Confidence Shouldn’t Come with Global Roaming

Liu Zhenyun not being good at English is not really a problem at all.

For people of his generation, English was not the kind of gatekeeping requirement it is today when they went to university. He later spent his career writing in Chinese, with little professional need to use English. There is nothing remarkable about an excellent Chinese-language novelist not speaking English well. Being able to read works in the original English would certainly be an advantage, but it is a bonus, not a professional qualification.

What is more interesting is that people who are not good at English can sometimes be especially willing to speak it.

In everyday conversation, getting things wrong is no big deal. But in a formal setting, dressed in a suit, standing on a stage in front of a room full of people, speaking continuously for two minutes while almost every sentence goes wrong, the issue is no longer simply English. A more interesting question appears — does a person actually know what they cannot do?

That reminds me of Mark Zuckerberg giving a speech in Chinese at Tsinghua University. His Chinese was also a struggle, with tones frequently going off course. He looked exhausted speaking it, and the audience had to work hard listening to it. It was a little like watching someone carry a piece of furniture that is clearly heavier than they are. You admire the determination while also worrying that, at any moment, they may end up underneath it.

Zuckerberg’s example, though, had at least a mildly inspirational quality. His awkwardness was part of the message — he was showing that he was genuinely learning. The same behaviour can mean something quite different when it comes from different people.

After achieving great success in one field, it is easy for a person to carry that confidence into other fields almost by default. Someone runs a successful company and starts feeling qualified to explain history. Someone writes excellent novels and decides a little English should be no problem. Someone does first-rate scientific research and suddenly begins offering guidance on life, marriage and international politics. Human ability is highly specialised; human confidence, by contrast, often comes in a universal edition.

Fame makes this even easier because it provides a buffer when people cross those boundaries.

When an ordinary person says one wrong thing, someone will usually tell them directly. A famous person can say ten wrong things and still receive applause. Sometimes the applause is politeness, sometimes respect for status, and sometimes simply an audience trying to prevent an awkward silence. The speaker may not always be able to tell the difference.

That creates an interesting possibility — reputation earned in Field A gets taken into Field B and used like a credit card.

None of this is about finding psychological comfort in the mistakes of famous people. Nobody is good at everything. The more successful a person is, the more likely it may be that one particular part of them is unusually strong while the rest remains perfectly ordinary, or even below average. Perhaps that is one small piece of fairness the world has kept.

What is really worth studying is still why these people became successful, not where they embarrassed themselves. But there is some value in occasionally noticing the embarrassment as well, because it reminds us of something simple — success can carry influence across many fields, but ability usually does not travel quite so easily.

Confidence probably should not come with global roaming either.