"Some minds seem almost to create themselves, springing up under every disadvantage and working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand obstacles"
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Irving is selling a romance of self-invention, but he’s careful to make it sound less like hustle culture and more like inevitability. “Some minds” is a sly opening: not everyone, not even most. He’s praising an exceptional type, the person whose talent doesn’t merely survive bad conditions but appears to generate its own conditions, “almost” self-created. That “almost” matters. It nods to humility and mystery while still granting the mind a near-mythic agency, as if genius were a force of nature that only grudgingly needs the world.
The sentence works by piling up resistance: “every disadvantage,” “solitary,” “a thousand obstacles.” Irving’s music is cumulative, a drumbeat of impediments that makes the eventual progress feel “irresistible.” The subtext is moral as much as intellectual: true ability is proved by friction. In a young American culture eager for origin stories unburdened by aristocratic pedigree, this is a flattering creed. It dignifies ambition while dodging questions about access and luck by framing success as a kind of inner propulsion.
Contextually, Irving is writing in the early 19th century, when American letters were trying to justify themselves against European tradition and hierarchy. The “self-creating” mind becomes a national allegory: a republic imagining its own legitimacy. Yet Irving’s phrasing also smuggles in a warning. If genius is “solitary,” society may admire it without supporting it, congratulating itself for watching someone “work” through barriers it never bothered to remove.
The sentence works by piling up resistance: “every disadvantage,” “solitary,” “a thousand obstacles.” Irving’s music is cumulative, a drumbeat of impediments that makes the eventual progress feel “irresistible.” The subtext is moral as much as intellectual: true ability is proved by friction. In a young American culture eager for origin stories unburdened by aristocratic pedigree, this is a flattering creed. It dignifies ambition while dodging questions about access and luck by framing success as a kind of inner propulsion.
Contextually, Irving is writing in the early 19th century, when American letters were trying to justify themselves against European tradition and hierarchy. The “self-creating” mind becomes a national allegory: a republic imagining its own legitimacy. Yet Irving’s phrasing also smuggles in a warning. If genius is “solitary,” society may admire it without supporting it, congratulating itself for watching someone “work” through barriers it never bothered to remove.
Quote Details
| Topic | Overcoming Obstacles |
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