“The only way to forestall the work of criticism is through censorship, which has the same relation to criticism that lynching has to justice.”

—  Northrop Frye

"Quotes", Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (1957), Polemical Introduction

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The only way to forestall the work of criticism is through censorship, which has the same relation to criticism that ly…" by Northrop Frye?
Northrop Frye photo
Northrop Frye 137
Canadian literary critic and literary theorist 1912–1991

Related quotes

Jacques Barzun photo

“Criticism will need an injection of humility — that is, a recognition of its role as ancillary to the arts, needed only occasionally in a temporary capacity. Since the critic exists only for introducing and explaining, he must be readily intelligible; he has no special vocabulary: criticism is in no way a science or a system.”

Jacques Barzun (1907–2012) Historian

"Culture High and Dry" (1984), p. 20
The Culture We Deserve (1989)

Abraham Lincoln photo

“He only has the right to criticize who has the heart to help.”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

Original quote from William Penn (1693): They have a Right to censure, that have a Heart to help: The rest is Cruelty, not Justice.
Misattributed

“A critic can only review the book he has read, not the one which the writer wrote.”

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist

The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Unclassified

“There is a certain justice in criticism. The critic is like a midwife — a tyrannical midwife.”

Stephen Spender (1909–1995) English poet and man of letters

Lecture at Brooklyn College, as quoted in The New York Times (20 November 1984)

“Critics of visual arts and of music describe in words — that is to say, a system of signs other than those made by brushes on canvas or chisels into stone or notes of music — those characteristics of painting or sculpture or music which can be described or analysed. Visual artists and composers can disregard critics on the ground that the medium of verbal criticism bears so indirect a relation to the medium in which they make something. Poets are in a different situation. With the development of so-called scientific methods of criticism they are made ever conscious that criticism of poetry is in the same medium of work as the art which they practise. “Close analysis” is useful to critics and readers. But for the poet there is the danger of disintegration of poetry into paraphrase, examination of technique, influences, all analysed in the language of criticism.”

Stephen Spender (1909–1995) English poet and man of letters

"Tradition-Bound Literature and Traditionless Painting"
The Struggle of the Modern (1963)

Jakaya Kikwete photo

“Justice has to be done, justice must be seen to be done, what the AU is simply saying is that what is critical, what is the priority, is peace. That is priority number one now.”

Jakaya Kikwete (1950) Tanzanian politician and president

His backing for Sudan's President Omar Bashir, 2008-09-09 http://ippmedia.com/ipp/guardian/2008/09/09/122209.html
2008

“It is time to apply to the mystique of revolution the same critical intelligence that has been applied to the mystique of war.”

Giovanni Baldelli (1914–1986) Anarchist theorist

Source: Social Anarchism (1971), p. 8

“The pursuit of critical consciousness, the pursuit of social justice through a critical enlightenment, can also be settler moves to innocence - diversions, distractions, which relieve the settler of feelings of guilt or responsibility, and conceal the need to give up land or power or privilege.”

Eve Tuck Indigenous studies scholar

Source: "Decolonization is Not a Metaphor", p. 21

Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel photo

“Poetry can be criticized only through poetry.”

Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel (1772–1829) German poet, critic and scholar

“Selected Aphorisms from the Lyceum (1797)”, Dialogue on Poetry and Literary Aphorisms, Ernst Behler and Roman Struc, trans. (Pennsylvania University Press:1968) #117
Context: Poetry can be criticized only through poetry. A critique which itself is not a work of art, either in content as representation of the necessary impression in the process of creation, or through its beautiful form and in its liberal tone in the spirit of the old Roman satire, has no right of citizenship in the realm of art.

Related topics