The aim of all commentary on art now should be to make works of art — and, by analogy, our own experience — more, rather than less, real to us. The function of criticism should be to show how it is what it is, even that it is what it is, rather than to show what it means.


The art of the critic in a nutshell: to coin slogans without betraying ideas. The slogans of an inadequate criticism peddle ideas to fashion.


The artist doesn't have time to listen to the critics. The ones who want to be writers read the reviews, the ones who want to write don't have the time to read reviews.


The author himself is the best judge of his own performance; none has so deeply meditated on the subject; none is so sincerely interested in the event.


The avocation of assessing the failures of better men can be turned into a comfortable livelihood, providing you back it up with a Ph.D.


The best criticism doesn't trap an employee or child in a dead end. It gives them an escape route.


The biggest critics of my books are people who never read them.


The covers of this book are too far apart.


The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic.


The critical opinions of a writer should always be taken with a large grain of salt. For the most part, they are manifestations of his debate with himself as to what he should do next and what he should avoid.


The dread of criticism is the death of genius.


The easiest thing a human being can do is to criticize another human being.


The good critic is he who relates the adventures of his soul among masterpieces.


The greatest honor that can be paid to the work of art, on its pedestal of ritual display, is to describe it with sensory completeness. We need a science of description. Criticism is ceremonial revivification.


The person of analytic or critical intellect finds something ridiculous in everything. The person of synthetic or constructive intellect, in almost nothing.


The pleasure we feel in criticizing robs us from being moved by very beautiful things.


The public is the only critic whose opinion is worth anything at all.


The rule in carving holds good as to criticism; never cut with a knife what you can cut with a spoon.


The strength of criticism lies in the weakness of the thing criticized.


The television critic, whatever his pretensions, does not labor in the same vineyard as those he criticizes; his grapes are all sour.

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