WHY ARE SOME OF THE BEST WRITERS DYSLEXIC?

 

As we have seen, some of the best scientists are successful because they are strong visual thinkers. Strangely, I would argue that some of the best writers are successful, in part, for the same reason.

A few years ago, I was asked to contribute a short piece for a new book, an anthology of prose and poetry by dyslexic writers, to be published in the United Kingdom by a group called RASP. Later, the editor, Naomi Folb, asked if I would be willing to write a foreword for the volume as well. I was delighted to do it—and I was even more delighted because the whole argument came tumbling out with no apparent effort on my part. (I wish this would happen more often. Normally, I have to struggle to find the right words, redrafting often.) I was also pleased when I saw the finished book with the following quotation of mine standing alone on the inside front cover: “The truth-talking commentator who is not caught up in the race. They have felt the otherness from the start.”

My argument in the foreword went as follows:

There are many puzzles and paradoxes linked to dyslexia. One of the most strange of these is that some of the best writers are dyslexic. How can this be so? How can those who struggle so with words become such masters of words? Well, good writing is different from good spelling, reading out loud or rapid recall of memorized texts.

Good writing often requires an ear for the sound of language. Good writing often requires a strong visual imagination with powerful images and metaphors communicated through the words. Often the best writing is very plain, using well the most simple language. Also, good writing requires fresh language—not the usual string of conventional terms and syntax. Good writing is thoughtful and sometimes surprising in its content and form.

Oddly, the difficulties experienced by dyslexics sometimes can lead directly to becoming advantages in service of the best writing. Dyslexics are a heterogeneous group. They are unlike non-dyslexics. They are unlike each other. But there are many common elements. They often, almost by definition, learn to read late and very slowly (after a long and difficult struggle). This is partly the reason that many never lose the sound of language in their head—as happens with rapid and efficient readers.

They often have powerful visual imaginations—seeing pictures in their minds as they read or speak. Some of the best storytellers say they never remember the words of a story. Rather, they have a movie running in their head and they simply talk about what they see. You don’t have to be dyslexic to do this. But dyslexics seem inclined to do this—whether they want to or not. But as one can readily see, if you cannot remember texts as texts—but only see images—then the words are likely to be different each time. Sometimes fresh. Sometimes surprising. Sometimes shockingly apt.

Often I have heard the phrase, “they see what others don’t see or cannot see.” I have heard the phrase a thousand times, in a thousand different settings. It is not only having strong powers of observation. There is something going on in these larger than usual, slow moving, apparently overly-connected brains that yields perceptions and insights often denied to non-dyslexics—who may see the unexpected connection when they are shown. But they would never see it on their own.

Some say dyslexics are prone to ponder. Non-dyslexics may have a look, see what they have been taught to see, say the expected words and quickly move on—scoring high on conventional tests of conventional observations. (This drives artists crazy. So many of the clever students learn the words to say about a painting and then they think they undertand it. But they never learn to really see it.)

Many dyslexics find it very difficult to do things automatically— which can be a problem. It can be very slow. Whether training the movements of their body (as in an Olympic sport) or observing nature (in a literary or scientific puzzle), they have to think and think hard. Big brains with many connections move slowly—but they can do jobs that fast smaller brains cannot do. They see the big picture. They see connections between apparently unrelated things.

Those who ponder hold on to an idea or problem or puzzle for a long time, turning it over and over. In literature, sometimes they come up with a fresh and deep insight. (In science or technology, sometimes they come up with a remarkable and unexpected discovery.)

It is a commonplace that the best artist or writer is an outsider, observing human events at the edge. Again, many non-dyslexics can take on this role. But many dyslexics, because of their deep humiliations from the earliest days, seem naturally to assume the role of distant observer. The truth-talking commentator who is not caught up in the race. They have felt the otherness from the start.

In my own research on talents among highly successful dyslexics, my literary friends were shocked and disbelieving when I told them that the most severely dyslexic historical person I came across was the Irish poet William Butler Yeats. It teaches us. Even in times unfriendly to formal poetry, his lines show up in songs and commentaries and book titles. He said that he often started with a rhythm, a pulse, and the sense then followed. He never lost the feeling of the sound of the language.

And everywhere you look there are vivid metaphors and images. About his early life, Yeats says: “I was unfitted for school work. . . . My thoughts were a great excitement, but when I tried to do anything with them, it was like trying to pack a [large hot air] balloon in a shed in a high wind.” A few years before his death, he observed: “It was a curious experience . . . to have an infirm body and an intellect more alive than it had ever been, one poem leading to another as if . . . lighting one cigarette from another.”

I closed the foreword with these words: “I am honored to introduce this volume of the work of dyslexic writers—sometimes harsh and angry, sometimes as beautiful as a song, sometimes so short and powerful that you feel you have been punched with a boxer blow. But always fresh, truth telling, full of vivid and unexpected sounds and images.”

Frank G. Tallman, Master Pilot, Dyslexic

Recently, I was talking to a farmer friend about low flying planes used to spray wheat fields to ensure the full development of the crop. This made me think of the low-level flying and film stunts of Frank G. Tallman -- a master pilot -- who was also dyslexic – perhaps a master pilot because he was dyslexic. Note his accomplishments -- and what his parents thought when he was young. -- Tom

“April 20, 1978. The first plane roared low over the ridge. Five hundred people looked up, many through tears. They recognized the red and white stripes of the famous Super Chipmunk as it soared past, trailing pink smoke into the clear, southern California sky. The crowd had come from the church in a mile-long line of cars and now stood around my brother’s open grave, to me an abyss on this green and windblown hillside. Following the smoke trail, pairs of planes from every decade of aviation history thundered overhead in further salute to Frank Tallman, who had flown them all. Corsairs, Mustangs, Zeros, jets, an all-red Fokker Triplane. Frank’s comrades flew them today.

“A flight of police helicopters was up there too in the V-shaped missing man formation, their own salute to the improbable man called ‘king of the Hollywood stunt pilots.’ My other brother, Foster, was standing beside me. ‘Those older planes came down to fifty feet,’ he said. ‘I looked one guy right in the face. They violated about every federal air regulation known to man but who’s going to complain?’ After the ceremony, while the crowd drifted away, I lingered behind with my hands on the casket. Foster smothered his own grief and took hold of my arm. ‘Come on Sis,’ Foster said, ‘it’s all over.’ But it never was. Not for Foster and me.” -- Excerpt from 'Where the Birds Warble Sweet' by Prudy Tallman Wood, younger sister of Frank Gifford Tallman, unpublished manuscript.

“Of course I am sincerely worried and most upset over Frank. Have just told him he has to stay in [school] and graduate if it takes forty years.” -- Frank’s mother, October 1934.

“I agree to some extent young Frank lacks fundamental training but do not feel this [is] the main difficulty -- rather as you say it is his lack of ability for self-help and work. . . . I have a feeling this boy lives in a dream world made up of guns and aeroplanes and ‘movies’ and that no way yet has been found to bring him down to earth so that he will realize there is work to do and responsibility that he must assume.” -- Frank’s father, October 1934; former WWI pilot. (Frank’s age 15, grade 9)

“[Frank’s teachers] seem to be looking for some reason why such an apparently able and thoroughly engaged student could perform so poorly. . . . I suppose he might have been diagnosed with a dyslexia of some kind today. The fact that foreign languages and math seem to have given him the most trouble, indicate something like that to me.” -- School historian, December 2000.

Copies of family letters and school reports (above) were provided to Thomas G. West by Frank Tallman’s sister Prudy Tallman Wood.

“Frank Tallman is in town to promote the new film ‘The Great Waldo Pepper.’ But no film could be as interesting or as charming as Frank Tallman.” Washington Post review, (paraphrase) 1975.

Excerpts from Wikipedia:

“Tallman performed the stunt flying in the 1963 chase movie ‘It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World,’ including the flight in a Beechcraft Model 18 through a Coca-Cola billboard. He also contributed to The ‘Carpetbaggers’ (1964), ‘The Wrecking Crew’ (1969), and ‘The Thousand Plane Raid’ (also 1969) . . . . He served as the flying supervisor for ‘Catch-22’ in 1970 and was personally involved in locating and acquiring the 18 or so flyable film unit B-25s appearing in the film. Tallman flew the dramatic night shots of the Milo Minderbinder Air Force B-25 bombing its own base just over the heads of actors Jon Voight and Martin Sheen. . . .

“He was aerial supervisor for ‘The Great Waldo Pepper’ in which he performed barnstorming stunts. When the controls failed in his World War I aircraft replica, the plane went out of control and struck power lines. Tallman suffered a head injury. . . .

"In 1973, Tallman recounted his experiences rebuilding and flying vintage aircraft in the book 'Flying the Old Planes'. . . .

“On Saturday 15 April 1978, Tallman was making a routine ferry flight in a twin-engine Piper Aztec from Santa Monica Airport, California, to Phoenix, Arizona, under visual flight rules when he continued the flight into deteriorating weather, a lowering ceiling and rain. He struck the side of Santiago Peak in the Santa Ana Mountains near Trabuco Canyon at cruise altitude, dying in the ensuing crash [apparently from a fatal heart attack while flying]. Following his death, Tallman's historic collection of movie warplanes and camera planes was sold off.” [Many to a museum in Florida.]

Diversity in Time of Need

 Some ideas from my third book, Seeing What Others Cannot See, that seem remarkably appropriate for today --

DIVERSITY IN TIME OF NEED

Throughout this book, we have been dealing with diversity and mixed talents in many different forms. However, there are some deep questions that seem to lie under all of our considerations. We want superiority. So why do we need diversity?

Perhaps the simplest answer is that we need many kinds of superiority—and that we cannot have it all at once. It seems that we should encourage diversity not only to be civil, not only to be respectful, not only to be humane, not only to be just—but also because we have a particular stake in diversity that is rarely, if ever, fully articulated.

We want there to be people who have abilities we do not yet know that we need, abilities that we have not ever tried to measure, because we do not know that we needed them—abilities that may be in no way associated with the conventional abilities and talents that we now measure by formal or informal means.

As we have seen, adapting to change has been a major feature in human survival, as with all of life. We have made the point that as technology and other factors in the environment change, they sometimes substantially redefine the kinds of talents and abilities (and passions) that are wanted.

The theory of multiple intelligences is very important in this discussion. If there is only one kind of intelligence (as many have been taught to believe), then you have only more of it or less of it. But if there are in fact many forms of intelligence, then the whole discussion is transformed.

Accordingly, in this context, the main idea is that changes in the environment often occur too quickly for either evolutionary or cultural adaptation to respond. We are capable of learning and adapting in many ways and at many levels, but it takes time.

What we want, therefore, is to find means to tolerate and cultivate the talents in a wide diversity of individuals—with supportive institutions and organizations, so that when we need a certain set of talents and abilities, it is already out there, ready to be brought into service—sometimes, perhaps often, at the last moment, when finally it is realized that the old leaders or the old ideas are no longer working.

Time is short, and radical, perhaps even frightening, changes must be made, regardless of the risks. . . .

THINKING “OUT OF THE BOX”

We need to assess the institutional changes required so that dyslexics and different thinkers with markedly mixed talents can still work within established larger institutional structures. We need studies of how this works and does not work.

For example, as we have seen before, we can look at the relationship that dyslexic paleontologist John R. (Jack) Horner has with the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Montana. The museum staff modified their procedures to do things in unconventional ways in order to allow Jack and his students to do high-level work, making dramatic discoveries, while designing new and highly innovative museum displays to communicate with the public.

Because of his dyslexia, Horner had flunked out of the University of Montana seven times (as he once reminded me). But he came to be known as one of the two or three most important paleontologists in the world—known as an original and innovative interpreter of the fossil evidence.

Horner says he tries to teach his grad students “to think like a dyslexic” because that is where the “good stuff" comes from—learning to read the book of nature with fresh insight without being distracted by the theories of others. He says the rest is “just memorization.”

One of Horner’s dyslexic students, as we noted, made discoveries thought “impossible”—finding red blood cells and flexible blood vessels inside a 68-million-year-old fossil bone. Horner pointed out that this discovery was never made before, because “all the books in the world” would say that it could not be done. Recall, he noted that it is easy for dyslexics “to think outside the box” because “they have never been in the box.”

Finally, we need to be convinced that it is indeed time for substantial change. It is hard to see that, in a remarkable number of cases, true innovation in using the most advanced information visualization technologies comes, in fact, from those who have struggled most with the oldest technologies: reading and writing.

It is becoming increasingly clear that new tools and new ways of seeing and discovering will require new talents and, often, different kinds of brains.

We need to see the truth of Horner’s observation that dyslexia is “certainly not something that needs to be fixed, or cured, or suppressed!”

Indeed, we need to see that, as Jack says, “maybe it’s time for a revolution -- or at least -- it may be time to start something.”

Seeing What Others Cannot See, T.G. West, 2017, pp. 189 - 195.

THINKING LIKE A MARTIAN

 STUMBLING TOWARD THE TRUTH—THINKING LIKE A MARTIAN

Over and over again we have been focusing on stories about how our verbal culture fails because it is too fragmented, too limited, too specialized—while a visual, big-picture culture is ignored. We could see this as another example of the ancient Greek myth of Cassandra— who could see the future—but no one would believe her.

With many of those we have looked at, the pattern is clear: the new recognition of some big idea or concept; the battle against that new idea or concept by the conventional experts; the gradual recognition of the value of the key idea or concept—because over time it functions to reorganize lots of information or a whole field—and many apparently unrelated pieces fall into place. Eventually a new generation accepts the new vision as obvious and essential. The old believers fight a rearguard action in the courts and legislatures and (sometimes) universities, but the larger culture moves on, (almost fully) accepting as obvious the truth and usefulness of the new idea or concept. (Rarely, some special people, sometimes, make a reconciliation of the new with the old.)

In such times, and especially in our own, it can be quite useful to try to see the bigger picture by standing back a distance. In his book Timescale: An Atlas of the Fourth Dimension, the British science writer Nigel Calder writes of learning “how to be a Martian” –- trying to learn how to see Earth and everything on it as it would be seen by a “dispassionate,” disinterested, and distant being. Calder considers this exercise a way of identifying those things that are really important, the really substantial trends over time, which are often quite different from the presumed “serious business” of “pots, kings, and battles.”

Calder observes that it is quite difficult to cultivate this disinterested point of view. “Even the most skeptical historians,” he notes, “seem barely able to distance themselves from the assumptions of their culture.” Consequently, nearly “everyone takes it for granted that reading and writing are blessings.” However, our education provides us with little awareness of the “high levels of sophistication” attained by non-literate peoples—who were nonetheless able to understand the stars and deep ocean currents well enough to navigate the broad Pacific, for example.

“Skill in archery,” he observes, “may have been as important as writing in shaping the course of history.” There is a great danger of seeing pre-literate or non-literate peoples as merely primitive and undeveloped. We are so well trained in the dominant values of our own culture that it is hard to give them due respect for their considerable accomplishments in the things that, after all, truly are most important in the face of great and continuous change and in the long history of human learning and survival.

We should not be surprised, Calder notes, that there is some self- promotion among the makers and users of books. In their own limited view, he says, schools measure the “worth of young citizens” based on their “facility in the cumbersome information technology displayed on the wafer of wood pulp in your hands.” Our education institutions have given us little awareness that “most humans have lived and died unable to read or write, and some bright individuals are dyslexic.” (This is a truly remarkable observation in passing—within a book that presumably has nothing to do with dyslexia or other learning differences. One wonders whether Calder and his famous father, Lord Ritchie Calder, have any personal experience with dyslexia, near or far. However, in my experience over many years, it is not at all unusual for such remarks to come from those scientists and writers working at very high levels, especially when dealing with big-picture issues.)

Driving the point home, Calder observes that “new technologies may soon make the art [of reading] as outmoded as oarsmanship for galleys.” Consequently, he observes that the “emphasis laid upon literacy by scholars who earn their living with written words appears self-serving.” In this way, if we take a very long view, then possibly we may begin to see the limitations of what we have been taught. Perhaps we may begin to see how even those who would appear to be the most educated could have special difficulty in seeing the kinds of trends that we are expecting.

Also, they may be so thoroughly entangled in the world of words, so “word bound,” in fact, that they may be unable to perceive major changes just outside the boundary of their familiar world.

(These prescient observations have greater impact today, when so many of us are now surrounded with small machines that can easily read to us, talk to us, fetch information for us, and translate languages for us—all at comparatively modest cost. This was previously unbelievable, even in science fiction, only a short time ago.)

The power and effectiveness of words, whether spoken or written, in whatever era or context, is not, of course, being challenged here. However, I do propose that the balance may be shifting (and may need to shift) in fundamental ways—that the important work of the world (the comparative advantage for some) will increasingly involve the sophisticated interpretation of complex images, using the newest technologies.

And, of course, we may very well see that we will have good reason to expect that the development of these new technologies and capabilities will be led by those creative visual thinkers (sometimes, or often, with learning difficulties or differences of some kind) who may have some special talent and experience in these areas.

Consequently, we might anticipate not so much a shift from one style of thinking to another but rather a new balance between the two sides—that is, the restoration of a balance and interdependence between two modes of thought that has generally been rare (except among the most highly gifted)—one visual and one verbal. We might encounter (at a very different level) a new form of uncommon symmetry in thinking styles between the two hemispheres of the brain, which is still a major consideration, although unfashionable in some circles these days.

Thus, it seems clear—taking the longer view—that some of the things that the best educated take for granted as permanent and enduring could actually be changing in fundamental ways. The “new technologies” that Calder talks about could very well be linked to the computer graphics, simulators, and information visualization that we have been talking about. If the trends move in the direction that I have been indicating, then some of the possible outcomes seem clear enough. When a new technology becomes widely available to amplify and extend some important human capacity, we may presume that it is only a matter of time before these potentials manifest in real consequences that will reverberate throughout our economy and culture.

A NEW CLASS OF MINDS

Calder’s view is only one among a growing number of observers who have begun to see the deep implications of the coming changes. More individuals working at the edge of these new technological developments, in the sciences as well as in the professions or business, are beginning to recognize the emerging patterns.

One example is Dr. Larry Smarr, who is an astronomer, a physicist, the former director of the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, and the coauthor of a book called Supercomputing and the Transformation of Science. Over the years, Dr. Smarr came to see the likely impact of computer information visualization technologies and techniques. It is also notable that his observations include his perception of explicit connections between dyslexia and certain forms of creativity and high ability.

After we met at a computer graphics conference years ago, he sent me the following e-mail: “I have often argued in my public talks that the graduate education process that produces physicists is totally skewed to selecting those with analytic [mathematical] skills and rejecting those with visual or holistic skills. I have claimed that with the rise of scientific visualization as a new mode of scientific discovery, a new class of minds will arise as scientists. In my own life, my ‘guru’ in computational science was a dyslexic and he certainly saw the world in a different and much more effective manner than his colleagues. . . .” (Seeing What Others Cannot See, 2017, T.G.West, pages 101 to 105.)

 SOLITARY MEALS WITH EINSTEIN 

For me, the turning point in my story is clear enough—my solitary meals in a grand hotel in Cairo in the summer of 1986. I was working for an international engineering and consulting company and we were managing a large-scale energy project with the Egyptian Electricity Authority funded by USAID. The project director was on vacation, so I was doing his job in Cairo for three weeks while he was away. The hotel was full of mothers and children from Saudi Arabia, wanting to escape the greater heat of Riyadh. The young boys tried to play soccer in the patch of green around the swimming pool. I appeared to be the only Westerner in the entire hotel. I spent my mealtimes reading books about Albert Einstein, especially his own “Autobiographical Notes,” the slender volume in which he explains how his thinking had been shaped from boyhood on. 

I had always been fascinated by Einstein—at once almost universally acknowledged as the genius of our age—but also known to be eccentric and to have had trouble in his early schooling and career. I did not know it at the time, but he was to become my main guide throughout my research—introducing me to his own heroes and intellectual mentors— especially James Clerk Maxwell and Michael Faraday. These were names I knew only vaguely. But as I learned more, I saw that these three shared great respect and an extraordinary intellectual rapport across time— largely because they all relied heavily on their visual-spatial talents as the source of their remarkably original (and enduring) insights and discoveries. 

Over time, these considerations became the core of my research as I dug through primary sources such as letters and diaries, with one insight leading to another as I reviewed a period of nearly two centuries. I found unfolding a distinctive pattern of thought, innovation, and discovery— one that was useful to a small group long ago—but one that has become ever more pervasive over recent years with the advent of new technologies along with new discoveries in physics, biology, mathematics, and other fields. Visual thinking—once so productive for a few—was now becoming more important for the many—partly because of new approaches to science and mathematics—and partly because of increasingly powerful new tools and technologies. 

There is increasing evidence that many highly original and productive thinkers have clearly preferred visual over verbal modes of thought for many tasks. Some argue that visual-spatial abilities should in fact be seen as a special form of intelligence on par with verbal or logical-mathematical forms of intelligence. Historically, it is apparent that some of the most original and gifted thinkers in the physical sciences, engineering, mathematics, and other areas relied heavily on visual modes of thought, employing images instead of words or numbers. However, it is notable that some of these same gifted thinkers have shown evidence of a striking range of learning problems, including difficulties with reading, spelling, writing, calculation, speaking, and memory. What is of greatest interest here is not the difficulties themselves but their frequent and varied association with high visual and spatial talents. . . . 

In the life of Albert Einstein, the importance of visual learning and visual talents in conjunction with verbal difficulties has long been recognized. His poor memory for words and texts made him hate the rote learning methods of his early school years. However, he tended to thrive later at the progressive school in Switzerland, where he prepared to take his university examinations—no doubt, partly because the unconventional school was based largely on visually oriented educational principles. 

There is a debate among biographers and scholars as to whether the young Einstein was a brilliant student or whether he was a dullard. After some time looking at these conflicting points of view, I realized that to some extent he was both—a pattern that is typical of highly gifted visual thinkers with verbal difficulties. Einstein’s sister, Maja, recorded a number of details about his early life, commenting about his late development of speech; his slow answers but deep understanding in mathematics; and his frequent calculation errors even though he had a clear understanding of the main mathematical concepts involved. 

In secondary school, he dropped out of school in Germany (contrary to plan) to follow his parents after they moved to Italy. His reason was that because of his “poor memory,” he preferred to endure all kinds of punishments rather than to have to learn to “gabble by rote.” After he failed his first set of university entrance examinations, Einstein went to a new and unconventional school—one that was based on the highly visually-oriented educational ideas of Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi. It was at this school that Einstein’s abilities began to blossom and the great theories later published in 1905 began to take their initial shape. 

The coexistence in Einstein of visual talents along with verbal difficulties has been noted by several observers. Suggesting the recognition of a general pattern, the physicist and historian of science Gerald Holton has remarked: “An apparent defect in a particular person may merely indicate an imbalance of our normal expectations. A noted deficiency should alert us to look for a proficiency of a different kind in the exceptional person. The late use of language in childhood, the difficulty in learning foreign languages may indicate a polarization or displacement in some of the skill from the verbal to another area. That other, enhanced area is without a doubt, in Einstein’s case an extraordinary kind of visual imagery that penetrates his very thought processes.”

Later, in his own writing, Einstein made clear references to what he saw as two very different modes of thought, especially with regard to his own most creative and productive work. He pointed out that when he did really productive thinking, he always used “more or less clear images” and what he called “combinatory play,” as the “essential feature” in his “productive thought,” as well as of some “visual and some muscular type.”  But he explains that if he wanted to communicate these thoughts to others, he had to go through a difficult and laborious translation process, proceeding from images to words and numbers that could be understood by others.

It is anticipated that modern visualization technologies and techniques may eventually permit many more ordinary people to do what Einstein did with mental models in his mind’s eye—and permit the communication of sophisticated visual ideas without having to resort to poorly suited verbal and mathematical substitutes. 

The great power of the visual approach is underscored in one rather surprising account of Albert Einstein’s development as a professional scientist. In his later career, Einstein did become increasingly sophisticated in higher mathematics. However, some have argued that this increased sophistication may have been more of a hindrance than a help in his later creative work. The mathematician David Hilbert made clear, with some exaggeration, that Einstein’s creative scientific accomplishments came from elsewhere than through his mathematical skill. . . . 

Hilbert was not alone. Indeed, Abraham Pais, the author of a scientific biography of Einstein, observes that Einstein’s increasing reliance on mathematics over time also involved a reduced dependency on the visual methods that he used so heavily and so productively in his earlier work. (From Seeing What Others Cannot See, 2017, T.G.West, pages 54-61.)

 STORIES AS A BETTER DIAGNOSTIC TOOL 

Several years ago, after giving a talk in Santa Barbara, I met a child and adolescent psychiatrist who said he had been using In the Mind’s Eye as a diagnostic tool for years. He explained that he had given his clients something like forty or fifty copies so far. He asked them to highlight in yellow all those traits that were like themselves and cross out all those that were unlike themselves. 

I said, “Oh, you mean the list at the end of the book.” He said, “Oh no, I use the whole book -- it is much more useful than the usual tests and measures. They are all devised by linear thinkers for linear thinkers.” 

Afterward, it occurred to me that the whole book indeed could readily serve as a rambling catalogue of traits -- but that it also would not hurt that these clients would be forced to see in themselves traits shared by important persons who accomplished a great deal, sometimes in spite of their difficulties but more often because of their difficulties and their very different ways of thinking. 

To succeed with such extremely mixed abilities, as these individuals often do, you need to have a deep reservoir of confidence and fortitude to carry on in-spite-of the judgments of others that you are, in fact, really slow and lazy and stupid.

To maintain the required drive, determination, and sense of mission in the face of almost constant early failure and humiliation is often nothing short of miraculous. It would appear that only a comparatively small number survive these early days with enough confidence and drive to press on, against all odds, to find success in some area of special knowledge, deep understanding, and passionate interest. 

Much of In the Mind’s Eye was an attempt to understand the nature of this kind of success and the remarkable individuals who seem able to find their way around so many obstacles, seeking an area in which they are at home with their work, often performing at very high levels of proficiency and productivity.

I have come to believe that those of us who are trying to understand and to help dyslexics (along with others, more or less like them) must come to see that conventional academic remediation is only part of the job—and not the most interesting or important part. 

We need to seek ways to help dyslexics find and develop their own talents, large or small, so that they cannot be beaten down -- pushed into hiding their talents along with their disabilities. I, for one, believe that one of the best ways -- perhaps the only truly effective way -- to do this is to study the lives and work of highly successful dyslexics (in some detail and in all of their great diversity), so as to allow other dyslexics to see what can be done and to show how it can be done. (Seeing What Others Cannot See, TGWest, 2017, page 127.]