#criticism

But there is in everything a reasonable division of labour. I have written the book, and nothing on earth would induce me to read it. ↗

— G.K. Chesterton

#humor #literary-criticism #humor

...a fundamental rule of journalism, which is to tell a story and stick to it. The narratives of journalism (significantly called "stories"), like those of mythology and folklore, derive their power from their firm, undeviating sympathies and antipathies. Cinderella must remain good and the stepsisters bad. "Second stepsister not so bad after all" is not a good story. ↗

— Janet Malcolm

#literary-criticism

The way contemporary literature is emerging, soon we can expect "Item poetry" in novels. ↗

— Himmilicious

#literary-criticism #literature-quotes #literary-criticism

Here the phenomenologist has nothing in common with the literary critic who, as has frequently been noted, judges a work that he could not create and, if we are to believe certain facile condemnations, would not want to create. A literary critic is a reader who is necessarily severe. By turning inside out like a glove an overworked complex that has become debased to the point of being part of the vocabulary of statesmen, we might say that the literary critic and the professor of rhetoric, who know-all and judge-all, readily go in for a simplex of superiority. As for me, being an addict of felicitous reading, I only read and re-read what I like, with a bit of reader's pride mixed in with much enthusiasm. ↗

— Gaston Bachelard

#literary-criticism

In the beginning God created man in His own image, and man has been trying to repay the favor ever since. ↗

— Voltaire

#religion #religion

I'm fairly competant as a director and actor, but I am Mr. Neurotic as a writer. I just don't have enough confidence in my abilities to take criticism well. I take it personally. Start with 'It's a masterpiece,' and then tell me what you think could be changed. ↗

— Tim Robbins

#am #changed #confidence #could #criticism

Few people have the wisdom to prefer the criticism that would do them good, to the praise that deceives them. ↗

— Francois de La Rochefoucauld

#deceives #few #few people #good #people

Sometimes when I hear criticism of my husband, I want to come out of my seat and clock somebody. But you learn to take a deep breath. ↗

— Ann Romney

#clock #come #criticism #deep #deep breath

Above all, for his merciless, contemptuous treatment of Clifford Chatterley, blown to bits in Flanders in 1918, Lawrence can be damned to hell. Damned but not banned. ↗

— Germaine Greer

#literary-criticism

Ivanov had been a party member since 1902. Back then he had tried to write stories in the manner of Tolstoy, Chekhov, Gorky, or rather he had tried to plagiarize them without much success, which led him, after long reflection (a whole summer night), to the astute decision that he should write in the manner of Odoevsky and Lazhechnikov. Fifty percent Odoevsky and fifty percent Lazhecknikov. This went over well, in part because readers, their memories mostly faulty, had forgotten poor Odoevsky (1803-1869) and poor Lazhechnikov (1792-1869), who died the same year, and in part because literary criticism, as keen as ever, neither extrapolated nor made the connection nor noticed a thing. ↗

— Roberto Bolaño

#literary-criticism