“To criticize is to appreciate, to appropriate, to take intellectual possession, to establish in fine a relation with the criticized thing and to make it one's own.”

— Henry James , book What Maisie Knew

What Maisie Knew.
Prefaces (1907-1909)

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Henry James 154

American novelist, short story author, and literary critic 1843–1916

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“I consider that willingness to criticize Russia and Stalin is the test of intellectual honesty.”

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Context: Of course, fanatical Communists and Russophiles generally can be respected, even if they are mistaken. But for people like ourselves, who suspect that something has gone very wrong with the Soviet Union, I consider that willingness to criticize Russia and Stalin is the test of intellectual honesty. It is the only thing that from a literary intellectual's point of view is really dangerous.

“The critical sense is so far from frequent that it is absolutely rare, and the possession of the cluster of qualities that minister to it is one of the highest distinctions… In this light one sees the critic as the real helper of the artist, a torchbearing outrider, the interpreter, the brother… Just in proportion as he is sentient and restless, just in proportion as he reacts and reciprocates and penetrates, is the critic a valuable instrument.”

Henry James (1843–1916) American novelist, short story author, and literary critic

Criticism.

“To criticize is to appreciate, to appropriate, to take intellectual possession, to establish in fine a relation with the criticized thing and to make it one's own.”

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Henry James 154

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