I think the whole point is erasure of the all the variables that might help make a person a success (education, parents, wealth, community, nutrition, etc.) The

I think the whole point is erasure of the all the variables that might help make a person a success (education, parents, wealth, community, nutrition, etc.) The success a person has achieved is somehow an innate part of who the person is, these other variables merely distract or (in the case of Shakespeare's teachers) hold them back. If the world would get out of their way, these people would have been even more successful even earlier. How amazing would the world be if that was the case? An obvious corollary is that these successful people don't owe anyone anything: all of these variables don't really matter. I don't think that's mentioned in this talk, however.