The Atlantic

Big Breakthroughs Come in Your Late 30s

What the ages of Nobel Prize winners tell us about creativity
Source: Yves Herman / Reuters

James Murphy, the former frontman of the band LCD Soundsystem, made what he called the biggest mistake of his life at 21, when he turned down a writing job on a sitcom that was about to launch.

The sitcom's name was Seinfeld.

Instead, he lurched around, working as a bouncer and

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