WorkLife: The myth of genius with Helen Lewis

Rethinking Genius: Acts, Contexts, and Cultural Costs

In a wide-ranging conversation, psychologist Adam Grant and journalist Helen Lewis untangle the stories we tell about genius, arguing that the myth of solitary prodigies obscures the practical realities behind great work. Lewis’s new book, The Genius Myth, reframes brilliance as a sequence of acts rather than an immutable trait. She traces how cultural shifts, market forces, and media amplification have helped transform creators into demi-gods, while ignoring the networks, craft, and luck that actually produce remarkable results.

Why Acts of Genius Matter More Than Labels

Lewis proposes language matters: praising acts of genius emphasizes moments of insight and hard-won craft, while labeling people as geniuses freezes them into narratives that can stunt growth. This distinction reframes stories about innovation and artistry, making room for the unseen logistics, manufacturing breakthroughs, and everyday practices that enable breakthroughs. From Edison’s assembly lines to Musk’s supply-chain innovations, many celebrated breakthroughs are logistical or operational achievements rather than isolated conceptual leaps.

How Social Systems and Capitalism Shape Genius Narratives

The conversation links the modern fixation on individual genius to the rise of mass media, industrial production, and personal branding. Photographs, newspapers, and celebrity culture of the 19th and 20th centuries amplified certain figures while creating archetypes that persist today. Lewis highlights how markets reward myth-making: branded geniuses sell ideas, products, and legacies even when their mean performance or ethical behaviors are mixed.

Support Structures, Gender, and the Hidden Labor Behind Great Work

Lewis digs into the domestic and collaborative scaffolding that surrounds many lauded creators: spouses, housekeepers, lab teams, and copyists who manage the material life of a creative person. She examines historical examples such as the wives of writers and artists whose unpaid labor made iconic work possible, and she connects that to modern imbalances where women still shoulder disproportionate domestic burdens that limit full-time creative immersion.

The Psychology of Credit, Eccentricity, and Ambivalent Relationships

Success often buys idiosyncrasy credit, Lewis explains, allowing accomplished figures to deviate from social norms without the same consequences others would face. That licensing scheme affects teams and loved ones, producing ambivalent relationships where intermittent rewards or attention make people tolerate mistreatment. The psychology of intermittency—like pigeons responding to unpredictable rewards—helps explain why followers stay in toxic creative cultures.

Practical Distinctions: Peaks, Domains, and Longevity

Grant and Lewis explore how creative peaks differ by discipline: mathematically structured fields tend to reward younger innovators, while literature and the arts allow later flourishing. They emphasize deliberate practice, cross-disciplinary sampling, and maintaining a "green growing edge"—a commitment to discomfort and experimentation that keeps talent evolving through career stages.

Summing Up The New Frame on Genius

Recasting genius as a set of repeatable acts rather than a mystical identity shifts the focus to teachable habits, supportive material conditions, and ethical accountability. It surfaces the role of luck and survivor bias, challenges glamorized eccentricity, and calls for more honest stories about who does the work. The conversation offers concrete reminders: value collaboration, examine the systems that reward myth-making, protect dignity in creative workplaces, and keep pushing the limits of what you can learn and do.

This reframing encourages humility without erasing excellence: celebrate extraordinary acts while recognizing the scaffolding, risks, and chance moments that make them possible.