David Foster Wallace Quotes

I was born with a natural gift. My mother recognized the talent.

There's some guys - Michael Jordan and Mariano Rivera and Tiger Woods - that were blessed with the ability just to be... great.

Do you know how some people can do anything?” “What do you mean?” “I mean, you tell them to write a tune, they give you a symphony right there. You tell them to write a book, they write you a novel in a day. You tell them to move a spoon without touching it, they move it. If they want something, they make it happen. Miracles, almost.

I have been aware, from the age of 6, that I had talent.

Genius, when young, is divine.

When you're talented, you're talented.

Some people are better at maths than others: no one thinks you can be 'taught' to be a mathematical genius. And no one thinks of teaching, in that context, as a kind of forcing of the will. But there seems to be an idea of writing as an intuitive pastime which is being dishonestly subjected to counterintuitive methods.

I don't think artists are made, I think they're born.

You're gifted to do something.

Talent is a faculty that is highly developed, but genius commands all the faculties.

The term 'renaissance man' is always bandied about. I don't think that applies to me. You think about Leonardo da Vinci, and he was a painter and a physicist and an architect, and that is a true renaissance man.

Genius is childhood recalled at will.

Mozart was born Mozart. Charlie Parker was born Charlie Parker.

I won some genetic lottery. I always happened to be strangely good at mathematics in my head. I just popped out weird.

If you put the talent of all my brothers together, they wouldn't add up to the talent that was in my father.

Some people are born with a brain that has this weird, magical mathematical thing that makes them an amazing jazz musician.

Genius is immediate, but talent takes time.

To my mind, talent doesn't really exist.

Poesy must not be drawn by the ears: it must be gently led, or rather, it must lead, which was partly the cause that made the ancient learned affirm it was a divine, and no human skill, since all other knowledges lie ready for any that have strength of wit; a poet no industry can make, if his own genius be not carried into it.

Talent is a flame. Genius is a fire.

The great thing with Usain Bolt is he fell into great coaching, so his talent was exceptional from Day 1. You can coach technique and structure, but not talent.

You can't make an artist like Lady Gaga. You can help support, you can help develop the vision - I think you can add to the vision - but you just can't make an artist like that. That's like saying Lebron James' high school coach made Lebron James.

You need raw talent to be successful.

There are some guys that can roll out of bed and they can throw 96 from the very first outing. I've just never been one of those guys.

I never thought of myself as special or particularly good at anything. But once I started ballet, suddenly I had a new identity: prodigy.