Sources

All of the sources cited on this website (plus 100s more) are available in Arrival, and will be available when the book is published. (see Info re Book)

Here I will discuss a small number of books – both academic and biography – which should give you a sense of the sort of information I used to make my analyses of various ‘greats’, and show some of the research relevant to key aspects of the theory developed in Arrival. Hopefully this will be of some use to you in developing your own thinking re the issues involved.

The books listed here will either give you access to the type of information I used to make my analyses (of Mozart, Norma Jeane/Marilyn, etc) or will provide related research re key aspects of my analysis (eg, of personality or intellectual characteristics of the ‘great’, family dynamics relevant to development of ‘greats’, etc).

3 Starters

Howe, M. J. A. (1992) The Origins of Exceptional Abilities. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell.

Simonton, D. K. (1994). Greatness: Who Makes History and Why. New York: The Guilford Press.

Bloom, B. (Ed.) (1985). Developing Talent in Young People. New York: Ballantine Books.

I’d start with Howe – because he is short, extremely readable, raises important questions and provides informative examples in his answers -- then move to Simonton and Bloom, which are both much more extensive in their scope, and are two of the classics relevant to the question of how the great become great.

Simonton, the most prolific researcher ever on creativity and greatness, explores just about everything re the topic of ‘who makes history and why’, and has you riveted throughout in anticipation what surprising fact, observation, or person will pop up in the next sentence. He considers many theoretical arguments, but unlike Arrival or this website does not offer any overall theory to account for how the great become great.

Bloom’s book, the classic re the development of talent in young people, is based on interviews with 120 Olympic swimmers, concert pianists, sculptors, world-class tennis players, exceptional mathematicians and neurologists, and their parents. In contrast to Simonton’s book, the focus of Bloom and his research team is on the actual process of development of specific people from early childhood til they became prominent in their fields. The book is filled with direct quotes from the interviews and provides clear theoretical perspectives to account for such talent development. The particular individuals interviewed remain anonymous, and not surprisingly there is little consideration given to the role and development of personality (though you can get a fair hint of the differences by comparing the section on sculptors with that of eg, Olympic swimmers).

Books Relevant to Key Aspects of Arrival

Albert, R. (Ed) (1983) Genius and eminence: The social psychology of creativity and exceptional achievement. New York: Pergamon Press.

Albert, R. (Ed) (1992) Genius and eminence. Second Edition. New York: Pergamon Press.

Howe, M. J. A. (Ed) (1990) Encouraging the Development of Exceptional Skills and Talents. Leicester, UK: The British Psychological Society.

Runco, M.A. & Albert, R.S. (Eds) (1990) Theories of Creativity. London: Sage.

Above are four books of edited readings with articles by the top researchers on topics relevant to development and achievements of the ‘great’. Almost all of the major researchers in recent decades are represented in these books, as well as a number of classic studies from the past. Virtually every study in them can be considered with reference to Arrival’s theory re how the great become great.

Zuckerman, H. (1977) Scientific Elite: Nobel Laureates in the United States. New York: The Free Press.

This is the classic study of the socialization of American Nobel prize winners, as well as other members of the scientific elite.

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1991). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. New York:
HarperCollins.

If you Google ‘Csikszentmihalyi’, you’ll find several websites with a quick overview of the main points re what constitute ‘flow activities’, and will probably easily recognize how this matches up with Arrival’s argument that getting the ideal match between an individual’s strengths and the problems on offer (plus resources needed to take them on) can easily result in the experience of ‘flow’ re the development of key characteristics related to intelligence and socially approved aspects of personality. If you reverse these conditions, ie force the individual to take on problems that seriously subvert the ideal conditions of flow, you’ll get an idea of how ‘escape activities’ can result and with them the development of key characteristics related to ‘socially undesirable’ versions of personality and self.

There are cheapo versions of Flow available on Amazon for under $4. The main ideas relevant to Arrival are in Chapter 4 (“The Conditions of Flow”).

Gardner, H. (1985) Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. London: Paladin Books.

Gardner, H. (1999) Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the 21st Century.
New York: Basic Books

Gardner, H. (1993). Creating Minds: An anatomy of creativity seen through the lives of Freud, Einstein, Picasso, Stravinsky, Eliot, Graham, and Gandhi. New York: Basic Books.

The first of these is Gardner’s classic identifying 7 types of intelligence (spatial, visual, musical, logical-mathematical, bodily-kinesthetic, personal, and interpersonal) on the basis of everything from neurology to cultural anthropology. The second book considers extensions and implications re educational practice. The third illustrates the relevance of MI theory to the achievements of 7 ‘greats’ of the 20th century.
I wouldn’t bother getting any of these books at the outset, rather just go to Google and punch in, eg, ‘Howard Gardner MI theory’, and see if you can get a sense of how each of his intelligences operates and hence how they might get played out in relation to the development of Key Characteristics essential to whatever areas of achievement interest you. It is relatively easy to identify the Key Characteristics an individual ‘great’ needed in relation to intelligence to achieve s greatest productions - they practically fall out of Gardner’s list as soon as you put it up along side the actual productions themselves.

When it comes to tracing the development of an actual Key Characteristic related to intelligence, eg Guthrie’s wordslinging (see Cumulative Matching) things become much more complicated. You’ll need a good biography with plenty of detail re those first 20+ years of development for openers. Then Gardner’s original Frames of Mind (or his 10th anniversary edition) is probably your best bet for starting to suss the course of development.Identifying Key Characteristics related to intellignece. Personality and self is much, much more difficult. It requires a considerable amount of studying the productions, the conditions under which they were produced, and the processes involved for the individual at a psychological level while taking them on. Arrival considers this in great detail with reference to Hitchcock, Woody Guthrie, and Norma Jeane/Marilyn, but this analysis is not included on this website (with the exception of brief excerpts - see: Hitch excerpts, Woody excerpts, NJ/Marilyn excerpts- and the discussion of 4 of NJ/M’s 5 Key Characteristics (see: Key Characteristics).

The three books below should get you started. Of course none of them will provide anything more than orienting information re the person you want to study. The work comes in using these guidelines/orienting frameworks to explore information available in good biographies for the person’s life and productions.

Pervin, L. A. (2002) The Science of Personality: 2nd edition. New York: Oxford University Press.

This book, or the now cheapo first edition (1996), will give you an intro to the research re genetic biases in development of personality, the main theoretical orientations re development of personality and self, and much more.
If you Google “Big Five Personality” you’ll find a site or two that gives fair overview of the genetic models of personality. A good one I came across is: http://www.personalityresearch.org/bigfive.html. In addition to summarizing the key aspects of the theory, it outlines how it relates to the models developed by major personality theorists, eg Freud, Adler, Erikson, with links to websites re their ideas.
Pervin’s book will of course give you much more information. You might say too much and too little when it comes to sussing the identify and developmental course of Key Characteristics for a particular ‘great’. You’ll get a good lead re where the genetic biases most likely are, and then a number of concepts from various theorists which will seem related but not quite spot on re your person.

Then comes the fun of chasing up leads and digging further. In relation to NJ/Marilyn’s perfect self doubt, for instance, (see: Continuous Matching) early childhood info re Norma Jeane seemed clearly consistent with 1 of Costa & McCrae’s (1985) 5 genetic biases re personality, Openness to Experience, and consistent with some aspects of another, Neuroticism. The interpersonal quality of her first 7 1/2 years with the Bolenders also had many of the characteristics described in research on maternal deprivation (eg Rutter, 1979), institutional care (eg, Tizard & Rees, 1975), and childhood antecedents of borderline personality (eg Zanarini et al, 1989). Trull (1992), curiously, found strong links between ratings on borderline personality and Neuorticism, but no links to Openness to Experience. and so forth.. At the end of the day, it was this kind of to and fro between what was in the biographies and what was in the relevant research, mostly journal articles by this point in time, that led me to conclude that Norma Jeane could perhaps be described as a ‘borderline borderline’, because she escaped the worst of the childhood experiences common to ‘borderline trait patients’, ie severe/chronic physical & sexual abuse, the absence of any ‘triggering event’ after adolescence, etc. All the same she clearly had the adult experiences of self rejection common to borderline females, including ‘markedly inconstant’ and negative self-concept/esteem (Westen et al, 1992); pervasive sense of self loathing’ (Perry & Cooper, 1986), and a sense of being ‘small and worthless’ with a ‘shrunken self’ (Lindsay-Hartz, 1984). In short perfect for making her doubt there was anything about Norma Jeane worth having or keeping, hence the continual desire/search for a new self, as in Marilyn.

Wait a minute.

That was my yoke... well a hint of it. Doesn't have to be yours. Obviously if your gonna write your version of Arrival, or critique of it.. well how'd Fritz Perls put it re academic psychologists.. "obsessive compulsives, ever learning more and more about less and less..."

If you've got a life elsewhere to get on with and simply want to have a quick glance over your favorite hero, icon, pop star, golf prodigy... then I'd start with either Storr or Riso. They both zoom in on comprehensive patterns of personality/self which right from the outset feel like Einstein and Newton, Balzac and Schumann, Brando, Madonna, and Lennon, and yes, Ronaldino. Storr is the more interesting read, but Riso will get you stuck into a quick, rough & ready, sort of your hero’s key chars re self & personality.

Storr, A. (1983). The Dynamics of Creation. New York: Penguin Books.

This gives a short, fascinating, readable, revised psychoanalytic account of the origins and effects of extreme variations in personality with reference to a number of historic ‘greats’.

Riso, D. R. (1988). Personality Types. London: HarperCollins.
Riso, D. R. with Hudson, R. (1996). Personality Types: Completely Revised and Updated.

if you Google ‘Riso enneagram’, you’ll get a number of sites on which you’ll find at least some thumbnail description of the 9 types.
The stuff in Riso’s first book (1988 above) re the positive/ambivalent/negative relationship to mom/dad/both parents while growing up (3x3=9 types) is directly related to a number of analytic theorists, eg Freud, Horney, Jung. Despite the fact that the book is seriously sketchy re the critical issue of Childhood Origins (given our concern with accounting for development of Key Characteristics), it is extremely readable and as a orienting guide for trying to suss where in terms of experiences in family as a child the person’s Key Characteristics may have developed, it is extremely useful. The book is much more elaborate re how the 9 types get played out in thought, feelings, and actions as a function of variations in the psychological health of the person. It also provides very focused and helpful overviews for each type that again are easily used to applying the ideas to the analysis of biographies. Moreover it gives an intense feel in relation to each type of what’s likely to be going on re underlying psychological processes and how they are expressed in thought, feeling and action, while the person is both approaching and engaging in solving the sort of problems for which e became famous.
Needless to say in attempting to identify Key Characteristics such orienting information must be used with reference to good/thorough biographies re the person’s childhood and adolescent life and later experiences taking on/producing the work for which became famous.
The update of the book (Riso with Hudson, 1996, above) uses different labels for some of the types and gives more extensive information re parental influences on development and re the types as continuums, sub-type, and levels of health, etc.

A Few Books Relevant to Case Studies on This Website

Klein, J. (1980) Woody Guthrie: A Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
Spoto, D. (1993). Marilyn Monroe: The biography. New York: Harper/Collins.
Russell, B. & Branch, T. (1991). Second wind: The memoirs of an
opinionated man. New York: Fireside/Simon & Schuster.
Gillett, C. (1984). The sound of the city: The rise of rock and roll, Revised & expanded edition. New York: Pantheon Books.
Guralnick, P. (2000). Last train to Memphis: The rise of Elvis Presley. London: Abacus.
Levey, M. (1991). The life and death of Mozart. London: Cardinal.
Schenk, E. (1960). Mozart and his times. London: Secker & Warburg.