The United States doesn’t have the class of literary supplements that you find in Spain and many other countries. It only has one important periodical literary criticism publication: The New York Review of Books. There aren’t any powerful American critics any more, as there were up until the 1960s, writing in a prose that was understandable by anyone and introducing literature into the political, social and moral problems of the day. So-called ‘serious’ criticism has passed, for the main part, into the dominion of academics, who write in a specialist jargon, in the strange belief that the complex can only be presented by means of impenetrable phrases… Criticism, in the United States, has been reduced to ‘recommendations’, which arrive through reviews, blogs and Twitter. Prizes have become the standard validation of literary merit. I can’t think of a single American critic to whom one can turn in search of ideas …
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Quote of the day
I found this indictment by Eliot Weinberger of the terrible predicament of contemporary criticism in Squandermania and other foibles. If you substitute Canada for the United States, it's what I've been trying to say for years.
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8 comments:
This is accurate for Britain too. Our broadsheets have become degraded and populist, partly due to the influence of Rupert Murdoch after his acquisition of the Time and Sunday Times. In France, it's different, and the big newpapers publish serious, heavyweight essays and reviews which we really don't see here. The reduction of criticism to 'prizes and recommendations' has also given rise to writers who are unable to stomach criticism - one historian is currently suing the London Review of Books of a review.
Thanks, Alan
It's probably why the best criticism (of any kind)continues to come from France.I can't imagine Badiou, Ranciere, et al flourishing anywhere else.
Alan,
just one more thing. Can you recommend any France newspapers that publish serious literary reviews? I'd like to link to them if possible.
friends reccommend friends' (books/poems) ad nauseaum
& it s all become so non-stop narcissistic, trite & boring
that
I can't find one Iota of humor anywhere....
(I reviewed a book of poetry last year and thought that the only thing in the entire book that "worked" was the title. and I gave several instances/ passages out of the poems to show how absurd/trite/amateurish the poems were... the editor wouldn't post the review as "it s too negative"
I just read the obvious ones, Le Monde, Figaro etc - the former is a staid, establishment paper, but does publish good literary stuff. On-line, it hosts Pierre Assouline's excellent blog, La République des Livres:
http://passouline.blog.lemonde.fr/)
Unfortunately, to get Le Figaro Littéraire online you have to pay. Same with Libération, which also has good quality articles.
Thank you, Alan, for the République des Livres link!
A wonderful source.
I grew up idolizing literary criticism, because I found out (in high school) how much more urbane and sophisticated I could be in displaying my understanding of literary works in formal assignments. Sort of an upper echelon of Cliff Notes.
But writing poetry came from a different place. That was about mischief, and imitating the naughty art of poetry--a secret precinct where my emotions and feelings and desires could be explored and expressed, and I could pretend to be something in the real world, i.e., a poet--for which there was no official permission.
I loved Edmund Wilson, for instance, and read all his books. I could have continued down that path right into the academic world of theses, articles and cloistered insulation from the "real world" but chose not to--best decision I ever made.
Curtis,
I'm glad you didn't go the academic route either: the meanness & and small-mindedness of academia are the reason the 'great critic' has long disappeared from our shores.
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