Notes on Criticism I
Critical Sins and Objective Subjectivity

Art serves no definable purpose, and has no distinguishable reason to exist. To sat it offers a comfortable alternative to life may perhaps be true, but this is merely coincidental; and this so-called “comfortable” escape from life does not account for the fact that the most lasting works of art are those which confront and open up the darker side of life. With this in mind, then, if it has no real purpose, no real goal, then it cannot succeed. And thus, of course, it cannot fail either.

Art never sets out purely to entertain. Therefore, it cannot bore. To discard a poem, composition or film as boring is to commit the critic’s most common sin—to allow personal aesthetic preferences to bias one’s own judgement. Boring is a subjective term, and indeed one whose merit (or lack thereof) is debatable. Indeed, does boring immediately rank a piece of work as bad? What if it was the author’s intention to create a particularly drab piece of work? Is it, then, an aesthetic paradox, both boring and, thus, an artistic success?

A film, for example, can only bore if the critic’s attention span does not lend itself to the narrative’s maintaining of momentum. But it is the post-structuralist critic’s duty to pretentiousness never to admit this; never to admit it was due to the shortcomings of his own attention span, and instead degrades the film as boring. This is not so much a problem as a nuisance, where a few lines would sufficiently elaborate upon his opinion as to why the film was boring and thus validate his argument. As it is, the critique is discardable. In essence, boring is itself a boring word, and thus the critic using it runs the risk of being valued as little as the film he’s reviewing. To quote T.S. Eliot, “criticism is as inevitable as breathing”. Whether consciously or not, we play critics at just about everything. Thus, it is normal for us to rate and value on a subjective scale the critics themselves.

Somebody without interest in the complexities of criticism and the existential ponderings that come with it (indeed, those who find such essays boring!) may claim that art falls into two categories for them: that which they like, and that which they don’t like. They are not wrong in this philosophy. It is, at least, personal and honest. But then, to go by liking and disliking is to consume art in inconsistent measures, open to much outside influence which would inform the viewer’s outcome. A film viewing experience, for example, can be easily destroyed if, say, the print is shabby or the sound is muffled or friends ruin it by talking throughout. The critic’s reaction would understandably be a negative one; but is this a reaction to the film, or the circumstances in which it was consumed? The more honest critic will admit it is the latter, while the one with the lesser understanding of criticism would claim their opinion was of the film. Either way, the reviews are invalid, for both referred to something other than the actual film, or piece of art, or whatever.

Which brings us nicely to the point of passion. In The Collector, John Fowles fictionally quotes, “If you are an artist, then you must put your whole being into your art. Anything less than that, then you are not an artist.” To paraphrase and flip the coin, the same also applies to that same artist’s audience. The art to which a critic responds is entirely open to subjective interpretation; it is not a scientific formula or mathematical equation. Because of this, the critic’s response is never wrong. The more passionate a critic is, the more impersonal his critique of an artwork will be. He discusses in terms of what it offered him, or unconsciously, what he brought to the piece. He never discusses it in terms of vague, subjective adjectives like, as said, boring. Nor will he make the positive claim of a piece being hilarious, for humour is, after all, as diverse and specific as attention spans.

Thanks for reading,
Mick