsciously, while others need reminders. Some just have a knack for character, or dialog, or storytelling, or perseverance (or maybe single-minded obsessiveness), or whatever.

But I don't think anyone gets by on talent alone. And I think it's always possible to improve on the things that don't come naturally as well. It's probably pretty rare for someone to master all aspects of writing with equal ease.

Many writers write for decades and put much effort into improving and they do improve but only so much. They simply can't progress beyond a certain point. All the flaws in their writing that were there from day one are still there, smoothed over and all, but still there.

Then you have those select few who labor just as hard or maybe not nearly as much. The main difference is they do improve, tremendously. And the other thing is that their writing was never really flawed to begin with. It was raw and unpolished, but yet it still shone like a diamond in the rough.

That's talent. It's a rarity. Few have it. Maybe 1 in 10,000 writers who are serious about their craft. Don't have any myself. Not even a scrap. So I speak from experience in a way: knowing what talent is by knowing what it is not !

Buffysquirrel said:

Talent is just another word for privilege.

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What does that mean? Could you explain?

Buffysquirrel said:

Fortunately, nobody is born with or without talent, so we can all be artists if we work hard enough.

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I couldn't disagree more.

The thing that makes me feel weird about "talent" is that its so hugely unscientific. Any writer is the sum of their experiences and environment, regardless of whether they've had success or not. Would Ernest Hemingway been such a good writer or so acclaimed had he not started his career at the start of Modernism? I'm no historian but from what I recall from high school the whole point of his style was that it clashed with the more verbose romantic style that preceded it. It's arguable that if he had been born 100 years earlier his work would have never seen the light of day because of his sparse style. Then again its also arguable that if he had been born 100 years earlier he would have succeeded just as well but written differently.

This is a fun topic to discuss.

I think there are different aspects of any pursuit (writing, painting, playing an instrument) that some people have a greater degree of ease with - example - I'm very good with rhythm in music, but I struggle with pitch. Some people are the other way round. And some people have a knack for both those things. So, some people will have to work harder than others to make the same progress.


(so not fair...)

celticroots said:

What traits make someone a talented writer? The answer, I guess, is individual.

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I think if we knew what talent was, and how to measure it, we could create it, too. Put it in a computer and have it pump out creative and witty books for the cost of a few pennies of electricity. No need for slush piles, advances, contracts, or even writers themselves.

I don't see that happening soon, so I think every attempt to define talent is going to fall short.

johnsolomon said:

To be completely honest, I'm not really sure I believe in this idea of talent. IMHO, anyone without some kind of mental impairment who's determined enough is capable of being a great writer.

There are times where I feel like people cripple themselves by thinking of talent as this nebulous, mystic thing that they either have or don't, instead of a hell of a lot of smaller skills/techniques that can be observed, broken down and absorbed.

Again, IMHO, talented people are just those who got a head start by figuring out a lot of that stuff growing up... like kids who had readers for parents or those who loved escaping into books (and the techniques they saw happened to stick), etc.

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If that's true, about ninety-nine out of a hundred new writers I've had experience with are doing something unbelievably wrong. How do you explain all the writers, and I think ninety-nine out of a hundred is generous, who work as hard as it's possible to work, who have been readers since childhood, who study writing, who take classes, and who write dozen and dozens of short stories, or a dozen novels, but never do write anything that even remotely professional level?

Who know, maybe picking up techniques and having them stick from what you read is talent, but if so, a lot of writers lack the ability to do so.

Anyone can learn how to write, and how to tell a story, but if you read slush piles for a couple of decades, you'll learn very, very, very few can learn to do these things at a professional level. You see the same names year after year after year, and often decade after decade, and with no improvement.

I've known quite a few of these writers, and all most all of them had parents who read, almost all of them love to read, and always have. Almost all of them have done everything possible to become good writers, but it simply is not going to happen. Ever. Whethe ryu call it talent or not, they lack teh ability to write well enough, to tell a story well enough, to do anything well enough, to be good writers, let alone greats ones, and there simply isn't anything they've done that they shouldn't do, and anything they haven't done that they should have.

Not everyone can do everything equally well. They just can't. Writing is no different. Maybe a writer doesn't need much talent, and hard work certainly matters, but no one can possibly work harder than many of these writers who simply never write anything worth reading.

Likewise, I've seen a lot of writer who did not work hard, who did not study, who probably read a good bit, but who have done nothing else, just sit down one day and write something that's as good as anything, anywhere, be it an amazing short story that sells to a top magazine, or a novel that becomes an almost instant bestseller.

Talent exists in every field. You may not need a lot to be a writer, but you need some, and not everyone has it.

Hard work is a great thing, but all the hard work in the world can't turn someone without talent into a great writer, or a great anything in any field.

I tend to think that what talent is depends on the field you;re in. For a writer, I suspect talent is probably not much more than the ability to recognize quality writing and storytelling, and to make what goes in through your eyes and ears come out through your fingers.

It may sound a simple thing, but it isn't. It's extremely rare.

Whatever it is, talent most certainly exists, and without it, all the hard work in the world means nothing more than working hard without accomplishing anything. Every field needs talent, and it simply isn't the hardest working who excel, it's the smartest working, the most talented working. Those with talent seldom have to work hard. They may put in a lot of hours because they;re doing something they love, but you shouldn't confuse number of hours put in with how hard the work is for them.

Red Smith said, Writing is easy. You just sit down and open a vein."

Trouble is, he never had to do that. He just sat down and wrote brilliantly, almost from the start.

Talent is just being able to learn something faster than someone else, and being able to learn how to do it better than the average person. It's IQ in a particular field.

Saying talent doesn't exist is the same as saying hundreds of thousands, or millions, who have tried writing, who worked long and hard at writing while never writing well, were just lazy. If they had just worked a little harder, studying a little more often, they would have been great. That's pretty disparaging to all of those who have worked for years, for decades, who did everything they could possibly do, but who simply lacked the talent to be a really good writer.

Jamesaritchie said:

Talent exists in every field. You may not need a lot to be a writer, but you need some, and not everyone has it.

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100% this.