A Critique of Salon’s “Who Killed the Literary Critic?” Media no better than Literary Blogosphere
Good critics, according to T.S. Eliot’s simply have to be very intelligent. I’d add that being well read, good, entertaining writers able to express strong opinion with sound arguments doesn’t hurt either.
It has been posited that possession of these attributes, or lack thereof, is what separates bloggers from capital C critics.
With all due respect, the recent discussion entitled ‘Who Killed the Literary Critic?’, between Laura Miller and Louis Bayard at Salon.com — a place where one might expect to find the quintessential ‘capital C, ‘ — exhibits precious little of what Eliot propounds; little of what is sound, proving again that there are no lines between paid literary critics and unpaid – between ‘traditional’ and blogospheric criticism – one is equally likely to find in each, bad writing and shoddy argument, memorable prose and insightful polemic.
Speaking of the former, take what Miller says about good critics:
"I often think that there are two kinds: the ones whose taste I find simpatico — the ones I come to for recommendations on what to read — and the ones who are themselves terrific writers, irrespective of what they recommend. Sometimes there’s an overlap, but not often…
James Wood has a well-formed, if rather austere aesthetic but he seems to be the only one who actually adheres in (sic) it. Of all the people I’ve met who admire Wood’s criticism I’ve yet to encounter anyone who actually subscribes to his fairly restrictive standards or taste. They like his writing and seem to feel braced by his rigor, but at the end of the day, they go home with Jonathan Franzen or Zadie Smith instead."
What kind of ignoramus admires criticism solely for the way in which it is written? Even if William Shakespeare himself were to criticize War and Peace, if his arguments are fallacious, I’m in no way going to stop reading Tolstoy. Writing and argument are essentially the same thing in criticism. Elegant style may well be pretty, and surely does turn solid observation and insight into art. But without the latter, the former is but sophistry. Akin to some of Swinburne’s poetry, delightful but shallow. Criticism cannot be called great if it isn’t powerfully persuasive. It can’t even been called good. Rather, it’s useless. Much like Miller’s observation.
All of the people [Miller has met] who admire Wood’s criticism in effect ignore its recommendations? She must be hanging around in the wrong circles. Non- literary circles obviously. Circles that apparently don’t think.
But there’s more:
"There are critics, like Wood, that I go out of my way to read, although I have no intention of ever opening the books they tout. That’s indicative of an additional aspect to criticism besides evaluation (which McDonald [Ronan, The Death of the Critic, see my review here) wants to bring back to academic criticism) and interpretation (that is, elucidating the work and its many meanings, which we could use more of in journalistic criticism). It’s the literary worth of the criticism in and of itself, and the chance to see a sophisticated reader at work."
Assuming she doesn’t mean the ‘greats’ that Wood champions, this means that poor Laura misses out on Sebald, Hamsun, Richard Price, Svevo, Coetzee, Ishiguro, Bolano, Ali, Rush etc. etc. etc.
And here’s Louis Bayard:
"…James Wood, who most nearly approximates McDonald’s ideal of "the public critic," is a standard-bearer for classical realism, as conservative in his way as Matthew Arnold."
"Classical Realism" isn’t even a literary term. According to Wikipedia (okay, it’s the most convenient source, and reasonably reliable I’d say, one of the few places, actually, that even lists the term), it refers to
"…an artistic movement in late 20th century painting that places a high value upon skill and beauty, combining elements of 19th century neoclassicism and realism…
A central idea of Classical Realism is the belief that the Modern Art movements of the 20th century caused a disruption in the understanding of art production as it was first conceived in the Classical period, resurrected in the Renaissance, and carried down through the academies to the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries."
If Wood is a ’standard bearer for classical realism’ how does Bayard explain his support of Virginia Woolf, one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the 20th century, and her opinion that when judging fiction’s success we should not focus solely on its ability to evoke ‘life,’ but consider too how it can delight us with its more formal properties of pattern and language? How too does he explain Wood’s parting line in How Fiction Works: "The true writer, that free servant of life, is one who must always be acting as if life were a category beyond anything the novel had yet grasped; as if life itself were always on the verge of becoming conventional."
May 27th, 2008 at 12:41 PM
[...] Beale points to some startlingly reactionary remarks from Salon’s “Internet Killed the Critical Star” article. Now that I’ve [...]
May 28th, 2008 at 2:52 PM
Dear Nigel,
Thanks a lot for your considered review of my book. As you’ll be aware, the
book has been widely presented on internet forums as an assault on blogging
- and has sometimes elicited some strong responses for that reason. But
actually not that much of it is on the internet or blogging at all, and
those bits that are are by and large positive. I write on p. 5 – "You can
find very bad writing and sloppy impressionism in literary blogs, but also
incisive, fresh, thoughtful criticism from voices unencumbered by the
politics of Grub St". I would put your blog as in the latter category,
which is why I’m responding here.
I agree with you that the literary critical blogosphere brings huge
benefits and I do not, contrary to what your review suggests about my book,
blame the Internet for killing the professional critic.
I do, however, think that contemporary media often flaunts an insubstantial
rhetoric of democracy (perhaps more the rhetoric than the real thing) in
its obsession with interactive forums – ‘Speak Your Mind’, ‘You Decide’ or,
as The Sun newspaper puts it cynically, ‘Txt Yr Views’. This rhetoric of
‘people power’ often finds a home in discussion about the internet. Its
bogeyman is ‘elitism’ of all kinds and it is often shored up by the idea
that ‘one opinion is as good as an other’. But one opinion, in politics,
art, literature or football, is not always as good as another. Some are
more informed, more thoughtful, more eloquent and so on.
It seems to me the internet is about much more than allowing everyone to
speak their mind, as if everyone’s view was of equal weight or interest.
Rather the blogosphere provides an opportunity for fresh voices and
perspectives to emerge. My fear is that those voices might get drowned out
by the mediocre, the banal, the ad hominem and the bilious. But, I stress,
the problem is not the Internet per se. My book argues that criticism
thrives best not in a democracy, but in a meritocracy. In so far as the
internet breaks up cosy cabals and vested interests, it can richly serve
that meritocratic goal. Nothing in my book (which is by and large about the
eschewal of evaluation amongst academic critics) suggests otherwise.
With best wishes,
Rónán