a thought

[kelby_lake]

'I just can't understand why people persist in mediocrity. They devote their lives to things that they will only ever be mediocre at. But then maybe they are strong for their persistance. Do you think Shakespeare was a good writer?'
'Yes, of course I do'
'But he must have been a mediocre person. They hide behind their strengths so much that they are strong only in their strengths, not in themselves. They are held up as gods only because of a talent in the arts, that's all'

[CognitiveArtist]

'I just can't understand why people persist in mediocrity. They devote their lives to things that they will only ever be mediocre at. But then maybe they are strong for their persistance. Do you think Shakespeare was a good writer?'
'Yes, of course I do'
'But he must have been a mediocre person. They hide behind their strengths so much that they are strong only in their strengths, not in themselves. They are held up as gods only because of a talent in the arts, that's all'

Allow me to and run with this dialogue a little bit. Like all good dialogues in my opinion, they are best at generating and changing conversation instead of simply focusing it.

Saying Shakespeare must have been in mediocre circumstances is saying pretty much that greatness is always overcompensation or arising from significant challenge. If you interpret greatness as being only possible from overcompensation you're taking a psychological line, that is greatness only comes when people overcome their psychological disposition or "psychological circumstance". This means the person him or herself has to be mediocre, whatever that is. This is half the tale that Alfred Adler says, there are inferiority complexes (where there's a poor psychological disposition) where people overcompensate and thus become great. Although Adler never restricted greatness to requiring psychological inferiority or mediocrity like this dialogue seems to.
Another similar point was made by Friedrich Nietzsche who claimed that greatness was always necessary (by circumstances), but he didn't confine the necessity to arising from psychological circumstances. Nietzsche often points to Napoleon as an example of greatness, which can illustrate his point. We can say the general circumstances of Napoleon and his contemporaries were political and social change, consequently military leadership could be generated, which Napoleon took advantage of. Results were, given the large circumstances, that Napoleon could build up his character and make great impact, or as Nietzsche thought of Napoleon great character could develop. In this case there is no judgement that Napoleon must of been inferior or mediocre in psychology or self image, just that their living circumstances could nurture great efforts or creation (artistic or otherwise). Nietzsche was pretty tough on humanity saying it could only generate greatness in challenging times, which is why he feared the culture of the last man so much.

The argument in the dialogue "Do you think Shakespeare was a good writer?" "yes" "he must have been a mediocre person" relies on the premises that greatness can only come when there is a mediocre character which the individual must overcompensate and overcome. I don't think this is true for everyone. Goethe I recall had no real challenging circumstances but instead gradually and peacefully developed all of his qualities. So the idea that people have to be weak or mediocre "in themselves" to achieve greatness in art, sport, etc. seems shortsighted and wrong. It may be true for a lot of greatness, but I would say it's certainly not true for all greatness.

The sentence "they are held up as gods only because of a talent in the arts, that's all" is curious, it seems to suggest that a person's character or possibilities is more important then there actions, or what they actually do. Character is valuable, but I find such narrow character veneration foolish, as it justifies doing nothing because people can just say "I could do it if I wanted to".

The last point I can distinguish is persistence in mediocrity vs innovation into deviance/greatness. Personally I find the idea that "they are strong for their persistance" to be the lousy side to take. Generally speaking I take innovation to be the more valuable, as those who persist merely do so in social structures and institutions which were created by innovators!

I kind of wish I could of written up more dialogue, but alas I'm more of an interpreter, my innovation lies in my reading :)