"Criticism" - читать интересную книгу автора (Poe Edgar Allan)

the gross paradox of liking a stupid book the better, because, sure
enough, its stupidity is American.*

* This charge of indiscriminant puffing will, of course, only
apply to the general character of our criticism- there are some
noble exceptions. We wish also especially to discriminate between
those notices of new works which are intended merely to call public
attention to them, and deliberate criticism on the works themselves.

Deeply lamenting this unjustifiable state of public feeling, it
has been our constant endeavor, since assuming the Editorial duties of
this Journal, to stem, with what little abilities we possess, a
current so disastrously undermining the health and prosperity of our
literature.
We have seen our efforts applauded by men whose applauses we
value. From all quarters we have received abundant private as well
as public testimonials in favor of our Critical Notices, and, until
very lately, have heard from no respectable source one word
impugning their integrity or candor. In looking over, however, a
number of the New York Commercial Advertiser, we meet with the
following paragraph.
"'The last number of the Southern Literary Messenger is very
readable and respectable. The contributions to the Messenger are
much better than the original matter. The critical department of
this work- much as it would seem to boast itself of impartiality and
discernment,- is in our opinion decidedly quacky. There is in it a
great assumption of acumen, which is completely unsustained. Many a
work has been slashingly condemned therein, of which the critic
himself could not write a page, were he to die for it. This
affectation of eccentric sternness in criticism, without the power
to back one's suit withal, so far from deserving praise, as some
suppose, merits the strongest reprehension. Philadelphia Gazette.'
"We are entirely of opinion with the Philadelphia Gazette in
relation to the Southern Literary Messenger, and take this occasion to
express our total dissent from the numerous and lavish encomiums we
have seen bestowed upon its critical notices. Some few of them have
been judicious, fair and candid; bestowing praise and censure with
judgement and impartiality; but by far the greater number of those
we have read, have been flippant, unjust, untenable and uncritical.
The duty of the critic is to act as judge, not as enemy, of the writer
whom he reviews; a distinction of which the Zoilus of the Messenger
seems not to be aware. It is possible to review a book sincerely,
without bestowing opprobrious epithets upon the writer, to condemn
with courtesy, if not with kindness. The critic of the Messenger has
been eulogized for his scorching and scarifying abilities, and he
thinks it incumbent upon him to keep up his reputation in that line,
by sneers, sarcasm and downright abuse; by straining his vision with
microscopic intensity in search of faults, and shutting his eyes, with
all his might to beauties. Moreover, we have detected him, more than
once, in blunders quite as gross as those on which it was his pleasure