The Geography of Genius
A Search for the World's Most Creative Places from Ancient Athens to Silicon Valley
Eric Weiner
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10 quotes
Introduction
- This was the 1960s and ’70s, a time when creativity and genius were not subjects the academy took seriously, which seems odd, given that universities are supposedly in the business of producing geniuses, but less odd when you consider that, as the author Robert Grudin so astutely observed, “there are two types of subjects that a culture studies little: those which it despises and those which it holds dearest.”Jun 3 2024 5:41AM
- We hold dear the notion of the solitary creator, courageously overcoming the odds, vanquishing the confederacy of dunces allied against her. Yet we secretly (and sometimes not so secretly) despise the know-it-all, especially one with dangerous new ideas.Jun 3 2024 5:48AM
Chapter 1
- Why did this well-lit but otherwise unremarkable land give rise to a people unlike any other the world had seen, a people, as the great classicist Humphrey Kitto put it, “not very numerous, not very powerful, not very organized, who had a totally new conception of what human life was for, and showed for the first time what the human mind was for”?Jun 3 2024 5:52AM
- Admission to the club of genius depends entirely on the whims, the fashion, of the day. “Creativity cannot be separated from its recognition,” says psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the main advocate of this theory. Put more bluntly, someone is only a genius if we say so.Jun 3 2024 10:37AM
- A crucial question is not whether someone is competitive but, rather, for what (or whom) they are competing. In ancient Athens, the answer was clear: the city. The ancient Athenians enjoyed a deeply intimate relationship with their city, the likes of which we can scarcely imagine. The closest term we have to describe this sentiment is civic duty, but that carries the weight of obligation and doesn’t sound like any fun. What the Athenians practiced was more like civic joy. That we find that juxtaposition of words odd speaks volumes about the chasm that separates us and the ancients.Jun 4 2024 1:28PM
- One of the biggest misperceptions about places of genius, I’m discovering, is that they are akin to paradise. They are not. Paradise is antithetical to genius. Paradise makes no demands, and creative genius takes root through meeting demands in new and imaginative ways. “The Athenians matured because they were challenged on all fronts,” said Nietzsche, in a variation of his famous “what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger” line. Creativity is a response to our environment. Greek painting was a response to the complex light (the Greek painter Apollodoros was the first to develop a technique for creating the illusion of depth), Greek architecture a response to the complex landscape, Greek philosophy a response to the complex, uncertain times.Jun 6 2024 2:26PM
- In ancient Athens, notes the great urbanist Lewis Mumford, “poverty was not an embarrassment: if anything, riches were suspect.”Jun 6 2024 2:26PM
- Freedom, not democracy, is what’s needed, he had told me. They’re not the same thing. “You can have enlightened autocrats. China never had democracy but they had enlightened autocrats.” Some psychologists go even further, suggesting that oligarchies may actually foster more creativity than democracies since, with less public oversight, they’re more willing to engage in risky or “unnecessary” projects.Jun 6 2024 2:30PM
- Eccentric, barefoot, and endearingly stubborn, Socrates occupied that precarious position that all geniuses do—perched between insider and outsider. Far enough outside the mainstream to see the world through fresh eyes, yet close enough so that those fresh insights resonated with others.Jun 6 2024 2:38PM
- What distinguishes geniuses is not a seamless fit with their times but, rather, what psychologist Keith Sawyer calls “the capacity to be able to exploit an apparent misfit.” This was certainly the case with Socrates; he pushed the boundaries of acceptable discourse—and got away with it, until he didn’t. His ideas resonated even as they riled. That is the way it is with geniuses. They fit in their times the way a pearl fits in an oyster shell. Uncomfortably yet essentially. A useful irritant.Jun 6 2024 2:59PM