In the actual, not the possible, writers of our criticism there is, in the lower ranks, a lack of skill, of seriousness, of reasonable competence, and a cynical acceptance of the dishonest rôle they are expected to play; in the higher ranks, there is a lack of any vital message, a desire rather to win, without offending the publisher, the approval of the ultra-literary and the scholarly, than really to reach and teach the public. It is this degradation, this lack of earnestness, and not lack of inherent interest in the general topic, which makes our critical work unpopular, and deprives the whole literary industry of that quickening and increase of public interest from which alone can spring a vigorous and healthy growth. This feebleness will begin to vanish the moment that the publishers of books, who support criticism, say peremptorily that reviews that interest, not reviews that puff, are what they want. When they say this, that is the kind of reviews they will get. If that criticism indeed prove interesting, it will then be printed up to the value of the buying power of the public, and it will be supported where it should be—not by the publisher but by the people. It is said in excuse that, as a city has the government, so the public has the criticism, which it deserves. That is debatable; but, even so, to whose interest is it that the taste of the public should be improved? Honest criticism addressed to the public, by writers who study how to interest it rather than how to flatter the producers of books, would educate. The education of readers, always the soundest investment of the publisher, can never be given by servile reviewers feebly echoing his own interested advertisements. They are of no value—to the public, the publisher, or the author.
The publisher of a newspaper of which reviews are an incident need not, however, wait for the signal. If, acting on the assumption that his duty is, not to the publisher but to the public, he will summon competent and earnest reviewers to speak the truth as they see it, he will infallibly increase the vivacity and interest of his articles and the pleasure and confidence of his readers. He will not have any permanent loss of advertising. Whenever he establishes his periodical as one read by lovers of literature, he has the publishers at his mercy. But suppose that his advertising decreases? Let him not make the common mistake of measuring the value of a department by the amount of related advertising that it attracts. The general excellence of his paper as an advertising medium—supposing he has no aim beyond profit—is what he should seek. The public which reads and enjoys books is worth attracting, even if the publisher does not follow, for it buys other things than books.
If, however, his newspaper is not one that can please people of literary tastes, he will get book-advertising only in negligible quantities no matter how much he may praise the volumes sent him. Of what use are puffs which fall not under the right eyes?
If, again, his periodical seems an exception to this reasoning, and his puffery appears to bring him profit, let him consider the parts of it unrelated to literature; he will find there matter which pleases readers of intelligence, and he may be sure that this, quite as much as his praise, is what brings the publishers’ advertisements; he may be sure that, should he substitute sincere criticism, the advertisements would increase.
III
The third complaint of the author—from whom I have wandered—is that critics do not agree. To argue that whenever two critics hold different opinions, the criticism of one of them must be valueless, is absurd. The immediate question is, valueless to whom—to the public or to the author?
If the author is meant, the argument assumes that criticism is written for the instruction of the author, which is not true. Grammar and facts a critic can indeed correct; but he never expects to change an author’s style or make his talent other than it is. Though he may lash the man, he does not hope to reform him. However slightly acquainted with psychology, the critic knows that a mature writer does not change and cannot change; his character is made, his gifts, such as they are, are what they are. On the contrary, the critic writes to influence the public—to inform the old, to train the young. He knows that his chief chance is with plastic youth; he hopes to form the future writer; still more he hopes to form the future reader. He knows that the effect of good reviewing stops not with the books reviewed, but influences the reader’s choice among thousands of volumes as yet undreamed of by any publisher.
If, on the other hand, the public is meant, the argument assumes that one man’s meat is not another man’s poison. The bird prefers seed, and the dog a bone, and there is no standard animal food. Nor, likewise, is there any standard intellectual food: both critics, however they disagree, may be right.
No author, no publisher, should think that variety invalidates criticism. If there is any certainty about critics, it is that they will not think alike. The sum of x (a certain book) plus y (a certain critic) can never be the same as x (the same book) plus z (a different critic). A given book cannot affect a man of a particular ability, temperament, training, as it affects one of a different ability, temperament, and training. A book is never complete without a reader, and the value of the combination is all that can be found out. For the value of a book is varying: it varies with the period, with the nationality, with the character of the reader. Shakespeare had one value for the Elizabethans; he has a different value for us, and still another for the Frenchman; he has a special value for the playgoer, and a special value for the student in his closet. In respect of literary art, pragmatism is right: there is no truth, there are truths. About all vital writing there is a new truth born with each new reader. Therein lies the unending fascination of books, the temptation to infinite discussion. To awaken an immortal curiosity is the glory of genius.
From all this it follows that critics are representative; each one stands for a group of people whose spokesman he has become, because he has, on the whole, their training, birth from their class, the prejudices of their community and of their special group in that community, and therefore expresses their ideals. Once let publisher and author grasp this idea, and criticism, however divergent, will come to have a vital meaning for them. The publisher can learn from the judgment of the critic what the judgment of his group in the community is likely to be, and from a succession of such judgments through a term of years, he can gain valuable information as to the needs, the tastes, the ideals of the public, or of the group of publics, which he may wish to serve. Accurate information straight from writers serving the public—that, I cannot too often repeat, is worth more to him than any amount of obsequious praise. That precisely is what he cannot get until all critics are what they should be—lawyers whose only clients are their own convictions.