Age and Literary Creativity

Abstract

Research on the relation between age and creative achievement could be improved by using: (a) cross-cultural and transhistorical data, and (b) multivariate rather than bivariate analyses. A sample of 420 literary creators was drawn from histories, anthologies, and biographical dictionaries of Western, Near Eastern, and Far Eastern literatures. The modal productive age was then regressed on field and civilization categorical variables, longevity, time, and eminence control variables, and a number of interaction terms. The results confirmed that (a) poetry is produced at a younger age than prose (but failed to find any age difference between informative and imaginative prose), (b) achieved eminence and life span are positive determinants of the modal productive age, and (c) these relationships are cross-culturally and transhistorically invariant.

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