Can You Teach Talent?
01/13/11 18:02 Filed in: Theory
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The short answer is, “No.”
The long answer is, “No. You can not.”
If you are not a storyteller you will not “learn” to become one. Not ever. It’s just not in the cards for you. You might get better, sure, but that's a relative comparison that won't help you too much. One of the most common comparisons I make with writing it to athletics. An athlete may gain experience. They may learn fundamentals and be “coached up”, but if the raw natural athleticism isn’t there, the player will never be great. Not ever. And there just isn’t anything anyone can ever do about it.
The young writer is a raw athlete. Their talent can be wasted or nurtured. It is honestly up to them.
I wish these things determined everything, but they don’t. They are only strong contributing factors.Their humility, value system, teachability and work ethic will determine a great deal of where they end up.
Most times the young writer may not have the talent to make a career of it. If they love it enough though they will find ways to practice it anyway. Adults of all ages play weekend sports. Those leagues are filled with the high school player that didn’t have the goods to play in college, or the college player that didn’t go pro. They play now because they still enjoy it and not in an effort to make it to the bigs.
Often though there is a middle ground. A kind of purgatory. It is the most significant and painful difference between athletics and the arts. The arts can keep the unrealistic dream alive for much longer than professional sports. It takes the most stubborn and delusional mind to think they can “break in” to the NFL at 40 years old yet an entire industry is based on the idea that you can break into Hollywood at any given moment.
90% of what you read in screenwriting books is never talked about in story meetings. That 90% is the author trying to “teach” talent. They list and classify the minutiae of the structure, scene or a character; things the talented writer understood instinctively when they first started to punch away at the keys. If you tried to “think” about all these things while writing it would be difficult to even have a clear and concise thought, let alone communicate that thought on the page.
Teaching screenwriting is not like teaching plumbing. There is not just one right way to do it. You want to give the student the tools for success and not just list concepts that must be accounted for. Each writer is different and the teacher’s job is to help that writer find their own voice. The academic approach to screenwriting tends to be about listing and classifying and this usually confuses the young writer rather than enlightens.
A writer must certainly understand the fundamentals of story. No question about it.
But we don’t learn the fundamentals so we know how a story is supposed to work. We learn them so we know what to do when the damn thing doesn't.
Much of what the writer “learns” they already knew. They knew in their gut; they knew instinctively. They just never verbalized it or put a name to it. This is why so many talented writers have “light bulbs” go off when they’re learning! They get to put a name to what they knew all along! By putting a name to it it becomes easier to recall and then it becomes a tool they can use when it's needed.
But that toolbox can get heavy. When the writer burdens themselves with more and more “tools”, most of which aren’t helpful, practical, or even relevant, that information overload slows them down. The tools become more difficult to recall, and the temptation to use the tools they do remember grows, whether these tools are appropriate or not (“I don’t have a ‘Trickster’ in my story! I need ‘a trickster!’”) Decisions becomes more difficult to reach and when they do come they’re weaker than before.
If this is what too much book-learning does to the talented writer, how do you think the less talented writer feels when they’re confronted by this academia?
The less talented writer doesn’t understand these things instinctively, so they have to think long and hard just to “get” them. They may recall the names, but not truly understand the concepts they represent or how to even apply them properly. They’re frozen in indecision and maybe even a little fear. They’re overwhelmed.
Unfortunately, too many think they’re getting better because their vocabulary is expanding!
So they take more workshops, and buy more books. What they’re not doing is becoming better writers. They’re trapped by their own built-in ceiling that they never properly identified. Frustration and unhappiness dig in. It’s a vicious circle.
Making an honest assessment of one’s own talent is one of the most difficult things an aspiring artist must do, but it absolutely must be done. It is the key to their happiness as a participant in the arts. This is a terrible, hard fact: much of your professional future has already been decided. The underlying truth of your talent level will prevail no matter how much denial you pile on and no matter how many classes and workshops you take.
There are different levels of talent, of course, and different writers will all have different journeys. Talent is not magic, but it is real. It’s the ability to visualize possibilities of a scene instantly, hear dialogue, or conceptualize a character without a ridiculous 50 part questionnaire. It’s the unverbalized sense that a scene needs more conflict or a change in pace. That a scene lasts, too long or not long enough. These are all matters of talent and different people will have different strengths and weaknesses, but you must be honest with yourself about where your strengths and weaknesses lie.
Do not feel rushed with your assessment. You have plenty of time and plenty of work to explore before even thinking about coming to a conclusion. Additionally, you should absolutely never, ever listen to what anyone else has to say about it. Not ever. Like any great truth, we know it when we feel it. Understanding something intellectually is not nearly as important as accepting something emotionally and only emotional acceptance will allow a person to let go of their dreams peacefully.
A dream leaves a gaping, painful hole when it is taken away. It must be let go instead.
As a writer and a teacher I can comfortably say that the best students are the ones you need to teach the least. Like any coach, you guide them and lead then rather than tell them what to do. You take a strong but raw talent and you refine it. You focus their energies and give them direction. You teach the fundamentals so they can play to their strengths and hide their weaknesses. Most of all, you help them make strong choices so they can find their own voice
They may make you feel like a remarkable teacher but the truth is that they’re actually doing all the work. You’re just turning them in a certain direction and saying, “Go there.”
This is the proper role of a writing teacher. The job is to flatten the learning curve as much as possible. A teacher cannot take a writer anywhere they would not otherwise go; they can only help get them there faster. It is not the teacher’s job to try and teach talent. It’s frustrating for everyone involved and I have yet to see it done successfully.
This works both ways, of course. I am a professional screenwriter but if I could do whatever I wanted I would drop my laptop in a second and be an NFL wide receiver. I wouldn’t think twice about it. Cowboys, Texans, Panthers, I wouldn’t care. Just let me suit up and catch balls.
That’s my dream. That’s what I would like to do.
Do we even need to talk about my chances?