In my A Level English exam I concentrated as hard as I could.
I sweated every minute for (I think) 3 hours.
I didn’t waste a second.
Meanwhile my mate, Nick, sitting behind me did nothing, except flick ink at the back of my head.
Plus scrunched-up balls of paper, rubbers, pencils, paperclips.
He kept whispering jokes then finally, ten minutes before the end of the exam, he picked up his pen and started writing.
We both got the same mark, a ‘D’ I think.
I sweated blood to get that, Nick didn’t even try.
In fact all the time I knew him, Nick didn’t try.
He was absolutely brilliant, so he behaved as if schoolwork was beneath him.
He was light years ahead of the rest of us, intellectually and culturally.
Where I had to force myself to try to read a book, Nick would effortlessly inhale entire libraries.
Sartre, Proust, Gide, Kafka, Gogol, Herman Hesse, Elias Canetti.
I would have to re-read every sentence three or four times to try to make sense of it.
Nick would discuss advanced, esoteric literature flippantly.
The teachers didn’t know what to make of him.
He knew everything about everything.
My taste in music was Motown.
Nick looked down his nose at that and educated me in Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, Howling Wolf, Muddy Waters, Sun House, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Jelly Roll Morton, Meade Lux Lewis, Bessie Smith.
Eventually Nick moved on to music I couldn’t even understand – free form jazz: Paul Bley, Ornette Colman, Albert Ayler.
Stuff that didn’t even sound like music, just squawks and honks.
Nick knew he was brilliant, so he never tried.
It was all just too easy.
I knew I was thick, so I had to try harder.
I’d gone back to school after a year working in a factory.
At this new school everyone could read French and Latin.
At my previous school we could barely read English.
After A Levels Nick and I drifted apart.
Last year I heard he died.
Apparently he’d ended up as a porter on the railways.
That seemed like a terrible waste, but I could see it coming.
The problem was it was always too easy for Nick.
Nothing was a struggle, so it must not be worthwhile.
For me, everything worthwhile was a struggle.
In America that’s known as ‘The Protestant Ethic’.
Anything good is a struggle.
Or, as Arnold Schwarzenegger said: “No pain, no gain”.
The belief that if a thing comes too easily, it wasn’t worth having.
That’s where I was lucky.
Believing I was thick gave me an added source of energy that smarter people don’t have.
And that’s something that stays with you for life.
Believing you’re not as good is an unfair advantage.
Because you have to work harder.
And, in the long run, hard work beats talent.
This is so true Dave. You see it quite often in sport where the genius underachieves and the consummate professional overachieves. The holy grail is when you have a natural talent and the ultimate work ethic
If advertising doesn’t work out you’d be a shoe-in for Avis.
Hard work beats talent. This is so true. It’s always a pleasure and wonderful learning experience reading your posts, sir.
I had a mate at School who was exactly the same.
I think he ended up becoming an airline pilot.
Being not as good is definitely an unfair advantage
especially when it came to Chemistry and Physics
but it was an unfair disadvantage when sitting exams.
I don’t believe exams show signs of intelligence anyway.
It just proves some people can regurgitate information
same as an owl regurgitates food for its fledgelings
then forgets about it afterwards. Some people have
fire in their belly and others don’t. I couldn’t get over the
number of kids at my school when asked the question
“What are you going to do at University?” They replied
‘Dunno’. I knew what I wanted to do and went and did it.
It sounds arrogant, I know, but it’s the God honest truth.
More importantly.
You’ve just reminded me I have some work to do.
Thanks!
So … I’d like to propose an alternate conclusion, if I may. The fact that this guy was super talented and knew it may have contributed to the problem, but what if that wasn’t the biggest issue? What if the real problem was that he was willing to accept mediocrity, or at the very least, he was willing to accept a lifestyle that did not make full use of his talent? Because there are other people like Einstein and the like who ARE totally brilliant but ended up making HUGE contributions to the fields they loved because they weren’t willing to accept mediocrity. Yes, Einstein had an odd path to his success, but that was also a result of his brilliance.
Or, what if someone like NIck was on the same journey towards connecting unrelated data (from the railways, as it were) and just never got the chance?
Hi Dave, i think we met in some awards jury.
I’m a french creative director and now also entrepreneur running my own agency : ALTMANN+PACREAU
I’m a big fan of your weekly column. Simple. Clever. Inspiring.
I was just wondering if you should/could add to your blog an “alert” link. So that everyone will be aware of a new post, as soon as you publish it.
Maybe it’s already the case but i haven’t find it.
Sorry for my poor english. A friend and colleague. Olivier
Good idea Olivier, I’ll see if I can get it done,
Meanwhile (just so you know) I post a blog here every Monday, and a blog on Campaign every Thursday:
http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/trick-treat/1415504
Also, every time I post a new blog I put the link on Twitter: @davetrott