Still thinking about Sherlock, but this is a more general question...

[magnetic_pole]

I had an interesting exchange with donnaimmaculata on Monday about our frustrations with Sherlock and the way the show treats his "cleverness" as a superpower, which in turn got me thinking a bit about the various types of intelligence, and how they manifest themselves, and how you can depict them in fic.

So my question for you, flist, is this: is there someone in your life who's particularly bright in one way or another, and how can you tell? How would you go about representing that kind of intelligence in a fic? And/or, if you've written fic about a particularly bright person, how did you represent that aspect of their character?

Comments

[magnetic_pole]

BBC!Sherlock is pretty good at showing that quality. What they don't show is how for v.v. smart people coming up with the "right answer" is also a matter of trial-and-error (we call that "science"), it's just that they run most of the trials in their brains and very quickly.

*nods* And, ironically, seeing the process makes it more believable to me. I feel like some of the earlier episodes, with their slower pacing, allowed for more trial-and-error in Sherlock's methods, which brought me on board. The faster episodes seem to arrive at an answer too quickly. I think it may be because there's a certain something to seeing when you're wrong, or adjusting an answer to make it fit. Seeing Sherlock right all the time, immediately, makes his deductions seem more like a trick.

I'm with you on the social intelligence, which is one reason why this version doesn't always work for me. And the disguises--yes! I'm not sure why they haven't gone there very often. M.