Thursday 31 January 2008

Great Is The Enemy Of Good

This is a phrase that I've been using for quite a while, though I tend to put it "Perfect is the enemy of good". Over at Coding Horror they've found that Steve Martin, whose prior funniness does indeed forgive him any number of Father of the Brides, shares a very similar opinion:
The consistent work enhanced my act. I learned a lesson: it was easy to be great. Every entertainer has a night when everything is clicking. These nights are accidental and statistical: like lucky cards in poker, you can count on them occurring over time. What was hard was to be good, consistently good, night after night, no matter what the circumstances.

Coding Horror recasts this as: strive to be consistently good, and the greatness takes care of itself. I don't know, though, I think it actually comes out as: Great happens, good takes work.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

i cann´t get hold of you so turn the phone on. a guy called bernhard fowler is playing in traun (near linz) tomorrow with support from little axe and tackhead. all superb stuff. all bands are basically th same people but stylistically different. ask joe if he knows the drummer in all 3 formations, he´s a top man called kieth le blanc. speak to you soon ... mike