Talent is a gift, but to a certain extent

What do we talk about when we talk about talent? Is it something that can be measured, an innate gift or a capacity that can be developed? On BellevilleOnline, the web section of the Belleville Writing School in Milan, you can give streaming writing courses (for example by Aldo Nove on poetry or by Benedetta Centovalli on six great Italian writers), video lessons by Walter Siti, Rosella Postorino, Umberto Contarello, Diego De Silva and many others, and professional services for reading and evaluating manuscripts. But can talent really be given away?

Today talent is almost an ideology. It is based on the talent that people are defined and forecasts are made about their future. Talent is considered as the propensity to be brilliant, or in any case special, in a given activity. It is a concept akin to that of genius, but always implies an idea of ​​measurement and value. It is based on the belief that every individual is born with specific skills, definable and in some way weighable. In actual use, that is, the economic origin of the term survives. For the Babylonians and the Sumerians, talent was a unit of measure corresponding to the mass of water needed to fill an amphora: the unit of measure of the most precious good of all. It soon became a unit of commercial and monetary measure based on which to define the value of something and the price needed to buy and move it. For the Babylonians it was worth 30.3 kilos as for Jews and Palestinians (but at the time of the New Testament rose to 58.9 kilos), in Greece it corresponded to 26 kilos, in Egypt to 27 kilos, in Ancient Rome to 32.3. Talent was also a coin that could have been gold, like the half talent given by Achille to Antiloco in theIliad, but also silver or bronze.

It is difficult to say when and by what means talent, as a unit of measure, was transformed into the common language into a metaphor used to define every human activity – intellectual, artistic or sports – and the value of a person. To say of someone who is without talent means to condemn him to a mediocrity without escape. Accusing him of being "a wasted talent" borders on derision. Talent today is no longer measurable, it appears as an indefinable ability, more akin to the Christian concept of spirit and to the romantic concept of genius than to the Greek currency. It is likely that this translation of meaning began with Christianity, when talent was equated with gift.

The parable of the talents of the Gospel of Matthew is the best-known example of narration in which the two concepts – gift and talent – begin to overlap. Matteo tells that some servants received talents from their master, first of all understood as coins; each of them found a way to double them, except the one who, for fear of losing his only talent, buried him in a hole. At the return of the master, the most enterprising servants were rewarded, while the most fearful was reprimanded as "evil servant and idler" and thrown into the darkness, between weeping and gnashing of teeth. The gifts always involve a donor and, therefore, the gratitude of the recipient. They are given to men by God and they must be put to good use: whoever spares them or does not spend them will be punished, those who make them profitable.

The next step is with the concept of dowry, another synonym of talent. In Roman law the dowry, which comes from giving as a gift, indicated the objects and money given by a woman's family to her husband to support the costs of marriage – again, measurable goods. Unlike talent and gift, dowry defines the very nature of the person because he is received by the family and can be "natural". The romantic idea of ​​genius as the one who draws from himself in a mysterious way the inspiration to create works of immortal beauty is born from this mixture of dowry and gift. The problem is that conceiving talent as something received from above or by nature implies the idea – false – that genetic, social and economic factors do not count and, above all, that talent cannot be acquired and developed – or to double, to put it as in the parable.

Talent is not measured, it is not received and it is not possessed. We search, find and build ourselves. And it can only be done by doing. Jacques Brel, the singer-songwriter, said: «Talent is to want to have it. All the rest is sweat, perspiration, discipline ». It is also valid for writing, around which the romantic prejudice is stronger, according to which talent, as the man said, "one, if he does not have one, cannot give it". For some it is easy to find the way, for others it is more difficult (only sweat can be measured) and maybe it will be a different road from the one they had imagined, but everyone can cultivate what they have – that is what they are – provided they commit to look for him. Writing and reading are techniques, and as such can be learned through practice. Talent is a gift, but to a certain extent. It may be a burden to be placed on the scale, a gift from God or a natural gift, but if it is not sought it is impossible to find it.

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