The Beatles: Why John Lennon said their success had nothing to do with talent

10 June 2025, 12:08

The Beatles are often hailed as geniuses of pop, but John Lennon shrugged off grandiose claims about his talent.

The Beatles were legends in their own lifetime.

Countless books were written about the band in the decade they were together. Many more have been written in the 55 years since the breakup.

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Arguably the best is Hunter Davies's The Beatles: The Authorised Biography.

The only authorised account of the band written while they were a going concern, Davies published the book in 1968 having spent 18 months with the group, speaking extensively with the band themselves as well as thei friends, family and associates.

While the book is the origin of many of the now-canonical stories about The Beatles, it's written with a rare mix of respect and distance that, together with its contemporaneous nature, sets it apart from most other biographies.

So many Beatles bios focus on the musical genius of the Fab Four, painting the group – and especially John Lennon and Paul McCartney – as uniquely talented figures magically spinning gold from straw like a pair of pop Rapunzels.

John and George in a rare moment of calm during The Beatles’ first visit to America.

Davies doesn't go in for any of this mythmaking.

As well as eye-opening but also matter-of-fact description from inside the room of Lennon and McCartney writing songs like 'With A Little Help From My Friends' ("What rhymes with 'time'?") and 'It's Getting Better', he also quoted John Lennon himself shrugging off the prevalent OTT claims about the Fab Four's fame being down to some unique talent.

Lennon instead suggested that the secret to success wasn't otherworldly ability, but instead self-belief and luck.

"We're not better than anybody else," Lennon told Davies. "We're all the same. We're as good as Beethoven. Everyone's the same inside.

"You need the desire and the right circumstances, but it's nothing to do with talent, or training or eduction."

He continued: "What's talent? I don't know. Are you born with it, do you discover you have it later on?? The basic talent is believing you can do something."

Lennon pointed at the works by primitive painters and writers who never had training or education, but just had the belief that they could do something,

He argued George Harrison refused to draw for a long time because he thought he couldn't do it, but as soon as he and Paul talked him round he started doing it all the time, and got better, too.

"Up to the age of 15 I was no different from any other little c**t of 15," Lennon said. "Then I decided I'd write a little song, and I did.

"But it didn't make me any different. That's a load of crap that I discovered I had a latent. I just did it. I've no talent, except a talent for being happy or a talent for skiving.

"Somebody wants to bust open this whole talent myth, wise everybody up. Politicians have no talent. It's all a con."

It wasn't a one-off thought, either.

The Beatles - I'm Only Sleeping

Earlier in the book, Lennon admitted that while he enjoyed it when people liked his music, he had little time for those who "appreciated" it or looked too deep into his songs.

"Beethoven is a con, just like we are now," Lennon claimed. He was just knocking out a bit of work, that was all."

It's worth mentioning that Lennon slightly walked back the idea that he didn't have any talent in an interview not long after The Authorised Biography was released.

Lennon spoke to to Maurice Hindle and Daniel Wiles for Keele University magazine UNIT in December 1968 where he added a bit more nuance to his remarks.

"I used to think anybody can write songs and be a pop star – I think we even said it in 'The Beatle Book' last year by Hunter Davies – I've changed that much since then because I don't believe it now," Lennon said.

"I made it because I'm me and I have that thing that makes music and makes those songs up. I believe everybody has got something. They've just got to bring it out. The job I've chosen to do is write and record songs. It's my job."

He added of his work: "I say it is a con job in the terms of reference I'm using, like when I say Picasso was conning them and so was Beethoven both having a laugh up their sleeves; because they were.

"Anybody that's as great as they were, knows where it's at, and they know that it's all drivel like the stuff that's written aboout our songs and the Stones and Dylan and all that.

"Dylan knows where it's at in regard to our sings and what people liked about them and that is the 'con' job ...I don't think that 'con' is a derogative word."

Hunter Davies revisited The Beatles: The Authorised Biography in 1978, 1982, 1985, 2002, 2009, and 2018, adding extra material to make the story up to date, but it's that original text that continues to give a unique insight into the band at the height of their fame.