In a society which rewards brains over brawn, who better than a prodigy to place your bets on? The answer may surprise you.
Bobby Fischer was terrible at everything except chess. His entire life was punctuated by extreme paranoia, bouts of seclusion, and cascading, erratic behavior. Ted Kaczynski, a child math and science prodigy… I don’t have to tell you how that one worked out.
Thomas Chatterton was writing publishable poetry by the age of 12, and in the immediately ensuing years, wrote work that left its mark on the literature and influenced the romantic movement. He took his own life with arsenic three months shy of 18.
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