Literary Criticism Quotes

Browse through our collection of quotes tagged with Literary Criticism.

As long as people believe in the written word and a good sto

As long as people believe in the written word and a good story.. They will believe in me.

Inspirational Literary Criticism

I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thi

I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be silent as to his works.

Work Obscurity Apathy Writing Literary Criticism

What are American dry-goods? asked the duchess, raising her

What are American dry-goods? asked the duchess, raising her large hands in wonder and accentuating the verb.American novels, answered Lord Henry.

Humor Funny Books American Sarcasm Literary Criticism Novels

Only an obstinate prejudice about this period (which I will

Only an obstinate prejudice about this period (which I will presently try to account for) could blind us to a certain change which comes over the merely literary texts as we pass from the Middle Ages to the sixteenth century.

Literary Criticism

Attempts to connect men's circumstances too closely with the

Attempts to connect men's circumstances too closely with their literary productions are usually, I believe, unsuccessful.

Literary Criticism

The history of literature is very far from being one of simp

The history of literature is very far from being one of simple progress.

Literary Criticism

There is some relationship between the hunger for truth and

There is some relationship between the hunger for truth and the search for the right words. This struggle may be ultimately indefinable and even undecidable, but one damn well knows it when one sees it.

Christopher Hitchens

Truth Language Literature Literary Criticism Doris Lessing

In reality the puritans and the humanists were quite often t

In reality the puritans and the humanists were quite often the same people.

Literary Criticism

What is vital and healthy does not necessarily survive... An

What is vital and healthy does not necessarily survive... An art, a whole civilization, may at any time slip through men's fingers in a very few years and be gone beyond recovery. If we are alive when such a thing is happening we shall hardly notice it until too late; and it is most unlikely that we shall know its causes.

Literary Criticism

Periods' are largely an invention of the historians. The poe

Periods' are largely an invention of the historians. The poetsthemselves are not conscious of living in any period and refuse to conform to the scheme.

Literary Criticism

In theory it was, around now, Literature. Susan hated Litera

In theory it was, around now, Literature. Susan hated Literature. She'd much prefer to read a good book.

Terry Pratchett

Humor Funny Literary Criticism

Literature should not disappear up its own asshole, so to sp

Literature should not disappear up its own asshole, so to speak.

Writing Literary Criticism

The human animal cannot be trusted for anything good except

The human animal cannot be trusted for anything good except en masse. The combined thought and action of the whole people of any race, creed or nationality, will always point in the right direction.

Future

Offered a job as book critic for magazine as a young man, Be

Offered a job as book critic for magazine as a young man, Bellow had been interviewed by Chambers and asked to give his opinion about William Wordsworth. Replying perhaps too quickly that Wordsworth had been a Romantic poet, he had been brusquely informed by Chambers that there was no place for him at the magazine. Bellow had often wondered, he told us, what he ought to have said. I suggested that he might have got the job if he'd replied that Wordsworth was a once-revolutionary poet who later became a conservative and was denounced by Browning and others as a turncoat. This seemed to Bellow to be probably right. More interesting was the related question: What if he'd that job?

Christopher Hitchens

Literary Criticism Robert Browning Romantic Poetry Saul Bellow Time Magazine Whittaker Chambers Wordsworth

The mimicry of passion is the most intolerable of all poses.

The mimicry of passion is the most intolerable of all poses.

Poetry Passion Literary Criticism Affectations Algernon Charles Swinburne Mimicry Poseurs Pretension

I have tried to write about politics in an allusive manner t

I have tried to write about politics in an allusive manner that draws upon other interests and to approach literature and criticism without ignoring the political dimension. Even if I have failed in this synthesis, I have found the attempt worth making.

Christopher Hitchens

Politics Literature Literary Criticism

Some think it the historian's business to penetrate beyond t

Some think it the historian's business to penetrate beyond this apparent confusion and heterogeneity, and to grasp in a single intuition the 'spirit' or 'meaning' of his period. With some hesitation, and with much respect for the great men who have thought otherwise, I submit that this is exactly what we must refrain from doing.

Literary Criticism

The enduring rapture with magic and fable has always struck

The enduring rapture with magic and fable has always struck me as latently childish and somehow sexless (and thus also related to childlessness).

Christopher Hitchens

Sex Magic Literature Sexuality Literary Criticism Childishness Childlessness Fable Fantasy Literature

It must be remembered that no art lives by nature, only by a

It must be remembered that no art lives by nature, only by acts of voluntary attention on the part of human individuals. When these are not made it ceases to exist.

Literary Criticism

I had not particularly liked the way in which he wrote about

I had not particularly liked the way in which he wrote about literature in , and I was always on my guard if not outright hostile when any tincture of 'deconstruction' or 'postmodernism' was applied to my beloved canon of English writing, but when Edward talked about English literature and quoted from it, he passed the test that I always privately apply: Do you truly this subject and could you bear to live for one moment if it was obliterated?

Christopher Hitchens

Literature Edward Said Literary Criticism Deconstructionism Postmodernism