Yostivanich

The book essen­tially tells us to for­get the notion that “genius”, “tal­ent” or any other innate qual­i­ties cre­ate the greats we call geniuses. Instead, as the Amer­i­can inven­tor Thomas Edi­son said, genius is 99 per cent per­spi­ra­tion — or, to be truer to the data, per­haps 1 per cent inspi­ra­tion, 29 per cent good instruc­tion and encour­age­ment, and 70 per cent per­spi­ra­tion. Exam­ine closely even the most extreme exam­ples — Mozart, New­ton, Ein­stein, Stravin­sky — and you find more hard-won mas­tery than gift. Geniuses are made, not born.

via How to be a genius — life — 15 Sep­tem­ber 2006 — New Sci­en­tist.