The youngest actor in the world

At what age can a child be an actor? Well, if you watch children carefully, you may find a surprising answer. At least, in the case of some children.

On Christmas Day, Tiarnan, 23 months, gave me a present. It wasn't the kind of present you wrap carefully in gaudy paper - it was the kind of present that arrives unexpectedly, a spontaneous gift made of nothing more than the child's ways, themselves.

Tiarnan was in the TV area of the house, the "lounge" where people sit, talk and watch films. He spotted a notebook on the coffee table, and picked it up. What he did then was startling. He began to walk around the room with a pacing, stride and manner that could only be described as "Daddy-like". He adopted an earnest, abstracted expression as if deep in thought and leafed through the notebook, as if searching for something. Meanwhile, his face was not idle: he puffed out his cheeks, to give them a fuller look, a, let's be frank, fatter, middle-aged look.

He seemed to be no-one other than his father. He had captured my "essence" with astonishing accuracy. There, before us, was a little Daddy toddler version.

Tiarnan had made an unconscious imitation and interpration of his Daddy, when he picked up that notebook. The notebook was mine and I think he was rendering an impression of how I am when I have an idea.

We asked him to do it again, but he wouldn't. He just turned away in shyness and self-consciousness. This is clearly the kind of thing he will do when he doesn't realize that he is being observed.

The incident left me sure of one thing, though. Tiarnan has it in him to be an actor, if he so wishes. He managed to capture the expressed personality of another person such that that person was recognizable in his chosen behaviour. To do that at just 23 months old is quite something. He did it instinctively, too - and I believe all the best actors are instinctive (as are all the best artists, of any kind).

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and no months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, four years and five months, and Tiarnan, twenty-two months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, gifted adults and gifted children in general. Thanks.)