Talent vs. Skill
I feel as if I've done a post on this topic before, but the previous one was more about whether or not you can learn to be a writer... Hmmm.. when was that? (I found it. A post I did on my other blog in 2006 about whether writing is a talent or a skill. I guess a five year gap is enough time to revisit. ;)
Something recently drew this concept to mind again--and it was partly Stephanie commenting last weekend that she was now paying more attention to craft than she used to. And I'd already thinking about talent vs. skill.
A few weeks ago, I was walking through a bookstore with the fabulous Debbie Ohi and we stumbled on a woman doing a signing and we listened to a small chunk of her presentation. From what we could gather, her book was a cookbook, but also had personal stories about the recipes and some cartoon-type illustrations. Someone in the audience complimented the illustrations and asked her about them.
The author was a tad shy about her drawings and said she wasn't an artist or an illustrator by any sense of the imagination, but she'd shown them to the publisher and they wanted to include them. She also showed them to an artist friend at the time, to ask her opinion (should I really let them publish these?) and the artist replied something like: you don't have much skill, but you definitely have talent. That made me nod.
I think you can go a long way in many creative pursuits relying solely on talent, but at some point, when the going gets tough, or when something isn't working, or when you want to push yourself to do something different or better, or when you need to continue to produce more and more books, faster and faster, it sure helps to have developed some skill. :)
Something recently drew this concept to mind again--and it was partly Stephanie commenting last weekend that she was now paying more attention to craft than she used to. And I'd already thinking about talent vs. skill.
A few weeks ago, I was walking through a bookstore with the fabulous Debbie Ohi and we stumbled on a woman doing a signing and we listened to a small chunk of her presentation. From what we could gather, her book was a cookbook, but also had personal stories about the recipes and some cartoon-type illustrations. Someone in the audience complimented the illustrations and asked her about them.
The author was a tad shy about her drawings and said she wasn't an artist or an illustrator by any sense of the imagination, but she'd shown them to the publisher and they wanted to include them. She also showed them to an artist friend at the time, to ask her opinion (should I really let them publish these?) and the artist replied something like: you don't have much skill, but you definitely have talent. That made me nod.
I think you can go a long way in many creative pursuits relying solely on talent, but at some point, when the going gets tough, or when something isn't working, or when you want to push yourself to do something different or better, or when you need to continue to produce more and more books, faster and faster, it sure helps to have developed some skill. :)
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