I recently stumbled across an interview with Martin Amis where he went off on Joyce for having plenty of aspiration and not enough anxiety, the mixture of which he claimed made up writing. He then went on to say that he thought you could divide what a writer had to offer into "genius" and "talent" - genius being "the God-given altitude of perception and expressiveness" and talent being "knowing what goes where, how to make, how to modulate, how to draw the reader in" - and that Joyce was all genius and no talent.
He admitted himself that it was a bit "woolly" as a framework and I dunno about his take on Joyce in particular, but I've definitely come across people who are absolutely brilliant yet incapable of the basics of whatever it is they're doing. An example being someone who makes incredible music, but who can't structure and arrange it to save their life so you're left with these incredible ideas which never really hang together.
How much weight do you think the idea holds, if any, and do any examples spring to mind?
He admitted himself that it was a bit "woolly" as a framework and I dunno about his take on Joyce in particular, but I've definitely come across people who are absolutely brilliant yet incapable of the basics of whatever it is they're doing. An example being someone who makes incredible music, but who can't structure and arrange it to save their life so you're left with these incredible ideas which never really hang together.
How much weight do you think the idea holds, if any, and do any examples spring to mind?