Title: Powers of two : finding the essence of innovation in creative pairs /
Authors: Shenk, Joshua Wolf.
Year: 2014
Subjects: Creative ability; Creative thinking; Couples.; Artistic collaboration.; Teams in the workplace; PSYCHOLOGY / Creative Ability.; SOCIAL SCIENCE / General.; HISTORY / Social History.; ART / General.; Creativity; Cooperative Behavior
Abstract: "Recently writers like Malcolm Gladwell, Steven Johnson, and Clay Shirky have sought to explain creativity as the work of lucky, hardworking people or the result of certain qualities of a particular environment or group of people. Joshua Wolf Shenk shows how such notions, as appealing as they are, miss the essence of creativity, which is generated by people working in pairs. From John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Pierre and Marie Curie to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, Shenk portrays many of history's most iconic creative duos, drawing on new scientific research and building an argument that will reshape our view of the individual, relationships, and society itself. Along the way, he reveals how pairs begin to talk, think, and even look like each other; how the most successful ones thrive on conflict; why they break up; and more. He also marshals new research that suggests how deeply the notion of pairing influences our psyches: even when we're alone, we're collaborating with the voice inside our head. At once intuitive and deeply surprising, Powers of Two is mind-blowing"--
Contents: Meeting. "You remind me of Charlie Munger" : matchups and magnet places ; Identical twins from the ends of the earth : the convergence of homophily and heterophily ; "Like two young bear cubs" : the varieties of electric experience -- Confluence. Presence --> confidence --> trust : the stages of confluence ; The turn of faith : the final stage ; "Everybody just get the fuck out" : the psychology of "we" ; "No power in heaven, hell or earth" : creative marriage -- Dialectics. In the spotlight (in the shadows) : the star and the director ; Jokestein and Structureberg : the liquid and the container ; Inspiration and perspiration : the dreamer and the doer ; Turn-taking : generators and resonators ; "Everything's the opposite" : the psychology of dialectics ; The "other" of the psyche : the dialogue of creative thinking -- Distance. Creative monks and Siamese twins : the extremes of distance ; "Somehow we also kept surprising each other" : the varieties of distance ; "Desire for that which is missing" : the erotics of distance -- The infinite game. My most intimate enemy : creative foils ; Luke Skywalker and Han Solo : creative pairs and coopetition ; "We all want the hand" : power clarity and power fluidity ; "I love to scrap with Orv" : conflict ; Varieties of alphas and betas : the Hitchcock paradox ; "What about McCartney-Lennon?" : the dance of power -- Interruption. "Listen, this is too crazy..." : stumbles ; The paradox of success : wedges ; Failure to repair : why did Lennon-McCartney split? ; The never endings : Did Lennon-McCartney ever split? -- Barton Fink at the Standard Hotel.