On Advantages for Late Bloomers

May 13th, 2005 · 5 Comments
by Booksquare

“Unlike scientists or musicians, say, writers tend to mature with age.”

File Under: Quote of the Week

5 responses so far ↓

  • Susan Gable // May 14, 2005 at 6:52 am

    This is a stupid article. (Wait, let me stop holding back and tell you what I really thing. lol.)

    Look at the bit after the colon in the title. “50 is the perfect age to write a novel, a study of the best-selling authors of the past 50 years has shown.”

    Hmmmm…could it be because they wrote a lot of books before they get on the best-sellers list? (And hence, they’re younger when they begin writing, but it takes some time to build an audience, to get up to best-sellerdom?) That more time to hone one’s craft plays a factor?

    Could this be just a question of stupid mathematics? “The average age of an author on the best-sellers list is 50.” Big deal. We all know the games that can played with mathematics. Some are older, some are younger, but the average is 50. Shall we do the mean, mode, and median, just to be thorough?

    Does it surprise anyone that a writer with more life experience will be better able to discuss life in a fictional format? (There are always exceptions to this rule.)

    Perhaps we should do a new study about scientists. What’s the average age of a scientist when he/she formulates his/her most break-through theory? What about inventors? At what age did Thomas Edison really hit his stride?

    And let’s examine this quote: “Unlike scientists or musicians, say, writers tend to mature with age.” Ugh! Who wrote that sentence??? So, does that mean that scientists and musicians DON’T mature with age? So all older scientists and musicians are just as immature as ever? Or do they start off mature and stay that way?

    Well, that got my Saturday off to a rip-roaring start. Perhaps I should go and write an article while I’m all fired up. lol!

    Susan G.

  • KathyF // May 17, 2005 at 12:05 am

    And here I’ve been worrying I was getting to old for this writing gig! I guess I won’t turn in my pajamas just yet.

  • Booksquare // May 17, 2005 at 12:30 am

    Welcome back, Kathy. The rest of us do so hate to suffer alone!

  • anon // May 22, 2005 at 12:28 pm

    Don’t bother getting all fired up about it… It’s just page-filler PR copy… Just someone’s (mine, perhaps?) job…

  • Booksquare // May 22, 2005 at 1:48 pm

    Ah, but if we don’t let Susan G get worked up on a regular basis, she starts doing stuff like writing. Can’t have that! And if it weren’t for page filler copy, what would I have to make fun of? Which probably says something sad about me!