Do critics make mistakes?

Posted at: Sunday, July 6, 2008, 8:41 pm

Ken Turan has a typically striking take. “Asking critics about what they got wrong, or for that matter what they got right, is to fundamentally misunderstand what it is we do and how we do it,” he says:

What criticism offers, ideally, is informed, thoughtful, well-written opinion, an expression of personal taste based on knowledge, experience and insight that helps readers both decide what to see and understand what they have seen. And the closest I’ve come to making a mistake has been when I haven’t trusted my own instincts about a film.


2 Comments so far

  1. Scraps July 7th, 2008 3:46 am

    When his music criticism was reprinted, Shaw appended a note in 1936 to a column that originally appeared on 12 December 1888. Shaw begins by saying, “The above hasty (not to say silly) description of Brahms’s music will, I hope, be a warning to critics who know too much.” He ends with the simple “I apologize.”

    –Victor Amend, quoted in Veronica Geng

    I’m also fond of the critic John Clute, who reprinted his criticism with occasional elaborations, emendations, and corrections of himself in brackets, of which my favorite is “[a really stupid judgment]”.

  2. hitsville July 9th, 2008 9:32 am

    Yeah, I don’t know if I agree with Kenny 100 percent on this. He’s coming from a particularly rarefied position; there are a few things over the years I was just plain wrong about. I guess his point is that it was right at the time.

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