Reading people’s guesses about the authors’ types in the first issue of Type Writer has been both enjoyable and educational for me. Even when people chose not to disclose their reasoning, it was enlightening and fun to try to discern what it was about the piece, or the author’s comments, that had suggested a particular guess.

The ‘correct’ types of the authors are:

‘Mermaid’s Song’ by Jane Carlton, INFP, 9
‘Sky Child’ and ‘The Flu Defense’ by c.frost, INXP, 5w4 or 4w5 with 9
‘Sport’ by Diane Harcus, INFJ, 6 with a very strong 5 wing
‘Joey and Lisa Go Fishing’ by Dave Kramer, INTJ, probably 5

Although there was a wide range of guesses, ranging from accurate and perceptive to the proverbial ‘wild guess’, certain patterns emerge about both the methods people employed to help decide on the author’s types, and about the kinds of guesses made about particular authors.

‘Mermaid’s Song’ by Jane Carlton, an INFP and a 9, was a piece that attracted the most almost-‘correct’ guesses — that is, guesses that agreed with the author’s own understanding of her type. Nobody sucessfully guessed the combination of INFP/9, but it does seem that most people not only saw the strong NFP element in the poem (and thus guessed either INFP or ENFP) but associated these with either 4, and to a lesser degree, with 9, 2 or 6. In fact, the vast majority of guesses were INFP/4. So while the majority of MBTI guesses for this poem were accurate, the enneagram ones, for the most part, were not.

Why is it that so many people guessed this particular combination of INFP and 4? The first reason that comes to mind is that many people tend to regard INFP as almost equivalent to enneagram type 4, or at least think that most INFPs are likely to be 4s. Whether or not this can stand up statistically, it appears to be contradicted by this example, at least. Jane Carlton is certainly both an INFP and a 9.

It seems clear why this poem was seen as the product of an XNFP (although there were a few other close guesses, such as INFJ.) Many saw its introspective, feeling, symbolic qualities as reflective of NFP. The reasons given for typing it as 4 included its emotional and relationship content and its romantic sensibility. Yet while there is certainly some overlap between these the sets of qualities that people characterized as indicative of INFP and 4 repectively, it becomes clear that the automatic assumption of correspondence between INFP and 4 is quite erroneous.

Another assumption that seems evident here is that the apparent presence of emotional content, or content about relationships, generally indicates the dominance of type 4 (or 2, as seen in the fact that a few people guessed 2 for this author). This opens up the question of what is meant by such terms as “emotion”. Perhaps it highlights a confusion in the language used in the two systems. “Feeling”, used in MBTI descriptions, is frequently confused with “emotion”, but is not necessarliy the same thing. ‘Mermaid’s Song’ is strongly F in the MBTI sense but is not really about “emotion” as it is generally used in enneagram literature in descriptions of 4 or 2. It seems to me that ‘Mermaid’s Song’ is not really concerned with the emotion of loss or separation in itself, which would seem to be more representative of the 4 style.

Those who saw the writer as a 9 seem to have picked up on this. Jon Zuck (INFP, 4w5) who actually guessed 4, wrote, “When I clicked on the link, I kicked myself for not recognizing 9. I was thinking 4 because of heartbreak, but a 4's poem would probably be concentrating more on the anguish of her own hurt, here there's just a brief reference to it, ‘it hurt me too,’ and the language is rather matter-of-fact, not as melodramatic as it would be with a 4. Looking at it now, I see the whole poem radiates peace, not emotion. Very niney.” Perhaps, too, the fact that Jon is himself an INFP/4 predisposed him to originally see this INFP as a 4 as well.

Diane Harcus, (INFJ, 6w5, the author of ‘Sport’) who initially typed the author as a 4, a little later changed her mind and guessed 9. She wrote, “I guessed 4 at first, given the sheer romanticism of the tale. But her statement is very Nineish. Her ‘not knowing her reasons for leaving him’. Having ‘merged herself’ with him etc.” Then Diane perceptively adds, ‘Of course her saying that this was not a very typish poem, was a clue in itself.”

Paul Sturtevant, an ENFP and 4, who correctly typed ‘Mermaid’s Song’ as 9 with his first try, noted, “The poem made me feel she was a Seven, because I sensed an unexplainable need to avoid commintment. But her comments about merging swayed me to say Nine.”

The frequent combination of XNFP with 4 in the guesses does seem to reinforce my personal impression that not only do points 4 and 9 have a certain commonality but that they are often confused. On a personal note, Jane’s poem and her comments have helped me to see much more clearly the differences between 4 and 9.

Incidentally, the two remarks above by Paul and Diane indicate that at least in some cases, the authors’ comments were just as important as the writing piece itself in getting a grasp on the author’s possible type. Perhaps text by itself is just not always adequate to giving the reader that grasp, especially where, as in this project, we only have a single piece to type, rather than a whole collection by a writer over a period of years.

Both c.frost’s two poems, ‘Sky Child’and ‘The Flu Defense’, and David Kramer ’s ‘Lisa and Joey Go Fishing’ seemed to be quite difficult for people to pin down. This may be, I believe, due to the playful rather than serious approach of their authors, which seems to have had the effect of somewhat camouflaging the real person behind the writing.

Frost’s two poems attracted a very wide range of MBTI guesses, from ESFP to INTJ and everything in between. My feeling is that it was the great difference in tone between the two poems that made the author’s MBTI type so difficult to pin down. It is interesting and significant, I think, that c.frost him/herself also finds it hard to settle on one type, although s/he identifies most strongly with INXP.

People’s guesses about c.frost’s enneagram type were not nearly as diverse, however. There were several correct guesses of 5 (which I regard as fairly accurate since frost is self-described as either 5w4 or 4w5), but unfortunately nobody chose to explain their reasoning. My own conjecture is that someone writing in two such different styles was presumed to be both clever and detatched in many ways; thus the 5 verdict. Jon Zuck (INFP, 4w5) typed c.frost as a 7 because of “a tremendous amount of playfulness in both poems.” While incorrect, this strikes me as a very perceptive comment, as c.frost certainly does profess to a good deal of playfulness in his/her personality. Interestingly, one of the arrow points of 5 is 7.

Dave Kramer’s ‘Joey and Lisa Go Fishing’ also seemed to be an enigma for many readers, as it attracted a fairly wide range of type guesses. This may have been partly because in his statement Dave had explained that the story had been written as part of a contest, and that it did not really reflect his real type very well. So all kinds of wild guesses were made. One person, c.frost, did manage to type Dave correctly as an INTJ based on this very comment, that the piece was not really typical of the author’s usual style. As far as the enneagram types were concerned, a few people correctly guessed 5. (Dave is not sure of his enneagram type, since he feels much more rapport with the MBTI, but 5 seems to be his most likely type.) Diane Harcus (INFJ, 6w5) perceptively pointed out that (from Dave’s statement) his vocation as a software consultant, the cleverness of the way he managed to inventively combine all four nouns into a story for the contest, and (from the story itself) “his disdain for the romance in his original story, the email relationship with Mai Lin seeming to have more reality to him, than the face to face one he has with Lisa” all point towards the writer being a 5.

For me, all this brings up an important question: even if a writer is “playing a game” or actually trying to camouflage his or her real type, could there be clues in the text or sub-text that could nevertheless point to the writer’s true type? Judging from this example, it would seem to be possible, given the perception of the right clues (which both c.frost and Diane Harcus seemed to have done in different ways).

Diane Harcus’s own story, ‘Sport’, also attracted a pretty wide range of guesses, but quite a few people correctly guessed her enneagram type, but not her MBTI type, though there were close guesses.

The closest MBTI guess was ISFJ, which was made by both Walter Geldart and Peter Corbett. Both Walter (INFP, 9, and the author of papers in this Journal) and Peter (INTP, 5w4) pointed out the strong sensing components of Diane’s story. Peter came to his MBTI conclusion by examining the story with each MBTI letter at a time. He guessed S because of what he describes as the “situational awareness” of the piece. And the story does seem (to me, anyway) to have a strong S component—there appears to be a wealth of detail and sense impressions. Now of course, Diane describes herself as an INFJ, not an ISFJ. So it’s possible that in this case, the author’s type is not well reflected in the particular story presented here.

There is another possiblility as well. If we can accept the validity of John Fudjack and Pat Dinkelaker’s theory that having considerable N need not necessarily (contrary to traditional MBTI thoery) rule out that same individual also having considerable S, it might be possible that the assignation of INFJ to Diane is not completely incompatible with her having a strong S function as well.

A number of people pointed out the themes of doubt, loyalty and danger in both the story itself and in the author’s comments, and accurately typed Diane as a 6. Peter Corbett again: “The key word here was ‘danger’—once I had that word in my head, then 6 was there in the back of my mind, waiting for further evidence. The fox’s relation to the cubs speaks of loyalty, duty—very 6ish. There’s an element of ‘situational awareness’—also 6ish.” Interestingly, Peter has used this term “situational awareness” twice, in terms of both 6 and S qualities. This again brings up the suggestion that the piece exudes S even though its author herself types as an N—a situation which, as I have described, has various possible explanations. In any case, since Diane identifies as an INFJ, nobody actually guessed both her MBTI and her enneagram types together, although Peter came very close.

The manner in which people chose to go about typing the writers is interesting to consider in itself, and may sometimes say as much about the guesser’s type as about the writer’s. Peter Corbett was one of the few who came close to guessing correctly using the method of analyzing the MBTI letters one by one. His choice of methods may reflect on his own type (INTP, 5w4). This method sometimes seemed to lead other people astray, however, as did another method used by some, an attempt to type particular words and phrases used in a piece, since both tend to encourage a rather mechanical approach and don’t necessarily take into account the overall orientation of the writer.

Walter Geldart (INFP, 9) was one guesser who approached the pieces from a very intuitive point of view. With this approach, he didn’t manage to guess completely accurately, but he did often accurately describe an underlying process implicit in the piece, involving the various arrow points of each enneagram number. For example, Walter was able to beautifully describe the probable process of the movement from 6 to 3 to 9 of the author of “Mermaid’ s Song’, although he actually guessed 6 rather than 9 for her type.

I would like to publically thank the writers of the pieces in this issue--Jane Carlton, c.frost, Dave Kramer and Diane Harcus, for allowing me to publish their work on Type Writer, for being so generous in their comments and discussions, and for so bravely consenting to allow the general public to dissect and discuss their pieces of writing. I also want to warmly thank John Fudjack who has been so insightful, helpful and supportive to me from the beginning of this project.

I also want to thank all those people who not only engaged in lively discussions with me about their guesses but consented to being named and quoted in this article. Those whose comments I have not quoted were omitted only because I lacked the space to include them all.

As an enjoyable bonus, I also had the pleasure of reading the products of some people’s instant imagination from the “On the Spot” section of the page, where people were invited compose a poem on the spot and email it to us. It would be impossible to include them all, but here is a taste:

Peter Corbett (INTP, 5w4) wrote:

There was a young man from Dumbarton
Who once drank milk from the carton
His nagging old wife
Said, “Not on your life!”
Don’t you know that these are now things to part on!”

Paul Sturtevant (ENFP, 4) sent this one:

On the Spot
Is what it’s not.
But I thought
I’d take a shot.

Finally, John Fudjack, co-creator of this Journal (INFJ, 4) sent what to me, at least, seems like a very Fourish poem:

When a virtual tree
Falls in cyberspace
And there is nobody there to hear it
Who gets to keep the apples?

This poem seems to have a Fourish feel because, like a haiku, it has an unexpected turn of events in the last line, and an illusion that something is coming out of nothing--kind of like pulling a rabbit out of a Four's hat! In its own way, Paul Sturtevant's line "On the spot/is what it's not" has a similar feel; while Peter Corbett's clever limerick certainly feels compatible with INTP/5.

Editing ‘Type Writer’ has indeed been an enlightening experience. I’m looking forward to receiving many more pieces of writing, and many more attempts to type them, in future issues. Please feel free to share with me any comments about this article, the authors and their types, how people guessed, or about writing and type in general.