The Genius Myth

Helen Lewis, an Atlantic staff writer and host of the BBC podcast The New Gurus, examines how the single word genius has shaped and distorted ideas of success and achievement. Whom a society calls a genius, she suggests, shows what it values, whom it leaves out, whom it enables and what it will tolerate. Lewis argues that the modern model has run its course: a lone figure of near-supernatural gifts, typically a white man, exempt from social niceties and sometimes from the law. She ranges from Leonardo da Vinci's Renaissance Florence to Elon Musk's SpaceX rocket launches, uncovers overlooked wives and collaborators, asks whether most inventions were inevitable and wonders if the Beatles would succeed today.

Adam Grant chose it as a new book to fight brain rot, calling it a provocative look at what goes wrong when brainpower is placed on a pedestal, by a journalist who does not hold back.