Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance

The Life, Letters and Labours of Francis Galton
, vol. 1 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1930), 66.

---

“capacity for hard labor”
:
Francis Galton, 
Hereditary Genius
(London: Macmillan, 1869), 38. It’s important to note here that
Galton’s fascination with heredity was misguided. While his conclusions about the importance of zeal and hard work and ability have
been supported by modern research, his erroneous conclusions about heredity and race have not.
“
eminently
 
important difference”:
Charles Darwin, Letter to Francis Galton, December 23, 1869. Frederick Burkhardt et al., ed.,
The Correspondence of Charles Darwin
, vol. 17, 1869 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 530.
supernatural intelligence
:
See Leonard Mlodinow, 
The Upright Thinkers: The Human Journey from Living in Trees to
Understanding the Cosmos
(New York: Pantheon Books, 2015), 195. Catharine Morris Cox, “The Early Mental Traits of Three
Hundred Geniuses,” in 
Genetic Studies of Genius,
vol. 2, ed. Lewis M. Terman, (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1926),
399.
“no great quickness”
:
Charles Darwin, 
The Autobiography of Charles Darwin
(London: Collins Clear-Type Press, 1958), 140–41.
data presented itself
:
Adam S. Wilkins, “Charles Darwin: Genius or Plodder?” 
Genetics
183 (2009): 773–77.
“The Energies of Men”
:
William James, “The Energies of Men,” 
Science
25 (1907): 321–32.
that our talents vary
:
Talents are, of course, plural. For interested readers, see Howard Gardner, 
Frames of Mind: The Theory of
Multiple Intelligences
(New York: Basic Books, 1983). Also, Ellen Winner, 
Gifted Children: Myths and Realities
(New York:
Basic Books, 1996). Robert J. Sternberg and James C. Kaufman, “Human Abilities,” 
Annual Review of Psychology
49 (1998): 479–
502.
twice as likely to single out effort
:
Survey of America’s Inner Financial Life, 
Worth Magazine
, November 1993.
about athletic ability
:
“CBS News Poll: Does Practice Make Perfect in Sports?,” CBS News website, April 6, 2014,
www.cbsnews.com/news/cbs-news-poll-does-practice-make-perfect-in-sports
.
endorse “intelligence”
:
The 
60 Minutes
/
Vanity Fair
Poll, 
Vanity Fair
, January 2010.
more likely to succeed
:
Chia-Jung Tsay and Mahzarin R. Banaji, “Naturals and Strivers: Preferences and Beliefs About Sources of
Achievement,” 
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology
47 (2011): 460–65.
naturals were rated higher
:
Chia-Jung Tsay, “Privileging Naturals Over Strivers: The Costs of the Naturalness Bias,” 
Personality
and Social Psychology Bulletin
(2015).
favor the natural
:
Ibid.
“technical skills can flourish”
:
“Juilliard 
Pre-College,” 
The 
Juilliard 
School, 
accessed 
August 
10, 
2015,
http://www.juilliard.edu/youth-adult-programs/juilliard-pre-college
a self-fulfilling prophecy
:
Robert Rosenthal, “Pygmalion Effect,” in 
The Corsini Encyclopedia of Psychology
, ed. Irving B.
Weiner and W. Edward Craighead (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2010), 1398–99.
“I wanted to get better”
:
Chia-Jung Tsay, assistant professor at the University College London School of Management, in an interview
with the author, April 8, 2015.
“The War for Talent”
:
Elizabeth Chambers et al., “The War for Talent,”