Awhile back, I read an article comparing two kinds of artistic talent. One was the people who achieve great art at a young age and then go onto self-destruct or fizzle out. Think of someone like F. Scott Fitzgerald, who wrote several brilliant novels as a young man and then got increasingly dried out (and drunk) until he died at age 44.

The alternative to that are artists who mature first and then achieve great success. Think, for example, of Mark Twain, who was 32 before he wrote anything good and 49 before he published his masterpiece, Huckleberry Finn. These artists tend have both longer lives and careers.

At this point, I’ve given up all hope of being one of those young geniuses. Even when I was a 22-year-old longing for fame and glory, in my more honest moments, I had to admit that I probably didn’t have the skill or self-confidence to be a superstar writer. But I, like every writer alive, still wished for it. Ambition is an ugly, ugly thing, my friends.

Turns out, I may be better off with the way things are. The Village Voice interviewed Ned Vizzini, who published three books between ages 15 and 23. Then the pressures of that major book contract got to him and he had a nervous breakdown.

He thought about committing suicide and checked himself into a psychiatric hospital in November 2004 for five days. For Vizzini, there was too much to live up to. “Having a book published so young means you aren’t made to rely on the charm, guts, and social skills that artists need,” he says. “You’ve been delivered what everyone’s been going for.”

Whew. Dodged a bullet there.

Link swiped from Bookslut.