Not for all my little words

Salon ran an article on Stephin Merritt today and, while it was interesting, it mostly just reinforced my theory on genius: that it's usually accidental. Sure, Merritt has a lot of well-thought-out theories on music, but on paper, the theories that he puts forward would add up to some of the most boring music in the world. The fact that, by his own admission, he writes quickly and doesn't edit only makes me think that his genius phrases and beautiful melodies are stumbled on, served up by some deep part of his brain that most of the rest of the world doesn't have.

I think this is a genius that's shared by people like Quentin Tarantino and Evan Dando, who just vomit out their creation of choice, and if it's good, it's only because it just happened to be that way, not because they sat down and designed it that way.

I'm not criticising this sort of genius. As a matter of fact, it's only that much more amazing to think that it simply, cosmically, magically emerges and doesn't come about from practice, study and theory. But I do think that seeing it as accidental takes the credit away from this person as a thinking, creative being, and hands the credit of creation over to a channeling of a larger, more creative, unexplainable spirit.